Vcr

* North Laurel: 9200 block of Traders Crossing: Someone broke a small rear window on the driver's side of a 1982 gray Oldsmobile, apparently in an attempt to steal the vehicle between 11 p.m. last Wednesday and 6:30 a.m. Thursday. Nothing was taken from the vehicle.9500 block of Gorman Road: Someone stole a $288 Panasonic VCR from Forest Ridge Elementary School. The VCR was taken from the unlocked storage closet in the media center between 8:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. last Wednesday.

An annual public service provided in these columns at great cerebral expense is an exceedingly complex strategy regardinghow to get the most from your football viewing and listening on New Year's Day. The key is to have at least three television sets and a VCR, or two and two, plus radio(s).Warm up the tellys by tuning them to either the Fiesta Bowl Parade or ESPN's "College Bowl Game Day" show at 10 a.m. Make sure the VCRs and tapes are ready to go.The Tournament of Roses Parade comes up live on all networks at 11 and, after viewing about three each floats and marching bands and the attending nonsensical chatter, the Hall of Fame Bowl between Tennessee and Boston College should prove a welcome sight.

Talking to your video cassette recorder is nothing new -- or perhaps "muttering" better describes the rude utterances that might accompany a botched recording.But for all your remonstrances, your VCR has never listened -- until now. Stand by for a new wrinkle in video enjoyment, a hand held device called the VCR Voice Programmer. It enables you to control virtually all VCR functions by merely saying the word -- such as "play," "pause," "stop" and "rewind" -- as well as to order a programmed recording.

In the mind of a 9-year-old it must seem eons ago. Imagine, 1967, a dark age before Nintendo, compact discs and VCRs, when the bulldozers tore into an old farm to make way for an elementary school in Odenton.Rachel Frieder's eyes grew wide at the very thought: 25 years ago. Imagine."THAT'S long," said Rachel, of Odenton, who attends fourth grade at Waugh Chapel Elementary School, which last week celebrated its silver anniversary. "I think they were a lot stricter" in the school in those early days, she guessed.

Hate to mess with all those tiny buttons to manipulate your home video equipment?If you can talk, you can now train your VCR, TV and cable box to follow commands.All it takes is a new voice-activated remote control, the VCR Voice Programmer, developed by a small outfit called Voice-Powered Technology in Canoga Park, Calif.Using a sophisticated voice recognition sensing program that's interfaced with a modest, 8-bit microprocessor, this "speaker-dependent" system is smart enough to take voice command orders from four different users.

When it comes to videocassette recorders, two heads are still better than one.Go Video, a Scottsdale, Ariz., company, markets America's first working dual-deck VCR. With it, you can:* Tape two different TV shows simultaneously while you watch a third TV channel.* Tape a broadcast show on one side while you're watching a prerecorded tape on the other.* Make your own copy from any video source, even those protected by the Macrovision copy-guard coding, although you must pledge the copies are only for personal use.And the unit has memory programming with no need of a battery backup, even in a power failure.

When it comes to videocassette recorders, two heads are still better than one.Go Video, a Scottsdale, Ariz., company, markets America's first working dual-deck VCR. With it, you can:* Tape two different TV shows simultaneously while you watch a third TV channel.* Tape a broadcast show on one side while you're watching a prerecorded tape on the other.* Make your own copy from any video source, even those protected by the Macrovision copy-guard coding, although you must pledge the copies are only for personal use.And the unit has memory programming with no need of a battery backup, even in a power failure.

Technodolts of the world, unite! Spy magazine's running feature "Meet the Nobelists" this issue asks the laureates the simple yet profoundly revealing question: "Can you program your VCR?" So, for all of you with machines pathetically, perpetually flashing 12:00, take heart -- the VCR-minus mindset knows no bounds:* Paul A. Samuelson, 1970 Nobel Prize in economics: "You happen to be talking to an idiot who literally receives instructions from 2 1/2 -year-old grandchildren . . . on taping things.

CHICAGO -- Forget about the Michelangelo virus or those rumors about some nasty Friday the 13th computer infection.The types of problems most owners of home computers really fret about are not nearly so spectacular or so complicated."

Like to go to the movies but don't like having to sit with strangers in a dark room? Time to start thinking about your own home theater.Today's technology makes it possible to have a near-cinematic experience in the comfort of your recliner.It can be done as easily for $2,000 as for $10,000. Let's look at the elements of our home theater.Television: You want a large screen television, obviously, but there are other things to consider.First, you will want a television whose horizontal resolution (the number of lines that make up the picture screen)