Do it yourself or have it done by a company? (VHS to Digital)

[PatrickRyll]

Hello,

I am new to this forum and have the following task:

My family has asked me to digitize about 40-50 family VHS tapes.
Some of the people in these videos are unfortunately no longer alive and my grandparents would like to see these videos again.

I have read a lot today and I am aware of the basic equipment.

VCR
TBC
capture card

My question now is whether it is worth the effort to get the equipment or whether I should have it made by a company even if my grandparents don't really want to give the VHS tapes out of their hands.

The companies here in Germany would charge about 450€ (USD $500) for this work. Unfortunately, I can't imagine what kind of quality I'll get here in the end.

So my "budget" is the mentioned 450€ (USD $500) a Macbook or Windows 7 notebook and time.

Hardware that might come into question:

VCR: - Blaupunkt RTV 950
- Panasonic nv-hs 1000
- Panasonic AG-7350 S-VHS

TBC: ?

Capture Card: - ATI TV 600 USB

What do I expect from this project?

I don't want to have ultra lossless huge data, but simply good looking material that can be easily viewed on TV from an external hard drive or USB stick to keep the memories alive like old photo albums.

Hopefully you understand my request and can help me in planning this task.

With kind regards
Patrick

Translated with DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

[lordsmurf]

It really depends on the service. Lots of services are run by amateurs, and can do a worse job than you.

450€ is too small of a budget. However, remember this: buy it, use it, resell it. The equipment is a project purchase, not a forever purchase. When done, don't put it in a closet or drawer. Resell it. If you do it right, you can recoup some or all of the project costs. Then the only "cost" is time. So, in the long-run, your budget can be 0€.

As an example, I actually have a few PAL TBCs, for about 625€. TBCs are getting rare, and expensive. But again it's only a temporary cost. How temporary really depends on how quickly you do the project. Something to remember is that good hardware will make a project easier and faster.

Capturing lossless is suggested, then encode down to a format like high-bitrate MPEG (4:2:2 even better). Or H.264 (aka MP4/MKV), but there are limitations to be aware of.

[PatrickRyll]

Thanks for your quick response.

The equipment would definitely be resold after the project.
Unfortunately we can't spend over 600€ just for the TBC.

What do you say to the three VCRs I have listed, which one can I buy? (These three devices are very easy for me to get)

I would like to start with a VCR and a capture card, because I can't estimate the condition of the VHS tapes and maybe the result is enough for my grandparents.

Otherwise I would have to save for a TBC.

[traal]

Because of the possibility of losing your tapes in the mail, if you send them out, don't send them out all at once. It's better to lose just a few tapes than all of them, right? So please add the extra postage fees and the risk of losing tapes to your 450€ estimate.

[dpalomaki]

As to evaluating the service you are considering, you could sent one tape to them to see what kind of results you get. Pick a low priority tape that is perhaps not a great recording so if it is lost or damaged no big loss. You can mitigate shipping risk if they are within a reasonable commute of where you are located.

The key question is how good is good enough.

Tapes copy/capture in real time, so if you have 50 two-hour tapes, it will take 100+ hours to digitize the content, not counting set-up and so forth. There is also a learning curve to consider, which may add time to your budget, especially if you plan to do any image restoration, cleanup, or editing (e.g., to remove unwanted material).

Used gear (even old machines that sat in your own closet) may be prone to eating tapes, so always test with unimportant material before inserting a valuable tape in a machine. And if you haven't already, pop the write protection tabs.

If you are lucky there may be video enthusiasts in your area that migth have equipment you could borrow or rent, or work on a project jointly. Finding them is the hard part.

[Bogilein]

I would first ask the transfer service company which vcr they are use (at least they should have 2 or more different ones), which tbc they are use and which capture card? Which codec they use to save the file (huffyuf, ut video codec, dv-avi, mp4, mpg.......).
If it will be a true professional he will describe all the hardware he use. Forget services who offer to transfer a full tape for 15,- euro. Usually prices for 1 hour about 20,- euros and more.
Ask about if they are transfer a videotape who was recorded of tv. A true professional wouldn't do this because of copyright issues.

[PatrickRyll]

Hello,

this is a great tip thank you very much!

[hodgey]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PatrickRyll

What do you say to the three VCRs I have listed, which one can I buy? (These three devices are very easy for me to get)

They're all decent VCRs. which one to get would come down to the condition of them. 90s panasonics are notorious for having capacitors that go bad, so if the VCR has seen a lot of usage and has not had service done on it it's more likely to have issues with it.

All else equal I think the Blaupunkt (aka Panasonic NV-FS200) may be the preferred one. The AG7350 has excellent playback quality, but it's a professional broadcast deck, so it does play tapes recorded in LP mode, and only has manual tracking. It also doesn't have TBC to correct wiggle like the other two do, so it would require something external like a DVD-Recorder for that to look good.

If you end up doing it yourself, you may be fine with going with a DVD-Recorder passthrough setup instead of TBC route which would be a bit cheaper. Bogilein can probably direct you to a german writeup on that.

[Bogilein]

I have just checked german second hand market which capture gear is available at the moment.

I found 2 SVHS-vcr which I would have a closer look.

The Blaupunkt RTV50 (280,- Euro) from 1992 or a Panasonic NV-HS860 (100,-) from 2001.
Usually I would give advice to try to buy a JVC too, but there is no one out there I would be interested in at the moment.

As capture card the canopus nx (PCI-X version) 50,- Euro and edius 7 (Virtual Dub won't work) 150,-

as tbc replacement 2 dvd-recorders (panasonic dmr-es10 & Sony RDR 680) each about 30,- (but often cheaper).

Then later editing with Virtual Dub-Avisynth-Edius (if DVD or mpg)-Hybrid (mp4,mkv).

If you would do it quick and dirty.
SVHS VCR-(Panasonic ES10) Sony RDR-680 (hq+mode 15mbit mpg)-IsoBuster-Hybrid