As of yesterday I finally had the bare minimum equipment needed (deck and capture card), so I took my first test capture last night. HS-HD2000U s-video output >> Extron s-video to BNC Y/C split cable >> Kona LHe breakout cable BNC Y/C inputs >> capturing 8-bit 4:2:2 uncompressed in Premiere Pro CS6. I think CS6 is the last version that supported my LHe. About 1GB per minute

and I'm pleasantly surprised by how it came out. I'm particularly surprised by how good the audio is when heard through reference equipment. I tested on a THX Return of the Jedi VHS that seems to be in good condition. x265 compressed it to about 1.4% of the original uncompressed size with pretty minimal quality change. Excited to keep going and start trying different settings and eventually be ready to do the home videos properly.
This setup is temporary as I just couldn't wait to get my first capture by any means necessary. I know none of this is the recommended stuff but it's just what I already have set up and am already familiar with using. After I get a TBC I'll be ready to go for real and I'll have to move on to learning about the different capturing software.
I've attached 5 screenshots of the uncompressed video and also the x265 encoded .mkv clip of it.
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Uncompressed video/audio file info:
[Video - General]
Complete name : E:\files\video\captures\rotj-01.avi
Format : AVI
Format/Info : Audio Video Interleave
Format profile : OpenDML
File size : 1.19 GiB
Duration : 1 min 1 s
Overall bit rate : 166 Mb/s
[Video]
ID : 0
Format : 2vuy
Codec ID : 2vuy
Duration : 1 min 1 s
Bit rate : 166 Mb/s
Width : 720 pixels
Height : 480 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 3:2
Frame rate : 29.970 (30000/1001) FPS
Standard : NTSC
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 16.000
Time code of first frame : 08;06;40;11 / 08;06;40;11
Time code source : Adobe tc_A / Adobe tc_O
Stream size : 1.19 GiB (100%)
[Audio - General]
Complete name : E:\files\video\captures\rotj-01.wav
Format : Wave
File size : 11.3 MiB
Duration : 1 min 1 s
Overall bit rate mode : Constant
Overall bit rate : 1 537 kb/s
[Audio]
Format : PCM
Format settings : Little / Signed
Codec ID : 1
Duration : 1 min 1 s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 1 536 kb/s
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 48.0 kHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Stream size : 11.3 MiB (100%)
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x265 compressed video/audio file info:
[General]
Complete name : E:\files\video\encodes\rotj-test-01_x265.mkv
Format : Matroska
Format version : Version 4
File size : 17.9 MiB
Duration : 1 min 1 s
Overall bit rate : 2 434 kb/s
ErrorDetectionType : Per level 1
[Video]
ID : 1
Format : HEVC
Format/Info : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile : Main@L3@Main
Codec ID : V_MPEGH/ISO/HEVC
Duration : 1 min 1 s
Bit rate : 1 106 kb/s
Width : 704 pixels
Height : 478 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 3:2
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 29.970 (30000/1001) FPS
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.110
Stream size : 8.12 MiB (45%)
Writing library : x265 8bit+10bit+12bit
Default : Yes
Forced : No
Color range : Limited
Color primaries : BT.601 NTSC
Transfer characteristics : BT.709
Matrix coefficients : BT.601
[Audio #1]
ID : 2
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Commercial name : Dolby Digital
Codec ID : A_AC3
Duration : 1 min 1 s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 640 kb/s
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel layout : L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 kHz
Frame rate : 31.250 FPS (1536 SPF)
Compression mode : Lossy
Delay relative to video : -5 ms
Stream size : 4.70 MiB (26%)
Title : Stereo
Service kind : Complete Main
Default : Yes
Forced : No
[Audio #2]
ID : 3
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Commercial name : Dolby Digital
Codec ID : A_AC3
Duration : 1 min 1 s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 640 kb/s
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel layout : L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 kHz
Frame rate : 31.250 FPS (1536 SPF)
Compression mode : Lossy
Delay relative to video : -5 ms
Stream size : 4.70 MiB (26%)
Title : Stereo
Service kind : Complete Main
Default : No
Forced : No
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Even though I'm not staying with this workflow I'm still interested to know how the settings and results look. I came across a ton of options for the video capture that I hadn't been able to read about yet, so some I left on the default, some I took a guess and changed.
720x480 was the smallest resolution I was able to select -- didn't see a way to enter custom resolution, not sure if it was there or not. 2vuy and the other options (I think that was for color) I wasn't sure about and left at default.
Timecode was an interesting one, there were options for using embedded LTC or VITC #1 or VITC #2 -- I was thinking to set that to VITC #1 but LTC was the default so I left it on that.
I see my 4:2:2 when uncompressed got downgraded to 4:2:0 when I compressed with x265 -- I'm thinking I probably didn't lose anything discernible there since that happened in compression and I had already gotten the original capture in 4:2:2 off the tape so I had as much info as possible.
The eventual goal is to get everything set up properly and then do the VHS home movies and save the uncompressed files on separate HDDs, while burning compressed versions to BD discs and keeping those files on the media server as well. Still a way off but it's nice to finally have captured something just to be able to look through settings and options and see how it works.