LaserDisc

Also known as DiscoVision

Cause of death

Killed by a successor

DVD delivered comparable quality on a disc a quarter the size that people could also record onto.

LaserDisc offered far better picture and sound than VHS from 1978 onward and never captured more than a sliver of the market, because the discs were the size of a dinner plate, you had to flip them mid-film, and you could not record. It found a real home among collectors and in Japan, where new titles kept appearing until 2001. Pioneer built the last players in 2009, thirty-one years after launch.