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The Terminator (1984) - Original Theatrical Mono Preservation (Released) — Page 10

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crissrudd4554 said:
I didn’t actually capture it myself. A friend who used to copy tapes for my dad and I did it for me. Anyways the disc is actually at my other place so I’ll have to pop over there sometime this week to grab it.

Okay, thanks.

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 (Edited)

According to lddb.com, the Thorn EMI LaserDisc (the one that has the “Chace mix”) only has an analog audio track:

https://www.lddb.com/laserdisc/30336/2535/Terminator-The

That explains why, in the project discussed in this thread, it was an analog capture instead of a digital rip.

That means that the best available source of the Chace mix is VHS Hi-Fi or Betamax Hi-Fi, both of which are superior to LD analog audio, or at least they are on paper. As for the Thorn EMI Betamax release, I’ve looked at a picture of its sleeve, but it doesn’t seem to say “Hi-Fi” on it anywhere. Its sleeve is practically identical to the VHS sleeve, except, in the spot where the VHS sleeve says “Hi-Fi”, it has the catalog number instead:

sleeve

So if the Betamax release isn’t Hi-Fi, that leaves VHS Hi-Fi as the [theoretically] best quality source. And even if the Betamax release is Hi-Fi despite not being labeled as such, it would only be ~equal to VHS Hi-Fi, with any significant differences there may be coming down to the other variables involved.

Thorn EMI also released The Terminator on CED VideoDisc, which presumably has the Chace mix as well…

https://www.lddb.com/ced/01755/TE16340/Terminator-The

… but I don’t know anything about the sound quality of CED.

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CED audio is comparable to analog LD in some ways, but the nature of the format means discs can wear down over time and develop playback issues. Later stereo players added CX noise reduction.
Here are the specs from cedmagic.com
Audio Signal-to-Noise Ratio: >50dB (USASI), 70 dB (with CX)
Audio Bandwidth: 15KHz
Stereo Separation at 1KHz: 26dB
Dynamic Range Mono: 50dB
Dynamic Range Stereo: 70dB

I’m not sure why some Thorn/EMI Beta titles don’t have Hi-Fi indicated on the cover. Any title released around or after 1983 should have it though.
Here’s a Thorn/EMI beta of Volunteers from 1985, and you can make out the Hi-Fi on the back.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Volunteers-BETA-Tom-Hanks-John-Candy-Rita-Wilson-1985-Thorn-EMI/392118623440

On the flip side of the same coin, I’ve seen the Hi-Fi logo used on Laserdisc covers. 😉

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SilverWook said:

CED audio is comparable to analog LD in some ways, but the nature of the format means discs can wear down over time and develop playback issues. Later stereo players added CX noise reduction.
Here are the specs from cedmagic.com
Audio Signal-to-Noise Ratio: >50dB (USASI), 70 dB (with CX)
Audio Bandwidth: 15KHz
Stereo Separation at 1KHz: 26dB
Dynamic Range Mono: 50dB
Dynamic Range Stereo: 70dB

Thanks for the information. Those specifications look pretty good, at least with CX noise reduction.

I’m not sure why some Thorn/EMI Beta titles don’t have Hi-Fi indicated on the cover. Any title released around or after 1983 should have it though.
Here’s a Thorn/EMI beta of Volunteers from 1985, and you can make out the Hi-Fi on the back.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Volunteers-BETA-Tom-Hanks-John-Candy-Rita-Wilson-1985-Thorn-EMI/392118623440

On the flip side of the same coin, I’ve seen the Hi-Fi logo used on Laserdisc covers. 😉

I got the VCR I ordered today, and it works fine (though the heads were quite dirty). However, this Terminator Thorn EMI VHS tape doesn’t have Hi-Fi audio, despite “Hi-Fi” being printed on its sleeve. When I set the selector switch to Hi-Fi I get dead silence. I tested a different tape that I have, which also has “Hi-Fi” printed on its sleeve, and the Hi-Fi track works fine on it, and has noticeably better sound quality than the linear mono track.

So, either Thorn EMI lied about this being Hi-Fi, or this is a bootleg tape that someone dubbed and swapped the sticker labels. The labels don’t show any signs of tampering, but that’s not conclusive proof that they weren’t swapped. With help from a hair dryer, you can sometimes get stickers off cleanly. I did notice that the record tab has very obviously been broken off. Normally, with pre-recorded retail VHS tapes, they never had that tab to begin with.

Edit: I just checked every retail VHS tape I own, and most of them never had a record-protect tab to begin with. However, three of them did have one that was broken off: Batman (1989), A Night at the Roxbury (1998), and Total Recall (1990).

Does anyone here have the Thorn EMI VHS release? I’d like to know if other copies have Hi-Fi audio.

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Have you tried playing with the tracking to see if the Hi-Fi indicator lights up at all? I’ve had the odd tape where the sweet spot for the Hi-Fi not to drop out isn’t optimal for the video portion.

Believe it or not, screw-ups did happen in the dubbing facilities. It’s basically a room full of industrial VCR’s being fed the master tape. All it takes is a switch being in the off position. I’ve even bought a factory sealed movie only to find a totally different film was on the cassette.

Even stranger is an early Laserdisc I got in 1986 that didn’t have digital sound. (In spite of having the markings for it.) I didn’t discover this until I got a player with digital sound capability a few years later. I got another copy of the same movie which did have digital tracks. No evidence they are different pressings.

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SilverWook said:

Have you tried playing with the tracking to see if the Hi-Fi indicator lights up at all? I’ve had the odd tape where the sweet spot for the Hi-Fi not to drop out isn’t optimal for the video portion.

There’s no Hi-Fi indicator light on this VCR that I can see, but it has a switch that lets you manually select “Norm” (linear track), “Mix” (linear plays in one speaker, Hi-Fi in the other), and “Hi-Fi”. I’ve tried it with several retail tapes now, and all three of those switch positions work as expected, and the Hi-Fi sounds great in all of them except for one, Night at the Roxbury, in which the Hi-Fi track has major interference going on, like it’s not tracking properly. The linear audio works fine on it though. But in the case of the Terminator tape, it is just dead silence on the Hi-Fi switch setting, and silence in one speaker on the “mix” setting. I adjusted the tracking all the way from the left to the right and back again, and it made no difference.

Note that the version of this release which is labeled on the sleeve “HBO Video” doesn’t say “Hi-Fi” on it anywhere, which you can see here:

https://imgur.com/a/kksbArY (scroll down on that page to see all three pictures)

I assume that’s the exact same release as the Thorn EMI-labeled one, because HBO and Thorn EMI were in cahoots, and my Thorn EMI copy says HBO Video at the start of the video, and after the credits, it says “Thorn EMI / HBO Video”.

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That’s unusual, as the mix setting on my Panasonic industrial S-VHS decks blended them across both channels. Came in really handy for a couple projects, as I couldn’t really do any fancy audio mixing back in the 90’s.

It’s maddening how many video labels didn’t bother with proper labeling on the audio. Only a couple studios like Universal even bothered to mention the linear audio using Dolby noise reduction once Hi-Fi was standard.

I would be willing to take a shot at a beta transfer if you want to buy a copy and send me the tape.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/THE-TERMINATOR-Schwarzenegger-on-BETAMAX-Tape-BETA-NOT-VHS/163313673890
Due to work being done on my house, it will be a few weeks before I can hook my betamax back up though.

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SilverWook said:

That’s unusual, as the mix setting on my Panasonic industrial S-VHS decks blended them across both channels. Came in really handy for a couple projects, as I couldn’t really do any fancy audio mixing back in the 90’s.

That’s probably what mine does too. When I tried the mix setting on the other Hi-Fi tapes, it just sounded like a combination of linear and Hi-Fi. I assumed it was linear on one channel and Hi-Fi on the other, but it just as easily could have been a mix sent to both channels, which would make more sense anyway.

It’s maddening how many video labels didn’t bother with proper labeling on the audio. Only a couple studios like Universal even bothered to mention the linear audio using Dolby noise reduction once Hi-Fi was standard.

I would be willing to take a shot at a beta transfer if you want to buy a copy and send me the tape.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/THE-TERMINATOR-Schwarzenegger-on-BETAMAX-Tape-BETA-NOT-VHS/163313673890
Due to work being done on my house, it will be a few weeks before I can hook my betamax back up though.

Thanks, but before I spend any more money I want confirmation that it really is Hi-Fi. The Betamax sleeve doesn’t say Hi-Fi on it and neither does the HBO Video-labeled sleeve. The only one that says Hi-Fi is the Thorn EMI-labeled sleeve, and the copy I have doesn’t seem to have anything but a linear track.

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Can someone tell me where I can get this mono track? I’ve downloaded another one elsewhere but it seems to desyncronize from the the 5.1 track. Can I get some help?

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Officially you can get it on any Region 1 DVD or the remastered LD from the ‘90s.

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I host a Terminator audio repository with most released mono tracks from LDs, DVDs, VHS etc. in sync with the Blu-ray so anyone looking for a foreign dub, or one particular mono track, just send PM.

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I really want to obtain a copy of this 1984 classic that has the re-mastered blu-ray picture, but with the original theatrical mono soundtrack. Does any one have a copy of this? Or has any one here made one? I just cannot stand that 5.1 re-mastered soundtrack! I am looking for the original English version of course.

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hi guys id love this, could anyone pm me a link please? thnx in advance

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Watched the regrade with your mono soundtrack thnxman awesome

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Tyrese said:

Hey ZeroPC The Link Is Missing For The Terminator (1984) You Need To Recover

He hasn’t been active on here since August of last year.

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I’m sure some of you have stated this before but I’ll go ahead and say it anyway

I highly doubt Cameron is the reason why the current BD editions exclude the mono track, from what it seems he really only cares about visuals and doesn’t care so much about audio, just to at least want his movies to sound good. He also seemingly allowed it to be included on the old DVD releases and never asked for a newer DVD master and not include it (the 2006 BD even uses the same master as the 2001 DVD and he didn’t seem to insist on leaving off the mono track)

I suspect it’s most likely MGM’s laziness is the reason why the mono track isn’t restored considering this isn’t the first time an earlier DVD release of theirs had a mono track and the subsequent blu-ray edition of the same title excluded it in favor of a 5.1 track (just look at Red Dawn and In the Heat of the Night (pre-Criterion) to name a couple of examples)

If Arrow is working on a 4K of this movie it would most likely include the mono track

Raccoons

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Can only hope. The recent scan looks fantastic, just needs the love put in to the sound and colour grading.

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Does anyone have access to the link or the file(s) now that the link is gone. I would really love to watch the Terminator in Mono. Thanks!

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If anyone has the mono track please DM me.

Does anyone want fried chicken?

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I would also love a link too.

Project creator and film enthusiast.

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Can someone pm the link for this please? thanks 😃