A mains electricity (AC-powered), electronic, device designed to receive and store both image and sound on a magnetic video tape (a standard video cassette) as electronic signals. During recording, the inputs of the recorder's electronic circuitry and recording heads are connected to a video signal source (e.g., video or television camera). The information is retrieved through playback heads (that typically are an integral part of the recorder), and the output is connected to an appropriate monitor or is fed into another device for further manipulation. This is a general-purpose recording/playback device and is commonly called a VCR (video cassette recorder).