How many times to use a tape?

Re: How many times to use a tape?

Tape will deteriorate with age. Most tape manufacturers recommend that you fast-forward-and-rewind your tapes, every year or so, to keep them "rejuvenated" -- otherwise the tape may start sticking to itself.

Of course, nobody ever does this. I mean, in Driver's Ed we were taught you were always supposed to walk around the car and give it a general inspection before you got in to drive it -- has anyone ever done that? Doesn't mean it's not good advice, just that nobody does it.

I've got some tapes from 7 years ago, the dawn of DV, and they still play fine. But if you want to guarantee yourself a better shot of it continuing to work fine, occasionally fast-forward/rewind 'em, and if it's important stuff, consider making a dub onto a fresh tape every few years or so.
 
Re: How many times to use a tape?

Folks, I just recorded over my Panasonic 63MQ tape for the 2nd time and noticed some bad dropouts! So, yes, it does happen on the 2nd run....
 
Re: How many times to use a tape?

Looking at the various posts here, it appears that the experiences in this connection remain quite subjective. 8)
 
Re: How many times to use a tape?

Interesting reading.

I personally think Fuji mini dv tapes do very very well with almost any camcorder. It only seems a marketing technique by major companies to sell their own products or product accessories alongside the main hardware.

PQ/MQ may be good...but Fuji are not bad at all
 
Re: How many times to use a tape?

Fuji tapes have scored the highest in the ISO9000? tests put on by the minidv tape comitee for the the last 5 years, but Im not sure if the MQ's where tested in the results I saw. MQ's technically are a superior tape. There is a camera store here in town that only sells Fuji tapes, but it could be that they just get a good deal on them.

The only thing that Fuji has over the Mq's if you use them, is that you can get them almost everywhere. This may seem moot, but if you run out of stock in the middle of a shoot you could get into a "sticky" situation.
 
Re: How many times to use a tape?

...I mean with the availability aspect.
 
Re: How many times to use a tape?

Fuji tapes are Dry.. Jesus things change everyday. I just talked to someone from Fuji Film USA, and this was thier reply " Fujifilm Mini DVC tapes use the dry lube technology" . So who knows how accurate that is, but its from the horses mouth so hopefully its good info.
 
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