Could my VHS tape be partially corrupt?
 

Currently I'm in the process of capturing some old VHS tapes from my parents, and there is this one tape that kinda bugs me.

I could capture 25 minutes of material from this tape. After those 25 minutes the tape keeps playing (for the remaining 135 minutes) but just shows a black screen with some noise here and there on it. Why? All the other tapes I captured that still had space left on it, just show white noise (and the timer of the VCR also stops in those cases, indicating there is no more material on it). Where is the black screen coming from?

I'm looking for a logical explanation for the black screen. Could it be that the tape originally had more material on it, but part of the tape is now corrupt? Either because someone accidentally overwritten the material, or because part of the tape deteriorated over time / is faulty. If it's the latter, shouldn't that have an effect on the whole tape?

Or, wishful thinking, could it be that maybe when the material was originally transferred to the tape at the time, the VCR kept recording the input (most likely from a miniDV-camcorder)? And because the material was no longer than 25 mins. It just recorded a black screen?

Hopefully someone can give me more insight on this. I've added two samples of the tape, just in case. If it was just a black screen I might have been less wary. But the black screen also includes some noise from time to time. Not sure what to think of that.

Side note: (The label on the tape did indicate there should have been more material on it, because it describes two events, but only the first event can be found in the first 25 minutes). The last person who used the tape, also watched it until the 50 mins. mark, which seems kinda odd, considering there's now only 25 mins. of material on it, but would make sense if there originally was more on it).

A corrupted tape or magnetically erased tape would show the white snow with no time counter just as it was blank from the factory, The tape with black screen and time counter active could be that someone recorded on it with no source input, Meaning that the VCR wasn't plugged to any video source. Maybe he was trying to delete the remaining of the footage. Or it was dubbed from a short video from a camcorder and when the video ended the VCR kept recording. Just guesses, you know more about your tapes than anyone of us here. Either way there is no way to recover any video here, just be happy with what you got.

Thanks for your reply! I guess then it's most likely either someone deleted the remaining material or that the VCR at the time kept recording from a camcorder. Are those glitches/little bit of noise I'm seeing appearing on the recording of the black screen then just because due to the aging of the tape?

No, Those are noise spikes, When there is no video source (no RF) the blank signal being recorded is susceptible to interference commonly shown as horizontal white lines, The length of the white lines depends on the duration of the noise spike.

Thanks for the clarification latreche34. :)