Use case for DV-In port on D-VHS VCR?
 

I'm at a complete loss and I need help.
I've owned the JVC HM-DR10000 (Pal D-VHS deck) for over a year now and it's lovely. Lately, I've been exploring the D-VHS capability, making digital recordings from analog sources (S-Video). Recently I wanted to try it out with the DV-In port on the back, but I just cannot get it to work.
First I used a Panasonic NV-GS11 MiniDV camcorder that has a DV jack and connected that to the back - absolutely nothing. When you switch to I-1 which is the DV on the VCR, the screen goes from blue to solid black but no matter what I do with the camcorder it won't show a picture on the screen. I tried it while it was in Standby in player and camera mode and while it was playing back a tape, on the VCR side I tried it in Standby and also hit record but the recording is also a black screen.
This week, I got a Sony DCR-TRV840, and decided to try this one out with it's DV jack. Tried the same things, got the same result.
I was wondering if anybody knows why it won't work - is it because the VCR doesn't support iLink?
I'd also appreciate suggestions on what this port's intended use was, specific devices if possible rather than broad categories. I'd really like to get a digital recording from a digital source.
I used a cable I got off of amazon for these tests, interestingly enough, these didn't work with this cable with my firewire card on my PC either - I only got them to work with a 6-pin to 4-pin adapter cable while using another port on the card (and the WinDV pictures were very pixelated and low-res, much worse than analog capture, could that be because I was using the 6-pin port?). I'm not convinced it's because of the cable as I checked continuity between each pin on the cable and the corresponding pin on the port of the card while the cable was connected though so it's probably a compatibility issue.
HBB

Did you try both the front and rear iLink ports? I wouldn't transfer the already low quality DV to MPEG-2 SD, that's recipe for a disaster. DV better captured as is to hard drive, even if conversion is a must it is better done in software. You can make good VHS transfers though if you don't mind the MPEG-2 compression, Although I'm not sure if your model does output MPEG-2 via firewire.

I don't really care for transferring this in the highest possible quality, it's just a bunch of recordings I'm currently making with the camcorder I bought and I want to get them digitally onto D-VHS. I just want to have fun with some old equipment.

If you're referring to WinDV's Preview display, it uses a super crappy quality decode method. Presumably to maximize performance on the old computers for which it was designed. The actual captures should look good.

It sounds like you're using NTSC MiniDV cams.

I would:
1. Verify that you can output NTSC DV from WinDV to the camcorder. (Be careful not to record over any tape you may have in the cam.)
2. Then encode a little PAL DV AVI and try to output it from WinDV to D-VHS VCR.

I'm not sure if that model can accept files from the computer, Only few NTSC models were designed to transfer files from computer using a Windows XP only application called DVHStool.

According to the manual, it accepts DV input from camcorders. How would the DV output from WinDV be any different?

(I'm aware that the MPEG-2 TS format used by D-VHS is something else entirely.)

Because WinDV is not a camcorder, Trust me I tried it with my NTSC deck and it didn't work, As a matter fact WinDV doesn't even record to a DV camcorder at least with my camcorder and a DV Sony deck.

Then what is the WinDV recording function for? I was surprised it didn't work with either of my camcorders, the Sony Digital8 specifically mentions recording from a DV source with instructions in the manual but they use some sort of home theater amp looking device in the example drawings...

The WinDV progress was never finished when the developer pulled the plug on the project. Still has a lot of bugs that could have been sorted out had the support continued, Unfortunately it didn't .

I've used WinDV to output to Sony DCR-TRV340 (my Digital8 cam). Didn't record to tape though. My purpose was recording a test pattern from PC to VCR, so on the camcorder side it was straight from Firewire in to S-Video out. Also tried DVIO and ScenalyzerLive; both worked.

Now after hooking up my D-VHS & then Panasonic DMR-ES25 to the PC for the first time, I also can't get WinDV to output to the DCR-TRV340!

Wonder if it's related to this:
https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/...=1#post1618242

Or maybe I'm just forgetting something that I did before to make it work. Because he couldn't even get the camcorder recognized. Mine can still capture fine in WinDV.

I feel like this too often these days. :laugh:

One of my favorite scenes from Married With Children was when Kelly Bundy was cramming for a test. As new facts entered her head, old ones fell out. There's got to be some truth to that.

I don't know about DV but D-VHS can only work with up to Windows 7 for transferring from the deck to the PC via firewire. and up to Windows XP for recording from PC to the deck. Using apps such as DVHSTool and CapDVHS for both capturing and recording, But based on my personal experience CapDVHS is best for capturing (transferring) and DVHSTool2 is best for recording to the deck (from a compliant file).

Interesting stuff, but why can I not get it to work between the camcorder and VCR, two period accurate devices that should be compatible?

Did you skip over my post where I said it seems you're trying to send NTSC DV to a PAL-primary VCR?

Why would that matter? Isn't DV universal without being bound to any video standard? And regardless, the GS-11 miniDV is a Pal model and it doesn't work either so it's probably not that.

PAL vs NTSC matters because the chroma processing is totally different, 4:2:0 for PAL vs 4:1:1 for NTSC, Camcorders that recorded NTSC cannot record or playback PAL.

As to why your deck is not detecting the PAL camcorder? possibly wrong output setting on your camcorder, study the user manual of your camcorder and make sure it is set to DV out, Some camcorders cannot output DV and analog simultaneously.

But does that stand for DV? As far as I can see a PAL DV camcorder can play back a tape recorded on an NTSC one, it was a thread on this very forum. As far as digital goes, it shouldn't matter

Yes I was talking about DV but that applies to Digital8 as well, most PAL camcorders playback NTSC tapes but rarely NTSC tapes played back PAL tapes. I don't have a NTSC camcorder to test with, I have a Sony pro deck and if I don't set it to the right standard (60i vs 50i) it will playback the tape with black screen.

More standards, more micro chips, so to cut costs they use single standard.

Digital VHS decks natively record/playback MPEG-2 transport streams over their Firewire ports. Camcorders output DV which your DVHS deck will transcode to MPEG-2. It sounds like a cable problem to be honest, that or the Firewire jacks on the camcorders are loose/broken.

Hey everyone,
I left this alone for a while and kept using the deck as analog but today I looked up the schematic diagram and found something interesting I'd like your opinion on.

I checked the diagrams on my Panasonic Pal MiniDV camcorder, my Sony NTSC D8 Handycam and the JVC Pal D-VHS VCR and it turns out the pinout on the DV port is different on the cameras and on the VCR.
Both camcorders have A positive and negative on pins 3 and 4 as is the official pinout for the 4-pin IEEE1394 connector BUT the VCR has A positive and negative on pins 1 and 2 and B positive and negative on 3 and 4.
I want to cut a spare cable and reverse the wires so that A and B will connect to the same pins on both devices and I wanted to know if that would be enough for it to work. Also, is there a chance my current setup has damaged anything? I'd think not since the negative and positive aren't reversed, it's just the A and B pins and my camcorders still work fine.

EDIT : Added some screenshots of the pinouts from the service manuals. It's interesting to note that the JVC one is labeled in/out even though officially it's only an input. Maybe a possibility for a DV out mod by someone more skilled?