Concord 12 ips Inch Per Second Half Inch Open Reel

Concord released this machine as a significant improvement over the skip field format machines sold by Sony.  Part of the better quality as compared to Sony's Skip Field Format, was attributable to it's faster tape speed of 12 inches/second plus the full recording of both fields. The head drum was also larger, which enabled faster writing speeds which also translated into slightly higher video bandwidth.  This allowed approximately 40 minutes of video to be recorded on a standard 7" 2400 ft reel.

Panasonic also tried their hand with this format with the release of the NV-8000 and NV-8100 machines.   The format never caught on - probably due to it's limited recording time of only 40 minutes on a full 7" reel.  Panasonic saw the writing on the wall and quickly abandoned the format and made no other machines I'm aware of that supported it.  Concord stuck with it to the bitter end with the 600 and 700 series machines, but even Concord eventually threw in the towel and adopted the new EIAJ standard.

The format though superior to Sony's Skip Field Format, never made wide market penetration. Today, this format is considered very rare and on the verge of extinction.  The only commonality, is that Concord, like all the other half inch open reel formats, used the very same 1/2 inch tape stock.

Shown here is the Panasonic 8100 torn down with the skins removed, in  the process of being completely rebuilt.

As far as I know, we're the only one left standing with good working machines still doing transfers.