D-9 or Digital-S as it was originally known, is a professional

digital video Digital video is an electronic representation of moving visual images (video) in the form of encoded digital data Digital data, in information theory and information systems, is information represented as a string of discrete symbols eac ...

videocassette Videotape is magnetic tape used for storing video and usually sound in addition. Information stored can be in the form of either an analog or digital signal. Videotape is used in both video tape recorders (VTRs) and, more commonly, videocasset ...

format created by

JVC JVC (short for Japan Victor Company) is a Japanese brand owned by JVCKenwood corporation. Founded in 1927 as the Victor Talking Machine Company of Japan and later as , the company is best known for introducing Japan's first televisions and for ...

in 1995. It is a direct competitor to

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

's Digital Betacam. Its name was changed to D-9 in 1999 by the

SMPTE The Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) (, rarely ), founded in 1916 as the Society of Motion Picture Engineers or SMPE, is a global professional association of engineers, technologists, and executives working in the m ...

. It was used to a small extent in Europe and Asia and saw some use in the US, notably by the

Fox News Channel The Fox News Channel, abbreviated FNC, commonly known as Fox News, and stylized in all caps, is an American multinational conservative cable news television channel based in New York City. It is owned by Fox News Media, which itself is ...

, but was a commercial failure compared with Digital Betacam. It was superseded by high definition tapeless formats.

Technical details

D-9 uses a tape shell of the VHS form factor—though physically incompatible—but the tape itself uses a much higher quality metal particle formulation. The recording system is digital and for video uses DV compression at a 50 Mbit/s bitrate. Video is recorded in 4:2:2

component Circuit Component may refer to: •Are devices that perform functions when they are connected in a circuit. In engineering, science, and technology Generic systems * System components, an entity with discrete structure, such as an assem ...

format at a variety of

standard-definition Standard-definition television (SDTV, SD, often shortened to standard definition) is a television system which uses a resolution that is not considered to be either high or enhanced definition. "Standard" refers to it being the prevailing sp ...

resolutions, in either 4:3 or 16:9 aspect ratios. Audio is recorded as 16-bit/48 kHz PCM with up to four separate channels. Video quality is generally very high; at standard definition, D-9's quality is comparable with Digital Betacam. The BR-D51U model is additionally capable of analogue S-VHS playback.

HD recording

For

high definition video High-definition video (HD video) is video of higher resolution and quality than standard-definition. While there is no standardized meaning for ''high-definition'', generally any video image with considerably more than 480 vertical scan lines ( ...

recording, JVC developed an extension to D-9 called D-9 HD, using twice the number of recording heads to record a 100 Mbit/s video bitstream at resolutions of 720p60, 1080i60 and 1080p24. This variant can also record 8 channels of

PCM Pulse-code modulation (PCM) is a method used to digitally represent sampled analog signals. It is the standard form of digital audio in computers, compact discs, digital telephony and other digital audio applications. In a PCM stream, the am ...

audio at 16 bits and 48 kHz. The higher data rate and increased tape speed mean that the recording time of any given cassette would be halved. D-9 HD, based on specifications, would have been higher quality than Sony

HDCAM HDCAM is a high-definition video digital recording videocassette version of Digital Betacam introduced in 1997 that uses an 8-bit discrete cosine transform (DCT) compressed 3:1:1 recording, in 1080i-compatible down-sampled resolution of 14 ...

but lower than Sony

HDCAM SR HDCAM is a high-definition video digital recording videocassette version of Digital Betacam introduced in 1997 that uses an 8-bit discrete cosine transform (DCT) compressed 3:1:1 recording, in 1080i-compatible down-sampled resolution of 14 ...

; no objective tests were made comparing these formats. It is not clear whether this proposed format was ever manufactured or sold.

Additional information

Although D-9 uses the same video codec (DV) as

MiniDV DV refers to a family of codecs and tape formats used for storing digital video, launched in 1995 by a consortium of video camera manufacturers led by Sony and Panasonic. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, DV was strongly associated with the t ...

, the video bitrate of D-9 is significantly higher than that of the "

prosumer A prosumer is an individual who both consumes and produces. The term is a portmanteau of the words '' producer'' and ''consumer''. Research has identified six types of prosumers: DIY prosumers, self-service prosumers, customizing prosumers, coll ...

" format.

DVCPRO DV refers to a family of codecs and tape formats used for storing digital video, launched in 1995 by a consortium of video camera manufacturers led by Sony and Panasonic. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, DV was strongly associated with the t ...

achieves bitrate parity with D-9 and D-9 HD, but has a slower tape speed, making it less reliable. Some of the D-9

television studio A television studio, also called a television production studio, is an installation room in which video productions take place, either for the production of live television and its recording onto video tape or other media such as SSDs, or for ...

gear is capable of recording with

Sel-Sync Sel-Sync or Selective Synchronous recording is the process of selectively using audio tape record heads as play back heads so that new signals can be recorded on other tracks in perfect sync with the existing tracks. Sel-sync recording dramaticall ...

or pre-read and is provided with four-channel audio like Digital Betacam. Serial digital interfaces (SDI) are also provided. A dockable recorder, the JVC BR-D40, attached to a variety of cameras, and there was a one-piece camcorder, the JVC DY-70U.

References

External links

JVC's Japanese D-9 product page

Technical details

HD recording

Additional information

References

External links

See also