Use Cypress 1T-TBC or Datavideo TBC-1000?
 

Hi everyone,

So I took a *massive* punt on an eBay auction here in the UK. A scruffy-looking Datavideo TBC-1000 was up for sale and while there was some interest, I ended up buying it for just over £50.

It arrived today, looking even more scruffy than it did in the pics - a lot of discolouration on the top of the case, almost to the point of rust.

I took the lid off before plugging in and inside looks immaculate, though.

And sure enough, I plugged in a 12V 2A power adaptor - the same one I use for my 1T-TBC, in fact - and it seems to work fine. I've played a bit of footage through it, via the S-Video sockets, and it seems okay.

I'm a lucky boy, I guess. So now I have a working TBC-1000 and a 1T-TBC. It feels good to have some redundancy in my setup, but which do I use by default? Are there likely to be any major differences in image quality between them?

Regards to all,

Discy

There can be differences in the noise profiles, contrast, and sharpness. You'll find neither is superior in all categories. DataVideo is softer, but Cypress can sometimes be too sharp. DataVideo tends to have more random noise, while Cypress is cleaner. For contrast, DataVideo is accurate, while Cypress can be too pumped. These are mostly nitpicks, of course. Both are good, or at least those models can be.

There's a reason I use both, just like with the JVC and Panasonic S-VHS VCRs. Differences can be good.

I saw that TBC-1000, and it looks like a truck ran over it -- and then like a zombie, was buried and then dug up. There are a lot of legitimately fubar TBCs out there, ridden hard and put away wet, and I wouldn't go near those. I generally suggest others do the same, unless they want to gamble. It would have cost me $200 to import it, and the odds were greater than 50/50 it would be dud unit. Beyond that, the seller had some dings, so worse yet.

You got lucky. This time. Congrats. :)

Thanks, lordsmurf. Yeah, whatever erosion is on the lid isn't coming off, either - not with any cleaning product I'm willing to use on even the outside case of electronics. I was amazed when I opened it up at how clean it was/is.

I seem to have developed a knack of just bidding enough and no more for stuff like this at the moment. Picked up a mint Pana NV-HS950 for reasonable money the other week too. So now I have a couple of NV-HS950s, my JVC HRS7955, my TBC-1000 and the 1T-TBC, plus the ATI 600 USB that you sold me. Seems like a good set of kit to move forward with.

Thanks, as always, for the advice.

Discy

Tip: Get a DataVideo VP299 for under $50. I've seen several on eBay UK this year. Same case. Swap contents. Resell the now-ugly VP299 for a few dollars, just to keep it out of a landfill. Then you have a nice looking TBC-1000 in a nice case. Just remember that it's now a TBC-1000, not VP299 as printed on case.

Just always remember it's gambling. It happens. But for every "wow, look at this deal" post I read, I'll see at least a dozen more "I got screwed on eBay" posts. It's even worse when you buy from somebody that outright states "I know nothing about this item", usually a warning that it's broken, which is what that TBC was. Everybody thinks they can beat the odds when gambling, and for others reading this post, I just want to reiterate that it's uncommon and unlikely. I've gotten some awesome deals myself over the years, but bad deals were always far more common.

In years past, my advice was sometimes poo-poo'd by others because they bought a faulty item from eBay. Buying the right item isn't good enough, it must also be in quality condition. That's why I so often warn about eBay these days. Great site for action figures and whatnot, not so much for video gear.

Nice gear stack. :congrats:

You're quite right. It was an absolute punt, and could easily have gone wrong. Frankly, I was only able to consider taking the risk because I had already sourced known, working hardware through the Marketplace area here at DigitalFAQ. So if the battered exterior had been replicated inside, I'd still have had my Cypress anyway.