HDMI VCR - Should I still capture using an analog capture card?

[joe79]

I have a Panasonic DMR-ES45V (I hope this is a good start), which has HDMI. It looks really good compared to my other older Panasonic VCR (composite to Denon Receiver to OLED TV) so I'm planning to use the 45V. I read that I still should capture to my computer using an analog signal. I don't want to miss out on any possible quality or end up with a bad transfer, so I'd like to know what's a good quality capture card. I couldn't deduce from the forums, so I thought I'd finally ask. I have an Intel NUC Windows 11, plenty of processing power, just no internal room, so USB is what I'll have to use. Any recommendation would be extremely helpful.

Thanks!

[lordsmurf]

HDMI out = bad
s-video = best
composite = not great, but better than HDMI

I can expand later. Just quick reply for now.

[Gary34]

Quote:

I have an Intel NUC Windows 11, plenty of processing power, just no internal room, so USB is what I'll have to use. Any recommendation would be extremely helpful.

Video capture is a single core task. Per core speed is what matters. They have added more cores throughout the years but the speed per core has stayed about the same.

You really want your OS on an SSD and a HDD to capture to.

USB will be your limiter so whether you are using an SSD or HDD won’t really matter then if you are using USB. External drives don’t have the sustained connection required. capturing to USB will have dropped frames and other issues.

Windows 11 can be an issue. You will want to look for a capture card that has good compatibility with windows 11 if you are going to use a windows 11 computer for capturing. That’s part of why people capture to Windows XP. It has compatibility with more quality capture cards. Also Windows 10 and 11 will just generally give you more problems than XP or Windows 7. They do a lot in the background.

[joe79]

Thanks! I have an i5 2.4 GHz system with USB-A and USB-C and an internal m.2 SSD with about 400 gb available. Like others have pointed out, USB capture cards haven't advanced since shortly after VHS was overthrown by DVD 15-20 years back, so I'm looking for something from that era. I'm looking into the Pinnacle USB that's for sale on this site. I'm also curious if my VCR will do the trick, or if I'll run into some issues capturing. I'll find out one way or another.

Thanks!
Joe

[Gary34]

Quote:

I'm also curious if my VCR will do the trick, or if I'll run into some issues capturing. I'll find out one way or another

Your VCR is really where you get the biggest quality difference. The prices are high though so it’s tempting to try something unrecommended. You can resell it. That all is your decision though. Anyways I hope that helped some good luck with it.

[lordsmurf]

You will undoubtedly run into quality issues with that VCR.

[Gary34]

LS doesn’t sugarcoat anything lol. It’s good he does that. He was the only one telling me to get rid of my old capture card and I’m glad I did. Keeping that would have been an unnecessary headache. He is obviously right. He has 30 years of experience and he’s worked for a major studio. You are going to run into issues with that VCR.

I would read the guide and see why they use S-Video and information about timebase errors. Look into why they use lossless codecs and just all of that before you start buying. The guide is really good. When you read it do understand that things are geared towards lossless AVIs now because of how cheap HDDs are now.

[joe79]

I’m seeing about sourcing one from the list when the budget allows. For now getting the right capture card would be best for me.

[lordsmurf]

Quote:

Originally Posted by joe79

I’m seeing about sourcing one from the list when the budget allows. For now getting the right capture card would be best for me.

In the realm of video capture, it's always a battle between visual quality and signal quality. There is lots of nuance, as based on gear.

With a lousy VCR, no TBC, and a lousy capture card, a capture attempt will utterly fail. But you're getting a better card, known for a degree of resilience to bad signals. So while it still won't look great due to the VCR, and still may trip over bad signals (dropped frames, audio desync, etc) due to lack of TBC, it should capture without wholesale rejection. So you can see something, "get your feet wet" with the process. And then when budget allows, acquire the rest of the gear for the actual project.

I don't see a problem with your plan here.

[aramkolt]

As with anything, there are pros and cons to the method you choose. These are my opinions - not claiming that they are "right" or better than anyone else's.

Pros of the HDMI capture route:
-Far fewer steps/time involved
-No chance of audio sync issues
-EZ series usually have line TBC effects of the ES10/15 (may not be as strong, but it's there to some degree)
-Less expensive
-Equipment is more "likely to work as intended" out of the box since it was more recently manufactured - caveat is power supply caps which can go bad if the unit was plugged into AC for decades since the power supply is always active, even in "standby/off" mode - so would recommend doing this yourself or bringing it to someone that can if you see bulged/leaking caps.
-Shorter hardware chain (One single analog to digital conversion)
-Likely to be indistinguishable from better methods if viewed on a very small screen such as a cell phone.
-Doesn't require a specific operating system - Mac friendly

Caveat - Would not use this method if your player doesn't output either 480i or 480p at 59.94fps (you should be able to use your TV's "info" button during playback to see the frame rate). It needs to do that so that you can be sure it isn't throwing away half of the interlaced fields or isn't "blending" them. I believe Panasonic EZ series does do 59.94 fps, but you'd want to confirm that on your model first using the info button.

Cons of the HDMI route:
-Can't do anything about clipping/crushed/blown out darks/brights if the player does that (also described here as AGC/Automatic gain control issues) - not sure if that's known to happen with your model
-EZ series usually does not preserve interlacing over HDMI (there may be some models that do preserve it in Europe, but they probably have PAL-only VHS decks) - useful if you plan to keep the original large capture file and do current or future software deinterlancing methods which are probably almost certainly "better" and deinterlacing options may improve in the future that you can try later.
-You likely will have to also pass through a cheap HDMI splitter to defeat HDCP depending on the model even for non-copy protected content (home videos you made yourself) as the player probably adds protection to the signal and the capture card will likely refuse to capture without one. This refusal to capture is not due to a frame TBC not being present. Can't even imagine how many returns Panasonic would have had if VHS tapes couldn't play over HDMI as advertised haha. Modern TVs are not tolerant to digital signal errors, but they will of course display HDCP content whereas your capture card almost certainly won't without that splitter/HDCP remover.

If you are looking for the absolute best, then probably best to skip HDMI capture using an EZ series Panasonic combo unit, but you may find that diminishing returns in terms of time spent and overall quality improvement using the recommended method especially depending on your destination format and viewing window size. Odds are that the HDMI method will be far superior to what the average consumer or transfer service will do to convert tapes which is very often an Elgato video capture or worse from Amazon. Professional capture services often capture using the same, or they'll do it with better hardware, but capture at a low bitrate (for easy distribution) that destroys the quality anyway.

I have an EZ48V for an eventual comparison to the recommended methods, but I haven't done formal testing with it yet. My initial impression was that it does play back pretty decently and didn't show significant image distortion or tearing at the top of the image from what I remember.

[lordsmurf]

Quote:

Originally Posted by aramkolt

Pros of the HDMI capture route:
-Far fewer steps/time involved
-No chance of audio sync issues
-EZ series usually have line TBC effects of the ES10/15 (may not be as strong, but it's there to some degree)
-Less expensive
-Equipment is more "likely to work as intended" out of the box since it was more recently
-Shorter hardware chain (One single analog to digital conversion)
-Likely to be indistinguishable from better methods if viewed on a very small screen such as a cell phone.
-Doesn't require a specific operating system - Mac friendly

All of that is false.

- It's the same minimum amount of steps involved, regardless of hardware/software. The can be more, for better quality, but not less.
- EZ is not ES series, and even "ES series" is misleading because not all have TBC(ish) ability.
- It's not less expensive whatsoever. Perhaps if you buy a garbage HDMI converter for $5, and a thrift store VCR. But buy peanuts, and all you get is monkeys.
- Cheap gear actually has vastly more problems, not less.
- You can do VCR > capture card for any connection type, and it sucks equally across the m all.
- You can still see wiggle/etc when small.
- No modern OS is friendly to video capture. Microsoft, Apple, and even the open-source community does not care anymore. Capturing analog videotapes is a task from 20 years ago, and they want new and shiny (AI, 5G, metaverse. etc).

Quote:

If you are looking for the absolute best, then probably best to skip HDMI capture using an EZ series Panasonic combo unit, but you may find that diminishing returns

No.

Analogy time.

Your statement effectively is a menu of two items:
- prime cut steak
- cockroaches

Order now, serving dinner soon!

But in reality, those are not the only choices. Sure, you can splurge on steak, or you can eat bugs like a primitive. But most of us (probably 99%+) will choose a sub-prime steak, or hamburger, or even a fake-meat product. Or a salad, or fish, or bananas, or eggs.

Constructing a workflow isn't any different. Something like "fish & chips" or "carrots & peas" goes together, much like "X VCR & Y TBC & Z capture card". What you don't want is weird concoctions, like putting ketchup on ice cream (ie, using HDMI converters, which was made for video game consoles and DVD players, to be used in a video capture workflow).

Video quality is somewhat binary, either decent or crap. But the gear that gets you to decent/excellent has multiple pathways, and several budget points. The main difference in budget is allowing for trouble-free quality, and trouble-free usage.

With video conversion, you pay, period. With sanity/frustration/time, or money, or both (middle ground budget gear). As you get older, money means less than time (for family, for health, etc).

[Hushpower]

Disclaimer: I'm in PAL land and have PAL gear.

I have an EZ48. It's a great machine. It's quality is comparable to my SVHS JVC 5700.

It's HDMI output is on par with the S-Video output.

Aramkolt is correct in saying you may need a splitter, as the EZ48 outputs a protected signal and a high-quality HDMI digitiser will reject it. Regarding the HDMI quality, it is directly related to the cost of the digitiser. The $200 Startech USB3HDCAP captures great video; a $40 not as much, and a cheapo pretty poor.

With the right HDMI digitiser, the EZ48 will output Interlaced HDMI video. It is set up in the VCR settings.

The EZ48 has good stabilising properties, the same as the ES-15.

Windows 11 is fine for analogue capture. Use a decent modern USB digitiser such as an IO Data GV-USB2 or Hauppauge USB-Live2 and capture with AmarecTV.

With 400GB available, that's over 4 hours of lossless analogue video; IF your external drive (USB 3/USB C) can't hack it (I have no doubt that it will be OK) then capture to your internal HDD then transfer your captures to your external disk for editing.

[ahmed12h]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gary34

LS doesn’t sugarcoat anything lol. It’s good he does that. He was the only one telling me to get rid of my old capture card and I’m glad I did. Keeping that would have been an unnecessary headache. He is obviously right. He has 30 years of experience and he’s worked for a major studio. You are going to run into issues with that VCR.

I would read the guide and see why they use S-Video and information about timebase errors. Look into why they use lossless codecs and just all of that before you start buying. The guide is really good. When you read it do understand that things are geared towards lossless AVIs now because of how cheap HDDs are now.

Wow, I really trust LS for any topic related into digitization because his huge experience . But until now
as my technical background in Computer since , it is no way to have good experience with old card than
nowadays card , cuz of evolution, every thing is going in better way. specially in electronics and accessories PC. I know those cards were produced in 2000s but still untill now some company produced cards has same functions, So why those company produced cards less quality than 2000s, should be better or same at least. am I right guys ?

this is the most question coming to my mind all the time.
but for my side , I did many experement in digitization field with many ADC . and many ways . still not satisfied 100% and I am really excited to do LS way and see the result with my eyes.

[Gary34]

Quote:

So why those company produced cards less quality than 2000s, should be better or same at least. am I right guys ?

Everyone transitioned away from analog around the mid 2000s. You can see it in the TVS too. The 2004 Trinitrons were pretty nice. Heavy though. My wife hated mine. It’s gone now. The TVs around 2006 were hybrid analog and digital. Tbc’s got worse because some of the better chipsets weren’t being produced anymore so they got worse then kind of fizzled out. When this gear was getting made VCR manufacturers had huge budgets to come up with this gear. That all changed when the world went digital.

[Gary34]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hushpower

Disclaimer: I'm in PAL land and have PAL gear.

I have an EZ48. It's a great machine. It's quality is comparable to my SVHS JVC 5700.

It's HDMI output is on par with the S-Video output.

Aramkolt is correct in saying you may need a splitter, as the EZ48 outputs a protected signal and a high-quality HDMI digitiser will reject it. Regarding the HDMI quality, it is directly related to the cost of the digitiser. The $200 Startech USB3HDCAP captures great video; a $40 not as much, and a cheapo pretty poor.

With the right HDMI digitiser, the EZ48 will output Interlaced HDMI video. It is set up in the VCR settings.

The EZ48 has good stabilising properties, the same as the ES-15.

Windows 11 is fine for analogue capture. Use a decent modern USB digitiser such as an IO Data GV-USB2 or Hauppauge USB-Live2 and capture with AmarecTV.

With 400GB available, that's over 4 hours of lossless analogue video; IF your external drive (USB 3/USB C) can't hack it (I have no doubt that it will be OK) then capture to your internal HDD then transfer your captures to your external disk for editing.

I am not trying to be rude but i am wonder why you are on this site? If I didn’t think that this gear was needed and didn’t want to learn scripting I wouldn’t be here. You don’t really seem that appreciative of the help they’re providing. I’m just wondering why you don’t go to some site that promotes using an Ez48 with a Startech USB3HDCAP. That would be a better idea than arguing false points with LS who probably doesn’t feel like arguing back. You’re just kinda spreading misinformation.

[lordsmurf]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hushpower

I'm in PAL land and have PAL gear.

That's always the difference in these exact conversation. In some areas of video gear, PAL users are lucky. In others, NTSC users have an edge. Not just models and features, but pricing and availability (at least for now, that will eventually change to parity).

Quote:

Originally Posted by ahmed12h

it is no way to have good experience with old card than nowadays card , cuz of evolution, every thing is going in better way.

For this specific niche task, analog video conversion, what you state simply is not true. Analog video conversion is now a legacy task, something that was mostly completed in the 2000s and 2010s. Most current projects are redo (to fix bad captures with bad gear), or procrastinators (mostly large institutions, because of typical organizational politics and misplaced priorities).

Quote:

So why those company produced cards less quality than 2000s, should be better or same at least. am I right guys ?

No. The market demand for it is almost nil, very niche. Therefore no new quality cards have been designed since the 2000s. So excluding long-lived cards (all of which have suffered production change over the years, especially Hauppauge), what we've gotten since the late mid 2010s is either (1) cheap Chinese knockoff-grade junk, (2) HD cards that "also do" SD ingest very poorly (ie, Blacmagic and others). Also some items that are misused, such as HDMI converters made for videogame consoles and DVD players, and those entirely screw up analog videotape sources.

Sadly, we never got wish-list type capture cards from the early 2000s, that incorporated the best features from all extant cards at the time. For example, we could have gotten 4:2:2 broadcast MPEG hardware capture, than removed chroma noise -- but it never happened (though some beta-quality cards started, then ceased the model line).

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gary34

Everyone transitioned away from analog around the mid 2000s. You can see it in the TVS too. The 2004 Trinitrons were pretty nice. Heavy though. My wife hated mine. It’s gone now. The TVs around 2006 were hybrid analog and digital. Tbc’s got worse because some of the better chipsets weren’t being produced anymore so they got worse then kind of fizzled out. When this gear was getting made VCR manufacturers had huge budgets to come up with this gear. That all changed when the world went digital.

The main catalyst for the downfall of better gear was the GFC (great financial crisis) of '08-09. The GFC bankrupted lots of business, of all sizes. Other companies decided to downsize, become more lean, to ride it out, often selling divisions to Chinese/foreign companies (who then used the brand name, but on their own cheap inferior crap). And that "leaning" process continued well into the mid 2010s.

In terms of video, we lost blank media manufacturers (50%+ went under!), semiconductor manufacturers, and various hardware manufacturers. The mid 2000s M&A also caused some damage, such as the liquidation of Canopus and ATI, by Grass Valley and AMD.

So there's no mystery why video gear declined drastically in quality into the 2010s.

And relatively flat volatile financial conditions (and inflation) since late 2018 has kept away large new R&D spending on niche items like this. It's all about AI, 5G, metaverse, etc, none of which really affects analog videotape ingest. That will persist, and nothing "new" is likely to ever exist as a result (aside from perhaps niche small-run items, to cater to the now-small niche).

Video conversion probably has another decade left, before it becomes phone booths. So there is time to operate a small business, locate those stragglers, or even buy/use/resell gear. By the time video capture becomes a truly "old"/obsolete task (beyond a legacy task), I'll hopefully be retired. But that 10-year declining clock is precisely why nothing new will exist. Within 6 years, by 2030, we're probably going to see slop-shop companies like LegacyBox/Kodak/AMB and strip-mall Youtubers close up. I saw the writing on the wall for printed newspapers in 1999, and I see it now for video conversion. And before anybody mentions it, no, vhs-decode/etc will not change anything, it's on the same trajectory, and actually probably worse off since still stuck in eternal beta.

Pricing for extant quality gear won't really decline from current values, because it's now a vicious battle between failing gear and hobbyists hoarding gear for the longer-term niche (enthusiast ownership beyond a decade, like Betamax). Eventually it'll be antiques, and some arguably already are, especially 70s and early 80s decks.

As always, follow the money.

[latreche34]

The best capture card chips were made when computer resources were low, Now with adequate computer resources those chips are no longer being made or replacement designs and changes were made but not up to the task. This is why quality capturing is a rabbit hole for a lot of people that ignore this fact.