Betamax and Betacam
Betamax to digital, from a lab that kept its Beta decks.
Most Betamax tapes end up with us for one reason: nobody else has a way to play them any more. We keep working, maintained Beta decks. We also handle Betacam and Betacam SP, the broadcast format that only looks similar, and price it separately.
Betamax or VHS?
Betamax cassettes are a bit smaller and squarer than VHS and usually say Beta or Betamax on the shell. If you are not sure, send them and we identify each tape for you. They were sold from the late 1970s through the 1980s, which makes many of them forty years old.
Forty-year-old Beta tapes can usually still be saved. Some heavily degraded tapes have limits, and we pursue the best result each one can give rather than promising a recovery in advance. The sooner a tape is digitised, the more survives.
Betamax is not Betacam
Betamax
A consumer home-video format. Priced per two-hour tape like VHS, Hi8 and MiniDV, at $19.95 at the current special or $28.50 regular, as of September 2026.
Betacam and Betacam SP
A professional broadcast format that plays on entirely different equipment. One flat professional price: $40 per tape, or $35 per tape on orders over 25. Each tape yields roughly 6 GB, which we factor into the drive.
Digital Betacam, Betacam SX
Betacam and Betacam SP are our standard broadcast formats. For the digital variants, call to confirm handling before you ship.
Betacam SP was the 1986 “Superior Performance” upgrade: higher resolution and longer metal-particle tapes. It became the broadcast standard of the 1990s, and a lot of station and production archives are still sitting on it.
What it costs
Betamax is a consumer format and follows the per-tape rate. Betacam has its own flat price, and a broadcast archive over 25 tapes gets the lower rate on every tape. The $50 minimum order applies to both.
Per two-hour tape, any consumer format
$19.95 at the current special
$28.50 at the regular rate. VHS, VHS-C, Video8, Hi8, Digital8, MiniDV, Betamax: same price. A $50.00 minimum order applies. Blank footage and recorded television are edited out and never billed. Published rates as of September 2026; specials move, so ask for a current quote.
Sticky, squealing or mouldy?
Stop playing it at home. Sticky-shed and mould get worse with every pass through the wrong deck. Caught early, most affected tapes still transfer, so send them in sooner rather than later and tell us what you noticed.
Mixed archives
Beta tapes can be combined with VHS, film, photos and audio from the same collection under one chain of custody and delivered as one organised archive on one drive.
Nobody else will play them. We will.
Send a photo of one cassette and a rough count. We will tell you whether it is Betamax or Betacam and what it would involve.