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04-01-2022, 01:34 PM
Shakedown St. Shakedown St. is offline
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I've got a friend who asked... how can you determine if your BigVoodoo is an earlier model? Because he's looking to find one of his own.

I didn't have an answer for him, other than maybe the serial number? The Cypress is easy because you can tell by the color green or black. I'm not sure how you can determine this on the BVTBC10s.

If anyone would know, I bet it would be Smurf.

I know mine is an earlier model. My serial # for example is 10TXXC2
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  #2  
04-02-2022, 03:49 AM
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I have one available right now. Have him contact me, give him my email if he's not on-forum.

The serial number isn't necessarily a tell. As I've written in other places, serial numbers aren't what most people think they are. It's not a sequential counting of units (001,002,003,etc), but production codes. And that's why many have not just numbers, but letters. Serials that may only seem to be 1 number/letter off could be vastly different productions, years apart, insides changed.

The main tell is the performance, certain chip combinations (ie, must open unit). It's not about serials, or fonts, or anything externally visible. For TBCs, firmware on-chip matters as much as the chips, usually due to how multiple chips interact on the board. Structurally, there are some board tells, though not conclusive.

You're not going to find one of these on eBay, or Craigslist, or Facebook, or wherever. It will require some meaningful contact directly to an original seller. Not a recycler, not somebody random claiming "tested" and "working". (My favorite is "pulled from a working environment" which means not tested, no idea if actually working. Don't be fooled by this eBay speak.)

For example, my most recent stash came from a small facility dumping both VCRs and TBCs (and some other stuff). We're talking 7 excellent specimens of each. In this instance, the tell on age was directly related to the other gear being sold, as all was initially bought new at the same time. While I had previously decided to get out of VCRs, I can't resist acquiring something like this for our community. It was a find. I got an email from a contact, which got that rolling. Few questions, some back-and-forth on price, and it got Fedex'd here. I've since sold most of the TBCs, several VCRs, mostly adding capture cards for workflows. This was a unicorn deal, and something like this happen less than once per year. Very soon, I'll be completely out of gear again.

My previous find of about 5 units was a nightmare. All needed total teardown, several board-level fixes. It took about 6 months to get all back into working condition. But the outcome was flawless units.

I do have a stash of bad units, to swipe parts for good units that need repair. Both the 5 and the 7 batch needed parts from my stash. Mostly the 5, the 7 was just minor issues to fix. And how did I get these extra bad units? It wasn't on purpose. Bad buy. Buying video gear has a gamble aspect to it, even offline, even when you know what you're doing.

And that gamble nature, even armed with knowledge, is the reason I don't give out certain information. Because I'll get blamed for "bad information" when things go sideways. With buying TBCs, things can quickly go sideways. This is a main reason people stick to TBC-1000, historically. Sadly, failed caps in TBC-1000 is becoming an epidemic now. But at least it's binary(ish) advice -- good units (maybe with quirks, noise patterning, lesser transparency), or units with bad caps that need fixing (and then it should be a good unit again). TBC-1000 isn't the best of the TBCs, not in the top 5, merely excellent in top 10 or 15, easier to find/get, but it's safer for newbies that insist on sourcing their own units, rather than buy my refurb'd and rebuilt TBCs.

Even if your friend found an early unit, now being about 15 years old, odds are it'd need some attention to be put back in shape. Does he have the knowledge and parts for it? Is he willing to buy bad units for parts (also not really easy to find), and then spend months rehabbing it? Does he want to use a TBCs, or fart around with it? Where does he want to invest his time and money? He may save some bucks with DIY, but the costs of time will be far more.

Unless your friend has some contacts, or has some offline leads, he's chasing a fool's errand. Especially since he has zero knowledge of the broader market of what he's looking to buy. Good BV TBC units are relatively rare, some models especially. Key West wasn't a large producer, not like DataVideo or Cypress, and the biggest production was for bad units (especially BVTBC). What you're going to find online is crap that gets resold from person to person -- generally stubborn buyers ("I know I can find it myself for pennies on the dollar!"), who quickly become remorseful buyers ("Man, you were right."). Seen it many times, often only discussed in private, though a few admit to their folly in the forum.

FYI, Cypress is only ~99% accurate, referencing only the green/black AVT-8710. There are some later cycle units with quirks. Again, serial number is only a tell, not conclusive. Or any physical trait, be it color, fonts, button positions, etc. The boards, chips, and on-chip software is the actual variable.

Most people don't realize what I have to go through to arrive at the good gear I sell in the forum marketplace. It takes a lot of work to find these pieces, and then refurb back into excellent working condition.

- Did my advice help you? Then become a Premium Member and support this site.
- For sale in the marketplace: TBCs, workflows, capture cards, VCRs
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  #3  
04-03-2022, 08:26 PM
Shakedown St. Shakedown St. is offline
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The guru has spoken. I'll spread the word!
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