JVC CR-600U
A ¾-inch U-matic deck with SMPTE time code and a diagnostic warning system - the edit-room workhorse that outlived the format wars.
Overview
The CR-600U is a ¾-inch U-matic videocassette recorder. It arrived while the format was still very much alive in professional and industrial hands. In a working edit suite, a deck that talks to the CR-850U earns its rack space.
The same Studio Sound test report (September 1973, p.72) is candid about the sample it examined. Owners shopping today should read that line twice. These decks were worked hard, and a low-hours example is the exception, not the rule.
The feature set, as documented in that same report, was substantial for the period. It had pause control that stops the tape without unlacing, and a short rewind that also avoids unlacing so a minute or so of programme can be repeated. It used a microswitch pushbutton control system with all-solenoid operation, and had a remote control input on the rear of the recorder. Insert and assemble editing were covered, along with a simple tape counter "memory" with automatic search and a repeat facility for continuous replay of the cassette.
The mechanical loading cycle was judged as quick as the Sony's, though there was an 11-second delay before the picture appeared. Playback from NTSC tapes was rated very good, and the controls were described as light and pleasant to use. The counter-memory search let a user zero the counter at a chosen point, after which the machine would stop from a fast wind at exactly that spot.
Editing performance is where the CR-600U shows its era. It is not a frame-accurate editor, but it is a capable, forgiving one for its class.
By the early 1990s the CR-600U had settled into a different life. Mix (September 1990, p.159) lists a JVC CR-600U ¾-inch deck among the video equipment in a studio inventory. The fact sheet carries no original list price, so treat that secondary-market number as the only price data point available.
The CR-600U is not a collector's trophy the way a turntable or a reel-to-reel might be. It is a working machine, and the market for it has always been functional rather than sentimental. Buyers should expect to find them tired, and the diagnostic warning system that JVC built in is less a luxury than a necessity when evaluating one.
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