Who here owns a Laserdisc player? I've got a Pioneer CLD-D515 I bought in 1997. Have a whole string of Star Trek movies on PAL disc, but the NTSC discs always look nicer. I just think a thick 12" optical ANALOG video disc is the ultimate in retro cool.
I bought the Pioneer LD-700 when it first came out, also have a 909, and have 40-50 discs...always was a great format!!!
I have a player that uses a laser to read a disc. OK, so it's a run-of-the-mill DVD player, but that counts, right?
I'm at a convention so don't have the model number, but in the mid 1990's it was a very expensive Pioneer laserdisc player. It even automatically rotated the head to play Side B without you having to eject and flip the disc over It also had memory, so you could pause CLV discs, not just the pricey CAV discs It still works. I keep it in the box, have a small collection of Criterion Collection titles
Mine also reads the other side without having to flip over. Apparently Laserdisc players make excellent CD players (those that are compatible) because the player clamps the disc very firmly reducing jitter and read errors. I say "apparently" cause audiophiles will sometimes believe anything. While my Laserdisc player has a lovely CD sound, it's no better than my standard Yamaha CD player. Or at least I can't tell the difference. My favorite are the CAV discs cause they're so pretty when held under the light. You can see the vertical blanking interval and the sync pulses. I once took a Laserdisc to work to show my students. These were 19, 20 year olds and they were amazed at the size of the thing. They thought optical discs was a new thing....Incidentally Sony toyed with the idea of making an audio only 12" Laserdisc encoded with digital PCM audio in the late 70's. The idea spilled over to eventually become the CD in collaboration with Philips. Below is the CD player prototype (1979). Notice how the "CD" looks like a tiny Laserdisc, complete with label in the middle. The first time I ever saw a Laserdisc must have been in 1991 or so. A friend of mines' dad was a software developer. His company had been tasked with developing an interactive tour of the apartments offered by a developer. The images were stored on a Laserdisc, played via a computer controlled player. Clients could then "walk" through the apartment by touching a screen. The player would then instantly jump to the next image and hold it there. My friend and I got to play with the prototype. I think his dad encouraged us. Of course we had to tell him if something didn't work....WAAAY cool at the time.
Since the audio is encoded digitally, the reading part of CD playing is irrelevant. The upstream electronics either get the data or they don't. Now the DAC and other components do come into play, and I would suspect they are higher quality on a laserdisc player vs. a CD player of a similar time period. Not sure how the LD player would compare to a CD/DVD player today, though.
DVD player today would blow a Laserdisc out of the water for image and sound quality, but remember that in an era of VHS, Laserdisc was the ultimate in picture and sound. My Laserdisc player sounds just fine as a CD player. I sometimes just play a CD or two to give the mechanicals a bit of a workout. I also like to buy Laserdiscs on ebay because: - People who bought Laserdiscs generally took good care of them - The discs don't wear out - Some things were never re-released on DVD - The NTSC Laserdiscs with THX mastering look stunning!
The local St Vincent DePual resale store has hundreds of Laserdiscs for sale. They used to have a few players as well, but those have since sold. I sure wish someone would come and buy the discs because it seems like they have been sitting in their inventory for a long time.
I remember my cousins having some type of movie disc player during the mid 80's. The discs were in solid sleeves, about the size of a vinyl record, like a 3.25 inch floppy disc has.
Those were most likely this wasn't optical but rather a needle and groove system. Also way retro cool. THIS IS NOT MY VIDEO...but it explains this needle in groove videodisc very well.
I have a Pioneer LD-700. Great machine that also plays CDs (sound). I gave away most of our Laserdiscs and have replaced them with DVDs. Laserdiscs have great quality for image and sound.
I have an ancient Pioneer CLD V2600 industrial strength laserdisc player that I bought used on ebay. It is actually my third player - the disc loading mechanisms on the others all failed - this one is showing signs as well - must be a lot of strength moving the relatively heavy discs. Have about 50 discs - which I admit I rarely watch.
Yeah, I don't watch my collection all that often either. There's two movies I do like to watch at least once a year: - Noises Off - The Birdcage Very funny! Movies I wouldn't mind to find on Laserdisc - Xanadu - Tron
In the '80's there was stores that would rent laserdisc And we use to go the library and borrow mystery game game disks
