Which soap was the first you taped in your VHS video recorder??

[EricMontreal22]

I used to be so obsessed with quality, that I was loathe to use EP, but until I discovered longer video tapes, I had to if I wanted to get Loving/AMC and OLTL. And on special episodes (the Xmas one, etc) I would skip school so I could be home and record and pause during the commercials as I wouldn't tape over those episodes. Recently (well a year ago when I still used my VCR--I so have to get my two boxes of 90s episodes digitized--like the last four months of The City I have), I was going through a very old tape I found, and when the movie or whatever was over I found 20 minutes of AMC in Budapest! Thrilling.

[Soapsuds]

Hehehehe....I was the same way about tapes and using EP mode. I wish they had DVRs back then. Now I have no problem with picture quality since I have DVR. Its sad though that I use it for Days and not for my beloved ATWT...although I did DVR Y&R the other day.

[SFK]

Are there fans out there who recorded daily on dvds? I wonder. Seems like dvr technology quickly surpassed that approach.

[Soapsuds]

I was one that recorded on DVDs but again you had to record on HQ to get the best quality unfortunately it was hard to use that feature since I recorded most of the CBS lineup so I either used SP or EP..blah...but there was worse in DVD recorder...I forget what it was though....EP gave u four hours of recording.....

[Dr Neil Curtis]

I record on dvd and use slp

[EricMontreal22]

Much to my horror. There used to be a woman on here who I got along with like a house on fire, and she recorded everything on DVDs. My (way too) watched copies of the I Love Lucci marathon SoapNet aired are thanks to her copies she sent to me. She then switched to DVR and had no idea how to copy the shows onto DVDs--and I had no clue either. (She's kinda dsappeared--but I hope she still reads this forum, I know she was a big GH fan).

[DramatistDreamer]

I think I used to fiddle with the tracking button for the picture quality. Very early on, I learned about VHS speeds and every VCR seemed to have their own specifications in the 80s. What worked on a Samsung would probably not work on a Sony (for some strange reason, we went through a number of VCRs in the 80s, mostly exchanges or new purchases--and we were so careful with them . I can't remember what speed I used to use (SLP? was that one?) but I think the tracking button was very important for me back then.

[doolfan]

I have to say DVR has spoiled me. With VCR you had some fuzzy spots and things but with DVR you get perfect HD picture quality. I never have to miss an episode of a soap. I record GH everyday and watch when I get home. I wish they would release the figures of DVR viewing for the soaps like they do primetime. I read a article where a local news station did a story on Y&R and it was stated that although there has been talk over the years about a Y&R primetime special that they wouldn't need one because Y&R has almost primetime numbers with 30-40% of Y&R's audience watching it from the DVR. That would put Y&R above 6 million viewers. I want to see those figures.

[Dana]

I recorded on VCR for quite a number of years, but then started using a DVD recorder with a hard drive a few years back to record my soaps (all ABC). When using the VCR, I saved the scenes I wanted to save using 2 VCRs hooked together. When I started using the DVD recorder, I also saved scenes to a DVD; fortunately, I could use the hard drive as a way station to copy those scenes to the DVD. I was also able to hook up the VCR to the DVD recorder to copy my VHS tapes to DVD. I failed to get my last two tapes copied because my last 2 VCRs gave up the ghost (at the same time!) and I didn't want to get any more VCRs.

I stopped using my DVD recorder because my cable system went all digital and the recorder wasn't capable of doing that. Fortunately, that didn't happen until after AMC, my favorite soap and the one I mostly saved stuff from, went off the air. Now, I occasionally record GH on my Tivo and don't save anything.

And DVR technology is probably a main reason Soapnet died (that and mismanagement by you know who).