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  #21  
02-12-2010, 01:26 PM
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FR150 is 2.5 hours. Try to change it to FR180 or another increment. The MV5 should be the same as the others, unless this unit you have is somehow modified.

Get the Philips cables from Lowe's or Walmart.
Or if you're not in a rush, get these: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...SIN=B0002MQGK4

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  #22  
02-12-2010, 01:40 PM
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Ok, went to the menu and changed it to FR180....I'll Try it out, it only gave me 3 stars on the recording were it has 5 stars on the FR150 and SP mode.
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  #23  
02-12-2010, 01:51 PM
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That star system is stupid -- ignore it. It's based off the false idea that higher resolution equates to higher quality. Not true at all. I sometimes doubt icons like this were designed by the video experts designing the machines, but by some GUI-happy video-no-nothing marketing goon making bad assumptions. For more examples of this, pick up a product manual -- they're notorious for being written in Engrish, having grandiose statements about the product, and having misinformation. If you're lucky, you'll get one of those books where conflicting information is in different pages/chapters. Fun, fun!

FR180 = 180 minutes = 3 hours

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  #24  
02-12-2010, 09:50 PM
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I wish I was not like this...It is a form of compulsive disorder, it has to be, cause normal people are not this crazy...

My results: I recorded the same program using SP and FR180.

I used 3 DVD players for the testing

1 - player was used with an s-video cable
2 - players were used with an HDMI cable

I also mixed up the disks so I wouldn't know....

The FR180 mode, removes the blocks in the screen just about 100%, it is like they have been smoothed out.

However every once in a while you can kind of see something that looks like a block. To do this you pause the recorder over and over....

Sometimes on the motion of an object, it creates a streak effect...


Going from player to player watching the same events over and over. The quality is pretty close, however the detail in the SP picture is greater than FR180.

With the SP picture you do get blocks, however they are not as bad as the Panasonic DVD recorder...

The color seems to bleed more in FR180, the picture also blurs a bit more. The overall picture doesn't seem as bright.....

The best way to explain the difference is like so:

When u work on a photo and than save it to .jpg, the picture bleeds its colors out... When recording in SP the effect is far less than in FR180...FR180 bleeds like an .jpg picture which causes the overall picture to have more of a blur....It also can distort an object or figure in the video. The distortion amount is far greater than the SP mode.

This took a while to set up, and I had to view the same frames from both DVD's right next to each other....

Now off to test out the XP mode.....
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  #25  
02-12-2010, 10:36 PM
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XP mode....Also removes the blocks, overall that is what I wanted. The quality is pretty good also. Just going to have to burn through a ton of disks...

Question: If I record the video in XP, rip it to the PC, do my edits.

I want the final DVD's to be at least 2 hours, and some of them I would like to use Dual Layer disks....In the end, I just don't want to have 5 million DVD's.

What is going to happen to my XP recording when I merge to another XP recording and than burn it to a 2 hour disk...Will those Blocks show up...I am guesing not because they were not recorded in to the video....

I am off to try this out...XP mode seems to be the best.....
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  #26  
02-17-2010, 10:47 AM
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For the above observations, are you using the Panasonic AG-1980P VCR with that JVC DVD recorder? If so, I know where the problem is, why you see a "softer" image in FR180.

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  #27  
02-17-2010, 11:05 AM
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No only used the JVC VCR......

With the AG1980, I know it has soften to sharpen on the panel. (But what would be your reason)

These were pretty intense tests that I did with the 3 different settings...

Overall, The JVC recorder seems to be a little softer than the other DVD recorders I have used in the past. No Blocks in the screen using XP mode is MAJOR !!!

Of late been doing XP recordings the quality is really good...
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  #28  
02-17-2010, 11:27 AM
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The theoretical limits for VHS (when you incorporate Kell factor and some other resolution theories), it's often said that you need 720x480 to capture all of VHS signal to a DVD.

In practice, it's really not anywhere near there -- most of the "detail" you see at 720x480 sourced from a VHS tape is just excess signal noise, not actual picture.

This is why some people accuse 352x480 of being "soft" -- the noise is gone, and the noise gave the false appearance of image detail. (There are also some devices that encode poorly to Half D1 352x480, but this JVC DVD recorder isn't one of those devices.)

XP / FR60 and FR180 are basically the same quality, with the only difference being resolution; Half D1 352x480 vs Full D1 720x480. The bitrate allocation is near-identical, hence both giving best quality. SP is more compressed than either. SP is a more-compressed XP mode, being 720x480 too.

Some of those other errors (color loss) I'd have to suggest are probably imagination more than anything else. The encoder hasn't changed anything here.

Seeing blocks on 352x480 while pausing the video and looking for errors is a bit OCD. But being a test, I do the same thing! However, you can always find errors if you really loo for them. I could probably point out a dozen issues on the JVC decks (more from other brand decks) if I wanted to -- many of them being small or inconsequential. The XP mode version theoretically would have more blocks than the 352x480 version, as allocation is slightly less (~2%).

XP is a good recording mode, you won't do wrong there. Worst issue is more discs, but discs are small. Even a serious collector can store thousands of DVDs in a relatively tiny shelf space or closet space!

The default "0" setting on the sharp/soft slider on the AG-1980 is not neutral -- it's still sharpening. You have to slightly nudge it to the soft side to get it truer to neutral. This is one reason many owners suggest it's superior to other units -- and it's false.

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  #29  
02-17-2010, 11:55 AM
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You are right just tested out the XP with the OCD method of pausing using the HDMI setup and you can see some blocks. However on normal play one can hardly see them, if at all. (Yes they are greater than 352x480)

I am guessing blocks are how the DVD recorders gathers the infomation and how it puts the picture together.

One of the issues with 352x480 could be, I am using upconvert DVD players. When it gets converted up, maybe that is where u get the errors...

With s-video you can hardly see any difference. HDMI is where u can see the details..

One of the goals is to be able to play these old VHS tapes (converted to DVD) on the new TV's and have the picture look fine for viewing. That has really been the hardest part and the main goal of this project.

"Some of those other errors (color loss) I'd have to suggest are probably imagination more than anything else"

That is not the case at all, was viewing both recording next to each other on the TV to test. (If I could have taken screen captures or pictures I would have)

I would watch frames, really close than switch or would pause and watch the same frame next to each other. Trust me, it was not like I was missing any details....
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  #30  
02-17-2010, 12:25 PM
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MPEG-2 video is a matrix of blocks, with complex math determining how bitrate is distributed within blocks, between blocks, and temporally (if applicable). When bitrate is insufficient for the data, the edges of the block become more visible. Technically, the image is full of blocks in a perfect grid at all time. But with proper encoding, at a good bitrate, you never see them.

H.264 is popular because it is more granular, using blocks of different sizes and shapes. This helps with the quality, and with an added advantage of requiring lower bitrates.

There have been attempts to create non-block type video formats, but I don't recall any of them succeeding. Honeycombs and fractals, for example.

I think upconverting DVD players are terrible. Think about the economics of it, if nothing else. A $100-200 player is not going to have a better upscaler than the $1,000++ HDTV set. Many of the nicer ones even have tech based on Faroujda scaling. The HDTV has to scale everything to 1080p or 720p anyway. I prefer a component connection over HDMI, too, for SD DVD material. The HDMI "digitizes" it too much, in my experience -- I don't like that.

For future-proofing videos, we're starting to invest time and resources into VHS on Blu-ray -- even if the format fails, as projected -- because of H.264. But for now, DVD-Video is still the best option, both in cost and time.

You have a split-screen TV option?

Going back to something in an older post in this thread...
FR150 is still 720x480 and is VERY compressed. The changeover to 352x480 is either FR170 or FR175 (and I think it's 175 if I had to place a bet). You can test this yourself by recording a disc, and then analyzing the video recording in Gspot.

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  #31  
02-21-2010, 10:32 PM
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Ok, got a new S-Video cable at lowe's (RCA cable) tried it out......

This what I found by mistake....
(Using the Panasonic as a passthrough)

I had 1 recording that I wanted to try it with. Forgot to switch it back for the next recording....

THIS IS WHY
When I got to the next tape, the tape itself snapped. I than had to do VHS tape surgery.
(I wasn't thinking about my setup) Since I was on the operating table.

When I recorded the video, the picture seemed to be sharper. Completed the recording (3 disks XP mode)

I wanted to than try the 352x480 method, so I pulled out the pass through, and found tracking lines at the bottom of the screen. I forgot this was the problem that I had before with this tape. (It shows up on the TV)

(((((((the passthrough removed these lines...)))))))

I ripped the file to the PC, and looked at file. The scan lines below the picture were gone. It was so good that it almost didn't even need to be cropped...Normally it looks like this....The bottom Pic is using the passthrough...

ScanLineTest.jpg



Last edited by deter; 02-21-2010 at 10:36 PM.
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  #32  
02-21-2010, 10:53 PM
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That must not be standard tape head noise then, but a timebase/sync error in the lower most portion of the image. Not common, but not impossible.

The ES10 doesn't have any masking. I can't imagine other models would either.

The picture is shifted badly to the left, you'd want to re-shift it right in VirtualDub or another editor.

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  #33  
02-21-2010, 11:53 PM
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Oh that shift is because I pasted the pics on a black boarder in mspaint. I just screen copied than cut the pics from my video player....so sorry......
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  #34  
06-03-2010, 01:37 AM
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After further review the play has been reversed the fr180 or half d1 mode is worthless.....
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  #35  
08-17-2010, 09:21 PM
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Went back and tried the 352x480, and it is not worth the trouble of trying to work with 1/2 D1 digital file. Because these broadcasts are very long decided to even skip the DVD method....Now just put everything on a hard drive and play the hard drive on the TV

Everything is recorded in XP mode than editted.....

The problem with the re-issue has been the bitrates..

Without recoding the mpeg2 file.....That is a NO NO

The video was recorded in 1 hour mode about 4.7 gigs...It get sloppy when u try to than merge it in to a 2 hour video.....
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  #36  
08-17-2010, 09:24 PM
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Womble MPEG Video Wizard is what I suggest for editing MPEG files created on DVD recorders, including the JVC series machines. I work with such files near daily, and have no issues.

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  #37  
08-17-2010, 10:00 PM
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Here is the problem that haven't figured out how to get around....Record 4 or 5 disks in XP mode....The quality is fine.....

It is about 4 hours worth of material or 3 hours 20 minutes.......Doesn't matter....

Want to take the 3 hours and 20 minutes and issue to a Duel Layer disk....Doesn't work....

Want to take the 4 hours of material and issue to 2 DVD's...

How do u compress the mpeg file to fit when it is recorded in XP mode with out loss of quality....

No problems playing it from the hard drive the picture is fine and the bitrates can be as high as I want them...

However would still like to put them on DVD for backup
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  #38  
08-17-2010, 11:30 PM
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3.3 hours of content, at "XP mode" type bitrates, is too big for the disc. It would have to be re-encoded smaller, or it would require that less content be put to a single disc. About 1.75 hours of "XP mode" content is all that would fit a DVD+R DL. (And be sure to use Verbatim discs!)

I would generally not compress the homemade video again. I would either capture as lossless (or high bitrate I-frame MPEG-2) with a capture card and then encode that to MPEG-2 in MainConcept, or record on a DVD recorder to an FR mode that better suited the desired space use. FR70, for example, is not too bad (better than SP, not quite XP), and should fit the proposed two-disc DVD+R DL set.

You could always just split the file into 60-minute pieces, and put that onto single-layer discs. Or 1 hour and 45 minute segments, on DVD+R DL discs. For "archival" use, however, I suggest single-layer discs.

It really just comes down to math.

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  #39  
08-17-2010, 11:36 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by admin View Post
The changeover to 352x480 is either FR170 or FR175 (and I think it's 175 if I had to place a bet). You can test this yourself by recording a disc, and then analyzing the video recording in Gspot.
I happened to check my JVC SR45 last night and the changeover occurs on it at FR160.
I checked FR170 and FR180, not a lot of difference between 180 and 160 bitrate wise, about 200 bitrates lower at 180.
I don't know if that holds true with other JVC recorders.
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  #40  
08-19-2010, 03:44 AM
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Just wanted to add a few comments myself to what's already been said.

Womble MPEG Video Wizard (or MPEG Video Wizard DVD) is the way to go for sure, I pretty much use the same workflow you are using and it makes life about 1000x easier -- it's frame accurate and it has an intuitive interface that doesn't take much getting used it. Cutting with it is incredibly easy and accurate, it has far from a sloppy editing interface.

I work on a lot of old high-motion footage (wrestling mostly) and find that the sweet spot for minimizing macroblocks and maximizing disc space is right around FR-75/FR-80 on these recorders (I have a JVC DR-M100S). If your recorder supports that, I'd give that a shot and as was mentioned, at FR-80 you can get around 2 hrs and change of footage per DL disc. So your 3 hr and 20 minute shows can be split up as one DL and one SL disc and your four hour shows can be done as two DL discs. You can split them further into SL discs for archives and/or back up to an external drive.

You may have to split cells using VOB-blanker to get the layer break in right on the DL discs, as you will be pushing the maximum capacity of the disc, although that is pretty easy. Burn it with imgBurn of course.

Based on your earlier comments on the quality of the recording -- not sure how interested you are in purchasing new equipment or VCRs, but have you considered the SignVideo DR-1000 detailer? If you feel your captures look a little soft on output to DVD, a device like that will give you a much smaller range to tweak it with. I tread lightly with mine, but I find it gives that extra high-frequency look I prefer in my video, without causing mosquito noise or macroblocking.
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