Thrift store Mitsubishi HS-HD2000U?
 

I'm in a thrift store to buy a vcr or a vcr dvd combo unit and they have a Mitsubishi HS-HD2000U. I get it for $10. I thought I had RCA cables and a super video cable at home, but it ends up I can't find them, to test the unit.

I can put a tape in and it seems to play it, but I can't hook it up to a tv to confirm.

If this thing works, will there be a difference in the display and the capture between RCA cables and super video cable?

What is the address of that thrift shop…?

$10 is a lottery ticket. I'd buy it. Good luck. :)

BTW, s-video is for "separated video", because it separates luna/Y and chroma/C, aka Y/C cables. Not "super" cables, even if found on Super VHS (S-VHS) machines.

This thrift store almost always has VCR's. This was the first time I have ever seen a SVCR.

I see now that I will need a Svideo cable and the RCA cables for sound.

thanks, Svideo is what I want to use correct? I will get a play and capture quality better then RCA?

"RCA" is audio, the red and white wires.

The yellow cable is "composite", nothing to do with RCA. It composites/smashes the luma and chroma together into a single video carrier signal. (RF/coax crams both audio and video into the same signal, and looks/sounds worst.)

Yes, s-video better, because Y/C, and not smushed/composited.

Mitsubishi HS-HD2000U is not just a VHS/S-VHS VCR, it can also record and playback D-VHS tapes, Albeit, Being an early model it cannot playback high bitrate commercial D-Theater tapes (pre-recorded D-VHS tapes) and records only in low bitrate (19Mbps) off of over the air ATSC channels or via DV sources over firewire, Pre-recorded digital tapes are like 25Mbps. But it should be good for capturing VHS/S-VHS tapes since it has the capability of digital processing for stable video. You can also capture into MPEG-2 SD over firewire if you wish, though using an external analog capture device via S-Video to capture lossless AVI is way better.

FYI, this model, also has common audio noise/buzz issues, regardless of HiFi or linear.

I got a thrift store Svideo cable and RCA/Composit cables. I tested it out and the HD2000 seems to work like it should.

the onboard TBC has the ability to get rid of the squiggly line (screen tearing?).

If I can capture the way it looks on the tv (with the exception of the aspect ratio) I will be happy.

about the aspect ratio.

When I play a vhs tape on my 40 inch 720p lcd tv the picture is displayed at 16:9 (I assume I could have changed that on the tv, if I had the remote).

When I capture I will be able to pick 4:3 on the capture software?

That's worth probably $100-$150 even if it didn't work. Working units tend to go for more like $400 on ebay last I checked.

I haven't fully tested mine, so I can't really comment on audio buzz. I did replace some caps as I noticed a certain brand in there liked to test a bit out of spec - can't remember what color labels those caps used. The TBC does have some SMT caps on it, but it's only like 6 if I recall correctly and I think the head amp may have a few SMT caps as well. I replaced those on mine, but it's not like I could tell there was an issue before doing the recap. Other thing that can fail on those is the main capstan belt, but that's obviously working if you're able to play tapes, but if it ever does go bad, there's some risk of damaging the thing ribbon cable coming off of the head which does need to be unplugged to get at the underside of the mechanism.

Odds are it will do better than just about any VCR that you're likely to find locally and almost certainly so for that price using S-Video out and the line TBC enabled, so that is a legit find for sure.

Get the TV remote, use the AR button. That's completely a HDTV issue, nothing to do with the VCR.

The capture will be 720x480/576 with a SAR, not a 4:3 DAR.

:laugh::laugh::laugh::laugh:

No.

Only f'ing moron eBay sellers think their turds smell like roses. Zero chance that this model unit will ever fetch that dollar amount in some random unknown broken state. (Well, near-zero, because eBay has dumb buyers as well as sellers. It happens, sadly.)

eBay "working" is rarely working either. Just words, because it helps the item sell.

Agreed, and nice $10 find/gamble. This rarely happens, but neat when it does. :congrats:

I am very happy with the find. I am going to try the I-O Data GV-USB2 as a capture card and see how it does.

A few months ago I sent 20 vhs tapes to I-memories. They had about a 50% success rate in transferring the tapes. The bad ones were jumpy with screen tearing. I already have the tapes back from I-memories and I can play some of the failed tapes on the HD2000U and they look good on my tv. Not all of them though.

OBS studio has a good reputation being workable with I-O Data GV-USB2 so I shall see.

My bar is set pretty low. I am just looking for them to look good on a cell phone or computer in a small window.

edit I do see that I-O Data GV-USB2 is a suspect card. I will try it the day I receive it and send it back if I cant get it to work.

Not OBS, use vdub or AmarecTV, OBS is a screen capture with improved digital camera capability but not for analog to digital capture.

No, it does not. :no2: