Ok, some background: the main thing I'm doing is grabbing video from older tapes or copies of older tapes, so I'm looking to get the best quality picture I can. They're short clips that I'm digitally archiving onto my hard drive (as mpg2) as well as putting on dvd as video. I keep them as clips on my hd so I can make compilations easier.
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I have a plan old JVC now, nothing special about it afaik (not svhs). After reading everything here, I see the suggestion of getting the HR-S9911U or SR-V10U multiple times.
I've found the HR-S9911U for about 365 w/shipping; and the SR-V10U for about 260-270 plus shipping.
I'm obviously looking to get the best picture out of the VCR. Can anyone tell me what's in that extra $100 in the HR-S9911U that might help me achieve that?
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While I'm here I might as well ask: my wires aren't just the "cheap kind", but I do wonder - will grabbing a nice set from somewhere make a big difference in picture quality (audio is usually pretty good, but not as important with what I'm doing).
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I'm currently using a DAC-100 to get my footage as DV. I then do some small editing (nothing too heavy, but some of the clips need some frames shaved off, maybe a little splicing in the middle, no filters or anything on my end). I'm currently using Vegas 4.
On this end - what could help me get a better quality picture, the DAC-100 grabs a nice pic, especially when the source is good - but when it's shady, it's of little help, and it seems a tiny blip on the tape will cause a decent size skip.
The ADVC-300 looks great, but I don't know if that's just nice marketing.
Now, I know a new VCR like the JVC with it's features will help my picture already, may get rid of some of the skips I encounter now - but what would be a good helper - should I get a new "capture device" (I realize it's not technically "capturing")? Or should I pick up a TBC-1000? Or both?
I realize this is a bit open ended, but I figure I'd ask anyway.
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Lastly, I have a related question in terms of process: would transferring the tapes to DVD (let's say using some stand-alone device) then prohibit me from cleaning/restoring any of the video afterwards? I only ask this for literal space reasons, I have a lot of tapes.
My current process is also pretty slow. I transfer one clip at a time (generally a minute or two in length), slightly edit, render it as an mpg2 and wmv. I'll transfer a bunch at once, and then work on each, but rendering isn't too fast and if I have a skip (which I almost always do in between clips), it seems to really slow down the Vegas (it stutters bad on it). Perhaps I should upgrade to Vegas 5 and get a bit more ram (I have a gig), but I'd love for anything to be able to speed me up some, whether it be capturing a whole tape at once and easily slicing it up afterwards (that'd be nice), or anything else.
Any suggestions welcome, and if you want to answer in chunks (especially about the hardware since I'm antsy to pick up new stuff right now), I don't mind
Edited by: dmsinger