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Nintembo
1st June 2005, 16:05
Hi,

Can anybody reccomend a good place to buy HD tapes? I am looking to obtain some sort of a bulk deal.

Nin
bcrabtree
3rd June 2005, 15:20
I know you said HD but do you mean that or HDV?

Bob C
Nintembo
3rd June 2005, 16:31
To be honest Bob, I didn't think there was a difference?

Apparantly I was wrong??
Alan Roberts
3rd June 2005, 16:46
HD tapes come in all sorts of formats, e.g.:

HDCAM
DVCProHD
HDCAM-SR
HD-D5

and there are several old formats as well. But HDV records on ordinary-sized mini-DV tapes. You can use any mini-DV tape, but you might suffer long dropouts unless you use the Sony special HDV versions that are more expensive, better polished, and much less likely to show dropouts.

Tell us what HD you're trying to record, and we can be a bit more helpful, although APRVideo is always a good place to start looking.
cstv
5th June 2005, 10:42
Be very careful with Sony's HDV Digital Master tapes! There have been reports of sony reverting to their old lubricating methods (i don't recall the exact science) that they used to use on their DV tapes and caused head cloggin problems when people mixed tape brands. So long as you stick with just HDV Master tapes in the mechanism, or just standard DV or DVCAM tapes then there shouldn't be a problem, it's mixing tapes that can be dangerous.

I should point out that i've had no direct experience but John Ferrick's Collumn (http://www.hexus.net/content/reviews/dv_review.php?dXJsX3Jldmlld19JRD0xMDgx) covered this potential problem and it's also mentioned here (http://www.sonyhdvinfo.com/showthread.php?t=1744)

just something to be aware of. If you're going to switch tapes, it's probably best to run a head cleaner first.

It's also worth noting that HDV Master tapes are really quite expensive and i'd probably just use DVCam, or get a Firestore...

Anyway, back to the question... where to buy HD tapes. I assume you're talking about HDV. I was going to suggest 7dayshop (http://www.7dayshop.com), but they don't sell them. i was going to suggest Pricebuster (http://www.pricebuster.org.uk) but they don't sell them either! Although they do now have a postage-free site for smaller orders (http://www.postfree.biz/home.asp) :D

ARP (http://www.aprmedia.com/product.php?pid=2101&r=froogle) do sell the Sony HDV Digital Master tapes, for £9.99 +VAT

hth
mark.