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From: sho@maxwell.physics.purdue.edu (Sho Kuwamoto)
Newsgroups: rec.audio.high-end
Subject: Re: DAT for $800 ?
Message-ID: <6042@uwm.edu>
Date: 31 Aug 90 12:56:50 GMT
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Approved: tjk@csd4.csd.uwm.edu


In article <5988@uwm.edu> bilver!bill@uunet.UU.NET (Bill Vermillion) writes:
>VCRs [started at $1500]

>Given that the VCR prices didn't really start falling until shipments in
>excess of 1,000,000 per month became common about 3 years ago, and given
>that the average person can't seem to tell the difference between a 6 hour
>VHS tape and a 2 hour tape, it would indicate that the average person would
>not need an audio system of DAT quality.  I don't suspect you will see
>DAT's ever selling more than 10,000 units per month anytime in the next 5
>years, if ever.   

> [and that's why prices won't drop like a rock]

This argument seems to ignore completely the fascination the American
public has with the word "digital."  In fact, this argument could
easily have been applied to CD players.  At the time, we could have
said, "how many people need digital optical storage when a simple
phonograph record will do?"  

Now that the nation is so CD conscious, I think that DAT will sell
even if the quality were not noticeably better than "normal" tape
decks of comparable price.

You drew an analogy between DAT and S-VHS.  I think a more appropriate
analogy would have been between Dolby-S and S-VHS.  DAT prices will
definitely fall below $300 in a couple of years.  I was just in Japan
this summer, where the Sony model they are pushing here for $999 could
be bought for less than $600.

-Sho
-- 
sho@physics.purdue.edu