Panasonic VHS-C Video Cassette Adapter: A Must-Have Item For Home Movie Junkies!

I will be the first to admit that I am not the most with it person when it comes to electronics. While everyone else seems to have the latest and greatest in video recorders I am still using my older but still functioning perfectly VHS C cam. The only real drawback to this is that you need to play the mini cassettes back through the video camera unless you purchase an adapter that the cassette slips into. I did get one of these adapters when I purchased the video camera but it died a few years later, that’s when I picked up the Panasonic adapter and started using it to view, edit and copy tapes. It is easy to use, allows you to view tapes without having to drain the camera battery life and makes it easy for relatives to view tapes if you are too lazy to transfer them to a VHS video cassette. If you have a VHS C video cassette recorder and are looking for a replacement adapter, the Panasonic version is one that I highly recommend.

Panasonic VHS C Video Cassette Adapter

Most VHS C video recorders are sold with an adapter that allows you to play the tapes without having to put excess wear on the hand held cam. Depending on how much use it sees, it could last five years or die within a few. Most of the time a battery melt down is what ruins one of these; if you don’t plan on using the adapter for a while, make sure you take the battery out to avoid having it leak. Sometimes people want to have one of these handy to view tapes on the fly to make sure that everything is working properly with the cam, other times relatives want to have one to make copies of birthday parties or holidays. How many times have you said, “Oh, I’ll make a copy and send it to you” and you never get around to it. If they have a double deck VCR [or the cables to connect two decks] they can use this adapter to make copies before you leave. It is unbelievably easy to use and there is honestly no way to screw things up by putting the tape in the wrong way. If you can use a regular VHS tape then you can use this just as easily.

Directions

First you will want to see if your unit comes with an AA sized battery; this is needed to load the tape into the adapter and cue it up for playback. The battery loads in the side of the cassette and the protective cover slides over it. There is no lock on this so make sure that smaller children can not get to this or they may start to play around with it until they get it open. When you pop in one of the VHS C cassettes into the adapter you should hear the tape loading into place as well as the small red tab on the side start to move into the adapter. Once it has stopped making noise and the red tab is completely inside the adapter you are ready to load this into a VCR. From there you treat this as you would any other VHS tape, you can rewind, fast forward, stop, pause and play with the tape but you will want to make sure that you have the VHS C tape positioned to the “no tape” feature so that you do not accidentally tape over the contents of the tape. There is a large cut out section on the front of the adapter that prevents accidental recording but you never know when someone is going to put a piece of tape over this hole and screw things up.

This is just a suggestion but something that I learned the hard way. When you are done viewing the tape remove it from the adapter. If you allow it to stay inside the adapter it could cause some distortion since the tape is pulled out of the cassette and in ‘play mode’. I left one of these in the adapter for a few months and when I went to play it back to see what was on the unlabeled tape, there were spots where it was impossible to see what had been recorded. You will also want to check the battery from time to time, if it dies while it is in the adapter you won’t be able to get the video cassette out until you put in a fresh battery. There is no battery power indicator on the adapter so when it starts to take a long time to load or unload the video cassette that is usually a good sign that you need to replace the battery. You will want to keep this in a dust free environment if you choose to leave a video cassette inside the adapter, the lid is raised on the VHS C tape and could cause some real problems if left on top of the VCR or out in the open.

Price

There aren’t a whole lot of companies that make these so these may be hard to find in retail stores. I had the choice between the JCV C-P7U and the Panasonic PV1 and went with this one; the clerk at the store said that there had been some complaints about the JVC one but everyone that had purchased the Panasonic one had nothing but great things to say about it. I had a gift card for Best Buy so I ended up paying $6.99 cash for it, [it was $16.99 total but I only had to pay $6.99 out of pocket]. The JVC one was a few dollars cheaper but I wasn’t going to risk having a tape get damaged or destroyed to save a couple of dollars.

Warranty

This comes with a one year warranty against manufacturer defects. This only applies to the adapter and Panasonic will not assume any liability for damage to VHS C video cassettes or VCR decks due to misuse, commercial use or anything else that they say voids the warranty. Chances are that is there is a defect you will notice it right away, in that case you can return it to the store where you purchased it [for exchange or refund] so you can avoid having to send it to them for repair or replacement. There aren’t a lot of things that can go wrong with this adapter outside of trying to force it into the VCR deck without the red tab being fully retracted into the housing so this has a low “oops level”.

The Bottom Line

This is an essential item for anyone that owns a VHS C video cassette recorder. If you like to watch your home movies without having to drag out the video camera and fighting with cables then this is a great pick. This is also a necessity for those who like to make copies to a VHS tape to send to relatives; you can keep the original and send them a copy that they can watch without having to get them an adapter of their own. For the price this was more than worth it; I can view my tapes without worrying that they are going to get destroyed and when I want to make a copy of something all I have to do is pop this in the first deck and a blank tape in the second and hit the ‘quick copy’ button. So far I haven’t had any problems with this playing back my home movies of the brood, wrestling matches and other things. If you are looking for a replacement adapter I highly suggest the Panasonic PV1, it comes with the one year warranty and will give you crystal clear playback of your VHS C tapes without all the hassle and wear and tear of your video camera battery.


As always, thanks for the read!

~^V^~ Freak ~^V^~

© 2005 Freak369


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