S-Video or RCA? (composite)

[Okiba]

Hi everyone,

So after a while, the VC500 is finally here and I'm going to try to take a sample connecting it directly to my VCR -(LG RC288 - SAA7136 analog to digital video encoder, and an LSI chipset for system control and mpeg2-encoding).

The RC288 has HDMI, Svideo, and RCA outputs. The VC500 has either Svideo or RCA inputs. Which one I should use? I don't remember my old VHS has S-Video on it, so I'm assuming the signal is being modifying somehow if S-Video is used? I would have tried myself and see what's better - but I don't own S-Video cable, means I have to go buy one and those are rare to find here. I will try to find one if that's the better option, but I prefer to avoid the search if RCA is the right answer.

Also, does it matter which S-Video I'm buying? Or a cheap S-Video cable and a expensive S-Video cable will perform the same?

Thank you.

[keaton]

S-Video sends the luminance (contrast) and chrominance (color) signals separately. RCA sends both together. S-Video should give cleaner results because of this. VHS can look not so clean, but that is not s-video's fault. Regarding choice of cable, that is tough for me to say. Others can chime in on that. Lots of discussion already on this forum.

I bought years ago based on advice I found in forum, but that advice has since changed regarding that brand of cable, because it changed manufacturer and therefore quality of components. So keeping up with that could be difficult. Do a basic search on "s-video cable" of this forum and you'll find a lot of back and forth. Maybe more than you want to read.

[Okiba]

Thank you. So if I understand correctly S-Video should be the way to go. And If there was a discussion about it (which I will be searching for), I'm assuming a cheap cable is not the same as good cable :-)

Thanks!

[latreche34]

For best results your VCR should be a S-VHS machine with S-Video out so when you insert a VHS tape you are getting the original signal recorded on tape (not the combined one out of RCA), If your VCR is a basic VHS machine its output is already bottlenecking the signal flow so it would do you no good to split the signal back to S-Video after it has been already combined and degraded by the VHS VCR.

Maybe it's wiser to get a HDMI capture card hoping that the VCR is taking the component signal (Luma/Chroma) from the VHS tape and digitizing it for HDMI output assuming that your VCR has a HDMI output ??? couldn't understand your workflow.

If you must try a S-Video cable eBay is your source:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...call_filtering

[hodgey]

I believe the internal A/D converter is connected to the VCR part via composite, like on many of these combo recorders (because cost saving). In any case S-Video will give a better result than composite on this VCR, using composite would mean re-mixing the signal back to composite after the internal A/D chip (which has a much better Y/C filter than the VC500) has separated it into Y/C. Capturing from HDMI may give marginally better quality than S-Video, though not as good as a proper S-VHS VCR.

[latreche34]

By looking at the chip diagram for the ADC of that VCR it's had to tell if it's processing the component or the composite and converting it to digital, Also for the S-Video output it's hard to tell if it's taking the component signal from tape and outputing it via S-Video or combining the signal and splitting again with two circuits (that would definitely not cost saving), Even if it does output the component signal straight out of the S-Video a stand alone S-VHS VCR with line TBC is still a better option.

[jwillis84]

Someone recommended Pearstone S-video cables over many others from BHPhoto.

I've found them very solidly built and you can get them in anything from 10 ft to 1 ft lengths.

[Okiba]

Hi everyone, Thanks for the reply.

I will be sure to check Pearstone S Video cables. The VC500 has just arrived, so I'm reluctant to get another capture device that support HDMI (it was hard to find this in stock or any of the recommended devices). So as for now I will stick with it unless It will be really bad.

Based on what you said, it's hard to tell if I should be using rca or Svideo. So I suppose I should be getting a s-video cable anyhow - but just for the sake for it, I'm also attaching the manual for the Video, maybe this will help out:

https://elektrotanya.com/lg_rc288.pdf/download.html

Thanks!

[Eyal]

I didn't read the all discussion thoroughly, but generally speaking, S-Video is much better than composite(RCA), so if you have the choice then you should use the S-Video out option.

You keep calling the component output HDMI but it's 3 cables component connection(RGB) and not HDMI which is a different connection.

Use an S-video cable, the thickest and shortest that you can find and use, I highly doubt that a $30 S-video cable will give you any better results compared to a $5 one, I don't think you need to spend too much money on it, just buy a short cable if you can physically can use a short one.
I use the VC500 with a standard 6ft S-video cable(because that what I already had) and the picture quality is just fine, I have other issues with flickering and stuttering, but that's not because of the cable.

[latreche34]

S-Video is a component signal too made of luminance and chrominance just like the RGB signal, It is commonly known as S-Video though.