FORMAT: V2000     DATE: 1982 PRICE: £600 [2005: £1400] 53x33x17cm

The third Grundig V2000 machine was a "proper" slimline front-loader, little larger than modern machines (though a great deal heavier!). It looks spectacular in its gold trim, and had some nice features - a time remaining display, for example, which showed how much time was left on the tape.

Like the Philips V2000 machines, the remote control was an optional extra, and required the add-on receiver module on the side, connected by a fly-lead to a socket on the back. The controls are unlike modern machines, being labelled "PICTURE SEARCH" (cue and review), "STOP" (pause), "PLAYBACK", "REWIND", "FF WIND", "TAPE" (stop) and "CASSETTE" (eject). The illuminated symbols on these buttons are also non-standard.

The deck continued this Grundig tradition of unfaothomability with a timer programming system which was also nearly impossible to understand. Despite countless attempts we never did manage to program it without the manual, the only machine to have defeated us in the entire museum! It was also very unforgiving; if you took longer than 15 seconds to press the next key, the entire program would be erased and you had to start all over again...

Like the Grundig 2x4 and 2x4 plus, The Super also used the Betamax-style C-lacing, with a loading ring surrounding the head drum. Note also the circuit extending from the edge of the mechanism to the centre of the drum; this carries the control signals to the dynamic heads -- four different "tones" which are mixed with each track in turn; by detecting the strength of the tone the system knows how much to move the head, and which of the four tones it is tells it which direction to change in.

The Philips VR2025 -- a "badge-engineered" 2x4 super, and the only Philips front-loading V2000