Fastest way to transfer VHS tapes to PC?

[latreche34]

Quote:

Originally Posted by adarc8

but! i don't understand whats wrong with buying 80$ Elgato device and do this process with a simple VCR i will found online for like 20$, instead of buying 10 specific VCR which cost each around 200-300$, and 10 ATI readers..

is there a difference is the digital movie size?
when u say quality difference, u mean colors are more nice? or resolution? what exactly is the different?
are there video noise and stutters? what exactly the problem with Elgato devices or even cheaper one?

When you go to get some work done on your teeth do you want a message therapist to work on your cavities with cheap pliers and Dremmel bits? and most importantly do you want him to get it done as fast as he can? The point is if you don't understand how VCR works, and how video should be captured and what hardware is required for such a complicated job why do you want to get involved in such business? You can do your own tapes if you want to but why do you want to screw up people's valuable memories with bad hardware and little to no knowledge?

Don't get me wrong 10 years ago I had no idea about how video capturing work besides what the average joe knows and the only reason I had to learn it is not because I want a business, but because the so called "professionals" who use $69 VHS/DVD combo from Walmart in their basement and call it a business screwed up our family tapes that I had to do all over again which one of them was chewed up by his cheap VCR, You probably know by now why I'm pissed.

[adarc8]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dpalomaki

The first problem is finding gear that can do it. While 2x speed dubbers were generally available for analog audio tape/cassettes, to my knowledge that was not the case for VHS video tape. As an engineer you could no doubt design and prototype one, test it, being sure to provide the necessary controls to allow it to cope with the substantial variations found in VHS recordings, especially home recordings from various camcorders and VCRS. The signals recorded on VHS tape are much more complex than analog audio tape being comprised on various FM and AM RF signals in a helical scan as well as linear analog audio. Sadly, the guys with the green eye shades and sleeve garters will tell you there is an insignificant market for that type of gear, no way to recover the cost, so it would have to be done as labor of love/hobby. (High sped VHS duplication was possible [e.g., Sony Sprinter or Otari TMD] but that is a different problem.)

For the rest of us that means VHS (and related tape formats) have to be copied in real time - it takes an hour to capture an hour of tape; to that add setup time.

I sounds like you want fast, and you want "just good enough" as opposed to "as near perfect as is feasible." Most folks who participate here have a very high standard for "good enough" and recommendations are geared to that later standard.

Since budget is not a consideration, but speed is I suggest:
- buy several of the recommended high quality S-VHS VCRs that have been refurbished by a reputable technician
- buy an equal number of the recommended DVD recorders.
- buy an equal number of TBCs.
- buy an equal number of proc amps (if not included in the TBC's you buy)
- capture to DVD-R at the 1 or 2-hour record rate.

The DVD-R can be viewed directly, copied, or ripped for basic editing and uploading. The quality will for the most part be close to the same as the VCR playback, except for really video that has a lot of noise in it because lossy video compression has difficulty with noise. The file thus produced is in a highly compressed lossy format so it will not survive significant restoration or color correction.

Thank you for the explanation!

Quote:

Originally Posted by latreche34

By the time he buys all that gear his budget will be in the $5000 range, I can do it for him for half of that, I’m pretty sure Lordsmurf is more generous than me and he can probably do it for a lot less.

oh so now we are talking on the cost of such machine? I didn't wanted to build such a machine, I just asked and i quote: "Is there such a product that can run the tape very fast?"
The answer I got from you was kind of like "are you dumb??? its not possible, where have you been living these 2 decades??"
All I did was simply ask if kind of machine exist, because as an engineer I cant find a *physical* reason that this kind of machine can not be possible.
luckly dpalomaki answer that question that it is possible but from economic reason this machine does not exist.
You didn't tell me that, you just tried to whack like i am saying some sick impossible physical thing. next time have some faith

[adarc8]

Quote:

Originally Posted by latreche34

When you go to get some work done on your teeth do you want a message therapist to work on your cavities with cheap pliers and Dremmel bits? and most importantly do you want him to get it done as fast as he can? The point is if you don't understand how VCR works, and how video should be captured and what hardware is required for such a complicated job why do you want to get involved in such business? You can do your own tapes if you want to but why do you want to screw up people's valuable memories with bad hardware and little to no knowledge?

Don't get me wrong 10 years ago I had no idea about how video capturing work besides what the average joe knows and the only reason I had to learn it is not because I want a business, but because the so called "professionals" who use $69 VHS/DVD combo from Walmart in their basement and call it a business screwed up our family tapes that I had to do all over again which one of them was chewed up by his cheap VCR, You probably know by now why I'm pissed.

The reason is that you don't answer to the point. All i heard is that Elgato is crap and i need some premium 3000$ equipment. so i just asked why? whats exactly is the difference???
and i did got the answer. so I understand I just simply ask what is the difference, I wanted to know exactly instead of just saying this youtube is a shit talker, and this elgato device is shit.

[dpalomaki]

A simple look at what make the 2x speed copying of analog video tape like VHS difficult is the mechanics and electro-magnetics of the information recorded on the tape.

While mechanically moving the tape faster is not difficult, we have SP, LP and EP tape speeds already, and getting the linear track (analog) audio would not be difficult, we would just have to digitally frequency shift it down to the normal range from the "chipmunk" sound range. To preserve its nominal 10 kHz frequency response would mean sampling at 48 kHz, no big deal, and playback as if sampled at 24 kHz.

The more difficult item is the video and HiFi audio recorded on the tape. It is read by a spinning head in a helical scan, one frame (two fields) per rotation of the head along a track rotated diagonally across the tape. The physical tape speed sets the track pitch, the RPM of the spinning drum sets the speed of the head over the tape (corresponds to the ips of analog audio tape). At SP the tape speed is about 1.3 ips, the head speed over the tape is more like 222 ips. (Thus the primary driver between SP, LP, and EP recording quality is track width/pitch.)

The video and HiFi sound information on the tape is recorded on tape as modulated RF signals. HiFi sound is FM modulated at 1.3 and 1.7 mHz center frequencies, color difference is AM modulated with a center frequency around 629 kHz, and luma is FM modulated in the range of 5.4 to 7 mHz (for S-VHS, and not counting sidebands).

If you move the tape 2x speed, you need to spin the head 2x faster to capture the frame. Otherwise the head will be reading half of two adjacent tracks. (You can get an idea of this when you do a FFD/REW scan of a tape with a normal VCR.)

Of course then you need to double the bandwidth and center frequencies of everything involved with decoding the stream read off the tape. You would have to digitize your output chroma and luma streams each to a pair of 8-bit 29 mHz sample rate streams (to preserve 4:2:2 color and resolution) and then decode as if 14.5 mHz sample rate to recover the signals. That translates to 464 mbps data stream.

Alternatively you could build a special dual path VCR with a head mechanism that has double the heads, spin it at the normal speed, and have dual processing path electronics read two fields per revolution (ont one) and trust to digitizing electronics to combine the signals and get the frame and field order right. There is probably a design and patent for such a box already out there - just no viable market.

The notes that "Elgato is crap " and similar statements made about other gear means that it does not meet the high standards of most of the participants of this board. Reasons vary and may include reliability, ability to deal with poor signal streams (e.g., weak sync and/or drop outs), ability to accurately digitize a signal, introduction of artifacts, and so on. That the gear survives on the market means that it meets the requirements of some buyers. One pays one's money and takes one's chances.

[adarc8]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dpalomaki

A simple look at what make the 2x speed copying of analog video tape like VHS difficult is the mechanics and electro-magnetics of the information recorded on the tape.

While mechanically moving the tape faster is not difficult, we have SP, LP and EP tape speeds already, and getting the linear track (analog) audio would not be difficult, we would just have to digitally frequency shift it down to the normal range from the "chipmunk" sound range. To preserve its nominal 10 kHz frequency response would mean sampling at 48 kHz, no big deal, and playback as if sampled at 24 kHz.

The more difficult item is the video and HiFi audio recorded on the tape. It is read by a spinning head in a helical scan, one frame (two fields) per rotation of the head along a track rotated diagonally across the tape. The physical tape speed sets the track pitch, the RPM of the spinning drum sets the speed of the head over the tape (corresponds to the ips of analog audio tape). At SP the tape speed is about 1.3 ips, the head speed over the tape is more like 222 ips. (Thus the primary driver between SP, LP, and EP recording quality is track width/pitch.)

The video and HiFi sound information on the tape is recorded on tape as modulated RF signals. HiFi sound is FM modulated at 1.3 and 1.7 mHz center frequencies, color difference is AM modulated with a center frequency around 629 kHz, and luma is FM modulated in the range of 5.4 to 7 mHz (for S-VHS, and not counting sidebands).

If you move the tape 2x speed, you need to spin the head 2x faster to capture the frame. Otherwise the head will be reading half of two adjacent tracks. (You can get an idea of this when you do a FFD/REW scan of a tape with a normal VCR.)

Of course then you need to double the bandwidth and center frequencies of everything involved with decoding the stream read off the tape. You would have to digitize your output chroma and luma streams each to a pair of 8-bit 29 mHz sample rate streams (to preserve 4:2:2 color and resolution) and then decode as if 14.5 mHz sample rate to recover the signals. That translates to 464 mbps data stream.

Alternatively you could build a special dual path VCR with a head mechanism that has double the heads, spin it at the normal speed, and have dual processing path electronics read two fields per revolution (ont one) and trust to digitizing electronics to combine the signals and get the frame and field order right. There is probably a design and patent for such a box already out there - just no viable market.

The notes that "Elgato is crap " and similar statements made about other gear means that it does not meet the high standards of most of the participants of this board. Reasons vary and may include reliability, ability to deal with poor signal streams (e.g., weak sync and/or drop outs), ability to accurately digitize a signal, introduction of artifacts, and so on. That the gear survives on the market means that it meets the requirements of some buyers. One pays one's money and takes one's chances.

I just found an old VCR device that have both DVD input and a VHS tape. i remember this machine has the ability to record the vhs tape and save the data in the DVD. if i will do this, and then take the video from the DVD to my PC. how good will be the quality? I mean, if the machine was build and meant to be able to record tapes and save it in DVD then i belive it doing the job pretty good isn't it? so what can go wrong with that?

[dpalomaki]

Old/used gear is an unknown - it might work or it might need overhaul/repair. Plastic parts age and get brittle, rubber parts deteriorate, stretch, etc., lub dries out, and so on. Without testing there is no way to be sure of what you might be buying. Maintenance/repair/parts support for anything more than ~7 or so years old is problematic. Bottom line is buy from trusted sources or be prepared for disappointment.

It may work OK for some tapes. It may struggle with some tapes. A good, clean tape with low noise video on it may copy nicely to the DVD. The result will not be suitable for video restoration/clean-up work. However, it might meet your quality expectations. No one else here can make that decision for you. Only you know how good is "good enough" for you.

It will be a quick and dirty copy to DVD. And it copies in real time - a two hour tape takes 2 hours plus setup time. If you post the make/model someone here may have information on its quality potential. (Or search the site for posts about it.)