# Pausing videos

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pausing-videos/71900>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [July 10, 2001, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pausing-videos/71900 "2001-07-10T01:31:06Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\
**Post date:** [July 10, 2001, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pausing-videos/71900/1 "2001-07-10T01:31:06Z")

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How come when you pause a video, it turns all fuzzy and there are lines of static across the screen?

-Kris

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**Author:** ![Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/96bed5/32.png) [@Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patty_O_Furniture)\
**Post date:** [July 10, 2001, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pausing-videos/71900/2 "2001-07-10T01:49:05Z")

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Because you paid $99.00 for it.

Seriously, it has a lot to do with the quality, number of heads (a four head VCR gives you the best possible picture at all speeds) and whether or not the VCR has digital still picture. If you’ve got DSP, a frame of video is read into memory & displayed on the TV, so the image doesn’t need to be repeatedly scanned from the tape.