Propelled by consumer demand for higher quality visual stimulation, the technology age has moved into the digital era.
Music performance junior Craig Karlson, who switched to the DVD format more than three years ago, said size, price and special features have all helped put the DVD head and shoulders over VHS.
"Special features are the best thing that ever happened to watching home movies," he said. "The quality is better, the picture is clearer and you don't have to rewind them. The fact you can select a certain scene without having to wait and find it makes it so much easier."
In 1983, Dutch and Japanese companies Philips and Sony developed the first compact discs.
It would take 10 years for the two media giants to use the same technology to develop a higher quality visual picture.
In the meantime, Time Warner and Toshiba began to develop their own version and in 1997, the first DVD players hit the U.S. market.
For the most part, consumers are attracted to the smaller size, durability and digital quality of DVDs while manufacturers salivate over the lower production cost.
Thomson Inc., whose major consumer electronic brand in the United States is RCA, has kept its eye on what the market wants for years.
Thomson spokesman James Harper said the days of VHS are limited.
"Pre-recorded VHS tapes will probably disappear from most traditional retail outlets in a maximum of three to five years," he said.
"As for the players, people will still want to be able to playback their personal library of tapes so players will still be around on the market albeit with a greatly reduced presence for seven or eight years."
He said the superior picture quality, superior sound quality, random access, durable media and smaller size of DVDs will help the process.
As the price of DVD players continues to fall - nearly $500 over the last 5 years - their attractiveness to consumers will continue to rise.
"DVD player price points in the market have exhibited one of the fastest declines of any consumer electronics product in history with everyday pricing going from $600-$700 at retail when introduced in 1997 to less than $100 in 2002."
Though at one point in time it was inconceivable for something to replace even the VHS format, Thomson said there is already work being done to enhance the storage capacity, picture and visual quality of DVDs.
"Only the market will decide if the value proposition of any new technology will be compelling enough to replace the DVD player as the most popular medium for pre-recorded video content," he said.
The video rental market reflects the change.
Tom Leach, owner of Video to Go, 300 N. Clippert St. in Lansing, said DVDs have a pretty good foothold in video rentals. One of the advantages of DVD is its semi-reasonable purchase price.
"Rental wise, the 18- to 35-year-old range is really enamored by the DVD, whereas the older customers (35 to 55 years old) tend to still stay with VHS, primarily because you can't easily record with DVD," he said.
The disadvantage with DVDs, he said, comes with higher price for recording on disc and the inability to record over used discs.
They also can be damaged and scratched if not taken care of.
While some video rental businesses have been pushing VHS tapes off their shelves prematurely, he said Video to Go still maintains a large selection of VHS tapes to accommodate that market.
He said there are a very limited number of movies that come out only on DVD.
"Until you can easily and cheaply record on DVD, I think it will be around for five or six years," he said.
"What you are starting to see now is a lot of the studios are phasing out there catalog titles so you can't even buy them on VHS any more."
