The Morning News from Wilmington, Delaware • Page 97

By BILL HAYDEN How satisfying it would be to watch Atlanta burn at about the size as you would see it in a movie theater when "Gone with the Wind" airs on network television next year. Or to see a seven- WJXSctose up 0f Jack Webb's ear on a Dragnet rerun. That's what the future holds, and that future is here now, ready for your living room wall. The generation-old promise that television could be the ultimate entertainer is now being realized. The chey th3t yU Cmt buy tte futur But once having seen it, you may want to take a second mortgage on the house or indenture the children to be able to afford it.

The present cost of never again having to leave your living room is better than $8,000 for the package manTeleXn-ics experts recommend. What they're talking about isn experimental equipment. Each item in the package is now on the market. For the money, you get a seven-foot television screen a videotape recorder-playback unit, a mTcecrnfif 1 let you Programs you might miss on that rare night out for later viewing a camera to use on your own, lights to go with tiie camera, and if you get bored with the programs an electronic game set. About the only thing this set-up doesn't do is make sandwiches and serve beer.

Equipment aside, however, the real attraction of the system is what the computer boys call the software, most particularly something called Home Box Office Described by its parent company, Time, as a subscription program service. Horn Rnv ntn While they've been on the market only a couple urn" US price going current Sre seven-foot Advent units can't be made fash enough. Each week's production of 60 is sold as fast as it can be shipped out The Advent is a two-unit deal the screen and a teet in front of the screen. A bit of technical dexterity is needed to adjust and align the color synchronization each time the set is used but those famdiar with it say the effort is worthwhile If you have neither the money nor the ftoor BTJSfi? AdV' Wenowt Duy smaller, less expensive units whose chief "Wf self-contained Muntz 1 the same "Madman" Muntz of '50s fame who went bankrup several times selling cut rate TV seS -has a unit with a 50-inch screen, or about twicTth li ZiUlr COns.0,-e Tv scrn 'or abou? $1,800. Sony has just introduced a set with abbut the same size screen, but no price is available yet Villon! fr the electronic womb is a videotape color cassette recorder and player.

The Vh- ney Sony's model VO-1600 tot $1,525. Equipped with its own tuner, it can record ine same time. It also can record from a direct camera input at your home. Blank tapTcassettes to use on the machine cost about $25 to each minute tape. Pre-recorded tapes, partkidarnv structural material, are available from several FUms' -otheS! wallintoTri program you want on tape, Sony also markets a Shopping list Advent 7-ft.

TV $4000 Sony videocassette unit 1,525 Sony timer-tuner 225 GBC color camera 2 000 Light package 150 Magnavox Odyssey 99 Magna vox shooting gallery accessory 25 Total $8,024 is pay TV. It offers current movies, special programs and sporting events without any commercials for a monthly fee. Movies like "The Wilby Conspiracy" and "Give 'Em Hell Harry'" Sporting events like professional hockey and basketball. Subscribers also got a chance to see the video aped replay of the most recent Ali-Frazier fight the night after the bout. One catch with HBO is that your set has to be connected to a cable television system.

None of its programming is broadcast over the air like theOO signals of regular television stations Rollins Cablevision is the only rut(lt HB0 10 its customers. About a third of the 44,000 subscribers in its territory, which is limited to northern New Castle County, get HBO There's both an initial outlay and a continuing cost for cable service and HBO. Being connected to Rollins system costs $8 and $6.50 a month thereafter for the initial set. HBO costs are $20 up front, which includes a deposit on the midband converter needed to receive the programming, and $7.50 a month thereafter. recently expanded from serving the Middle Atlantic states into the South and Midwest through use of earth-satellite stations, has about 200,000 subscribers in all.

Jerry Levin, its president, says HBO does not compete with movie theaters or commercial television, but fills a niche between the two, offering a supplementary service. HBO's growth potential is limited because cable TV is available to only about 10 per cent of the nation 66.6 million homes with television. Still the possibility that close to 7 million viewers could opt for a form of pay TV has the commercial broadcasters and networks nervous, just as that seven-toot TV screen now popping up in neighborhood taverns has some theater operators worried tuner-timer for $225. It turns the recorder on and off and switches to any preset channel. It connects to any videocasette unit.

Since you now have the recorder, you might as well go in for the electronic viersion of home movies and buy yourself a television camera. While Sony sells a black and white camera for meverythmgelse you've gotten so far is color. GBC model CTC-5X is a good industrial quality, light weight, easy to use color camera for $2,000 A J1 is a must with a color camera. Lights will run betwene $150 and $200. k2t can be for more than just sitting back and wa clung.

You can play with it, too hS? tx unit caUed 0dyssey for iS? aUows you to a number of games like table tennis and hockey on the TV screen For another $25, you can buy an electronic Sift, 'Land sh00ng gallery accessory to use with it. Sears also has just introduced a similar JSJSkw ab-ut $99' but is ust confined to playing table tennis. SmdiY Htm Journal Wirt of Novtmbor 30 Dtttmbtr 8-Pogo.