Panasonic AG-1980 worth it for VHS-C?
 

Hi guys, I think I'm the only person on here using a JVC HR-SC1000u. The machine is one of very few that can play VHS-C tapes without an adapter. It's a well built mechanism and I assumed it would be better at playing VHS-C than a standard VCR because it's specifically made for that.

After spending a lot of time fixing it, I finally got around to transferring some tapes. I'm using a GV-USB2 and Panasonic ES-10 passthrough with VirtualDub on WinXP.

The VCR works just fine, it's not perfect. Standard commercial tapes play great, occasional dropouts but nothing out of the ordinary for the old tapes I'm playing. A freshly recorded tape plays flawlessly, like zero dropouts. This thing doesn't have any drop out compensation or any other digital processing besides a "stabilizer" function. It's got a brand new head drum. The transport mechanism is old and needs frequent alignment tweaks though, even after just sitting for long periods it can go out.

I have about 30 VHS-C tapes to transfer, all recorded with a mix of SP and EP on each tape. The tapes are all name brand, mostly JVC or Panasonic from 1996-2007. All stored properly, no damage or mold.

VHS-C playback is what you would expect, not as great. Mostly very stable just noticeably more dropouts. I'm not that happy with the results, but I am a perfectionist.

I'm starting to wonder if I should just get the AG-1980 so I don't waste my time with mediocre transfers.

A refurbished AG-1980 is out of my budget, there's a couple on ebay that I'd be willing to spend the money on and fix myself. I'm concerned that I might not be able to repair one up to a high enough standard to be satisfied with the results. I've aligned my VCR with a scope, replaced capacitors, etc. I just don't want to buy another machine, spend time fixing it, and finding again that maybe I'm not good enough at repair or the tapes are simply just old and slightly degraded.

If what people say about the AG-1980 is true, I think most of my tapes would look flawless.

Does anyone have any examples of VHS-C tapes on the AG-1980 VS a different deck? Is it that much better? Is it worth it?

Hard to say from here. We have neither your player nor your tapes to make a judgement on either, let alone as a combination.

Yes this isnt 2000 but 2025. The machines havent been made for many years. Condition of the player and the likelihood of getting it to "as new" playback performance" is very important.

Why not upload a couple of samples, including audio which can be tricky to get right especially on LP/EP?

Welcome. :)

TL;DR = yes, AG-1980P worth it, but only if you buy it from the right place/person. (So not TGrant, not Southern Advantage, definitely never eBay or the lying/incompetent eBay sellers, etc.)

Replying as I read...

Doesn't that model not have a line TBC? :hmm:

Not a good reason to avoid adapters.

VHS-C is a pesky format, and really has little in common with VHS in a handling/quality sense. The tapes were, in a word, crap. I regret ever having used it (for our family recordings in the 90s), and we should have used Hi8 instead. Hindsight.

<sigh> The GV-USB2 meme strikes again. Too many people are using that subpar card. I'm actually surprised VirtualDub works with it. That Japanese cards tends to only work well with the Japanese software AmaRecTV (which is itself made for recording video games, not videotapes). Hmm, I wonder if XP is why VirtualDub works? What are your timing settings? Screencap it.

ES10 is a decent line TBC(ish) to use with that non-TBC deck. It's budget, not what should be used for any sort of serious work (neither hobby nor pro, just one-off DIY if on a strict budget).

Honestly, as is expected, with this format, with this sort of mid-range deck.

Yuck. Having no DOC is actually somewhat rarer with NTSC decks, especially JVCs

This is exactly what you're doing. Wasting time, inferior results. As expected. Some people don't value their time, and will suggest all sorts of gear, in the sole effort of avoiding spending money on the gear that would (a) make their life easier, (b) give the quality desired, maybe even better than the person imagined was even possible.

eBay is not a gold mine, it's a land mine. You think you're wasting time now? You ain't seen nothing yet!

Most people have projects (or projects for others, ie no permissions), and are not going to make bad captures just to showcase how great the gear is. They want to use it, get the job done. It takes a lot of effort to make something like that for others, and it generally serves them no purpose. So this is why you don't see lots of before/after online.

Instead of blowing money on eBay, considering using the same funds to outsource the project to somebody reliable. (For only 30 -C tapes, I'd reluctantly do it. But only if you let me take the before/after as part of that process. Because I'm getting tired of always being asked for samples. So I'll need your lossless files on HDD/SSD, to compare to your current attempts. In fact, I have some other decks I'd run tests on, so multi-test!)

I feel like we're getting this sort of response too much lately. There's enough information in posts to have a good general idea. We know the hardware, the typical issues, the typical outcomes of better gear. It's not always that exacting to specific tapes.

This. :congrats:

If you're on the fence, if you send me one of your tapes that you've already captured that you're seeing some issues with, I can transfer it the way that I normally would with a refurbished AG1980 and you can decide if the result is enough different/better than what you got and decide if the AG1980 does what you are thinking it will. If you want a guaranteed good result without the effort at roughly the same cost of a parts machine plus the parts, [have somebody] transfer all of your the tapes with a refurbished AG1980 for around that price.

It's theoretically possible that the tapes could get lost in shipping which is the main downside. The guard against that would be to transfer them yourself first as a "just in case" copy so that the content isn't totally lost if they were to get lost in shipping.

As far as whether I recommend refurbing yourself, if those are your only tapes and you don't plan on doing more later, I probably wouldn't bother given the above option. It's pretty satisfying to have successfully refurbished such a machine, but even more frustrating to have spent the same amount of time, effort, and cost to end up with a machine that still doesn't work, so it is quite a a gamble if you go that route.

This. :screwy:

Note to self: I need to add one of those pointing up smileys.

Thanks for the replies!

Lordsmurf, thanks for the generous offer to transfer some tapes, I don't feel that comfortable having anyone but myself transfer the tapes, even though you are probably the most qualified person I know of. They are very sentimental! I'm sure you guys understand, since most of us here are doing our own transfers. I will consider it some more though. Family videos can be hard to watch sometimes too, maybe it would be easier to have someone else do them. Even then, I'd be terrified of them getting lost!

I do actually still have the original VHS-C motorized adapter we used back in the day. I'm pretty sure it's the good one.

I'm not completely happy with the GV-USB2, it's great device compared to the awful blackmagic intensity pro I was using before, but it barely works with virtualdub, the video preview and histogram will not show simultaneously, and I have to use the GraphStudioNext workaround for the proc-amp. There's a decent amount of capture errors too, I'm not sure whether it's down to the card or the ES-10. They kinda look like dropouts but one entire line has gone white or rainbow for the duration of a single field. At this point since I'm already using WinXP on a computer I use for negative scanning, I might as well look out for an AIW card.

Not 100% sure if the deck completely lacks DOC, it's from 1991 and doesn't mention anything in the service manual so I'm just assuming based on my capture results.

Definitely agree that eBay is too risky. I probably would be wasting a lot of time, even though I enjoy electronics repair, the ag-1980 doesn't look fun to repair. I have wasted a lot of time on this whole thing trying to do it on a budget, you're right. I've learned a lot though.

If I can find a good AG-1980 for a fair price that's probably the best place to start. Should the built in line tbc be enough?

I'm not unhappy with the ES-10, so far it's been solid. No dropped frames yet. There's some parts of tapes that can have a little vertical jitter which may just be down to the VCR, happens only really on EP.

I know 30 tapes (maybe even less actually) doesn't really seem like enough to justify the money spent but I guess I can resell the gear when I'm done. I've actually been planning on archiving these tapes for many years, since I noticed even back then that the VHS-C tapes seemed to look worse the more you play them back. That's another reason I'm hesitant about putting ALL of my precious tapes through a machine that I screwed around with. The sound of the heads striking the tape makes me cringe, especially when you hear the sound change slightly.

Realistically I can't afford to spent 4 grand on a setup, doesn't make sense. If I can somehow squeeze it all in for around $1k, that would be doable. Then I can sell it on to the next guy. (although I'd be tempted to hang on to a nice deck in case vhs-decode actually becomes really good someday)

Any suggestions on where to buy an AG-1980?

-- merged --

aramkolt, I appreciate the offer, I may have a tape that I'd consider sending to see how the AG-1980 deals with it. It's got some tracking issues at the beginning but otherwise it's a solid tape, it only contains about 4 minutes of footage.

My capture shows what I think is an acceptable amount of dropouts during the more stable portions where the tracking is ok. I'd be curious to see if the AG-1980 eliminates the dropouts completely.

It's really hard to know if there's any improvements to be had, a lot of the tapes have nearly flawless clips and quite messy clips mixed in throughout the tape. Could be how the tape was recorded, could be age, could be my machine. Really difficult to know.

About not mailing tapes, understood, that's a common fear, and a reason (of many) why gear sells. Sometimes fear is healthy! But still fear. The happy medium is to (a) do as good a job as you can, with the tools you have available, then (b) send those off for a 2nd attempt. This does carry "one and done" risks, not just mail risks. These days, videotapes are all about mitigating risks, while extracting the content.

I don't know what aramkolt has available, or is charging for it, but he may be your best option for AG-1980P right now. He's really new at all this, maybe 6 months experience at it. And yet, he is showing to be one of the only good options for AG-1980P. I reserve final judgement for when I see actual work, but everything I'm reading (even ignoring his feedback others, just going off his tech talk) is vastly better than most. (Last I knew, Deter was out of stock, gear hiatus, maybe even gear sabbatical. Gear burn-out is real, I struggle with it at times.)

However, I do wonder if certain JVCs will work for you. Most JVCs are tape eaters, though a few are not. But condition matters. AG-1980P is not automatically always better, just often, in general. All rules have exceptions.

Line TBC usually is not enough to prevent dropped frames and audio sync errors. Some form of frame correction is needed. The ES10 has a non-TBC frame sync, which does have visual issues (and you have noticed some already). And yet, better than nothing.

On your middling tight budget (yep, $1k is tight!) I would say you need 3 things:
- quality more-modern S-VHS deck (for transport, image stability, etc)
- ES10 as strong+crippled line TBC with on-TBC frame sync -- but noting you take good with bad here
- better capture card

You can try the AG-1980P with and without line TBC here, but no ES10 leaves you open to frame-based issues. Realistically, you'd looking at $2k+ here, and that's assuming you can buy the 1980 at a less-than-market rate (which aramkolt did last year).

In an ideal world, you'd get
- AG-1980P (or certain JVC)
- non-flawed frame TBC
- known-quality capture card

You've already gone down the "buy the not-best stuff, try to make it work", and this is where it's gotten you. As I always say, video has costs. Either money or sanity -- sometimes both (when not buying the correct items).

As an example, right now, I could make an NTSC workflow. One workflow. One. When it's gone, I have no idea if/when I can make another. Even for me, trying to locate decent gear (non-working refurb candidates, not even truly "working") has become challenging. It's only going to get worse, and drive up costs more (due to high parts/time repair costs, not just scarcity).

This is the reality of VHS ingest gear now.
- you get what you pay for
- the longer you wait, the harder it gets to find, and more costly it comes

Yeah, I considered a more modern JVC too, I actually find that most Panasonic products are kinda like german cars, really good but always broken. (I drive a BMW) :wall1:

The prices on ebay for modern JVC decks are outrageous now too. I think I'd trust a thrift store JVC over anything honestly, seems like the best shot at a low hours, never messed with machine. But thrift stores are a bust too, too many resellers have caught on.

As far as Frame TBCs go, I experimented in the past with a Panasonic wj-ave5 video mixer as a frame sync. It worked fine, crops the image very slightly, not sure I'd really want to use it unless necessary.

I think I might try the "happy medium". Keep my eyes peeled for any sort of modern JVC deck. Capture card is ok until I sort out the VCR. If the Panasonic is a huge improvement to quality then I'll consider getting one.

Even as it is now, the captures I'm getting are actually watchable, and you don't notice the flaws much when you're focusing on the content. I'm just a perfectionist, I would prefer "archival" quality but I guess something is better than nothing.

Thrift stores have been a bust for about 10 years now. All you find there is Funai combo VHS decks, or random low-end junk like GE and Sanyo VCRs from 30 years ago. Long gone are the stories of finding S-VHS decks -- and those were mostly in urban areas near colleges or rich school districts. I never saw an S-VHS deck in a thrift store, not a one.

Mixers are not TBCs. For the models that do have some sort of TBC embedded, it's always weak, often mere line, and it solely exists to assist the device (not your external sources). Going back to the car analogy, a mixer that "also has" a TBC is sort of like an engine that needs premium gas. It has no benefit to you as the driver, and is solely there because the internal engine needs it. Any perceived benefit to you directly is mostly imagined.

For -C, don't get the HR JVC decks, and even some SR are bad news. But again: condition, condition, condition.

I don't see that pricing for JVC decks is outrageous. Outrageous for the condition (it's all crap), yes, definitely. But if the deck were actually good, the current pricing really is no different than MSRP. In fact, with inflation, most are 50% of original MSRP. And that tracks with the prices of still-in-demand used AV/photo gear. These are not the home VCRs that kids put PB&J sandwiches in, but serious hobby and small-studio gear. But again, eBay almost never has "good gear", that's really just an oxymoron eBay is a flea market, not a trustworthy source of gear. 99% of it is recyclers and resellers, and they don't the different between Super VHS and Superman.

You can always take your tapes, set them aside somewhere secure and temperature controlled, and revisit this when budget allows. For now, you have inferior "watchable" (not a compliment) copies. Although, again, you run the risk of gear getting even harder to locate later. Perhaps grab that capture card upgrade, it's fairly cheap.

That is a perfectly reasonable request and you're not the first to have made it.

Talking to my neighbor about my VHS transfer project and they said "hey our wedding video hasn't been seen in 30 years and it's on VHS-C.". So if and when they dig it out, assuming they have the adapter, I can compare AG-1980 and JVC HR-S9800U. Private Message me if I forget and no one else offers.

-- merged --

My neighbor dropped off the JVC VHS-C tape inside the JVC C-P6U adapter. The adapter seems pretty high quality for all the bad I've read about these adapters. By accident I discovered the AA battery which fortunately had not exploded but was completely dead. I put in a new one and popped it in the JVC deck. The tape looked like it hadn't been played since it was recorded in 1995. Knowing my neighbor it hadn't been and was well stored. The tape played without any issues but unfortunately the camera operator was pretty inexperienced. Lots of dark scenes with bright lights in the scene. The best video was of the wedding party and their colorful gowns. Unfortunately there isn't much of that which I can share. But then came the fruit and cheese table. Evening lighting but colorful enough with a bonus guest getting in the frame at the end. So 7 seconds to compare. Hopefully enough for your needs.

My opinion... I think the color on the JVC looks better than on the AG-1980. Now, is that because my AG-1980 isn't in top shape (bought from TGrant in 2018) or because the JVC (bought off eBay in 2018) plays VHS-C better? I may never know but I might start to comparing my most important tapes for now on.

Both videos were recorded with the same tape and adapter on both the JVC S-HR9800 and Panasonic AG-1980. Into the Datavideo TBC-3000, ATI 600 USB, Lenovo T500 laptop running Windows XP and captured with VirtualDub 1.9.11. Cyberpower 1000VA UPS. Edited to 7 seconds and saved a second time as Lagarith lossless compressed AVI.

I hope this helps!

Very interesting!

The colors on the JVC do look much better. Something I noticed immediately though is the JVC has some sort of checkerboard kind of artifact.

It's most obvious on the plate in the bottom left. The Panasonic seems to display this as well but it's much less noticeable.

This might be down to the s-video cables you are using though. Maybe its only less noticeable on the Panasonic because of the poor colors.

The audio on the JVC is certainly quieter, and the Panasonic is louder.

The Panasonic seems a little more clear but I actually prefer the JVC audio somehow, it sounds more natural.

I guess we would have to compare the waveform to see if there's any equalization and noise reduction applied by the Panasonic.

How did playback of the beginning and end of the tape compare between both machines? Those parts typically look worse.

Was there a noticeable difference in the amount of dropouts, glitches, etc. between the two decks throughout the entire tape?

Also, what speed/mode was this tape recorded in?

Not sure where you read that. The C-P6U is one of the best adapters, period. It's a Matsushita adapter that's rebadged as JVC, Panasonic, and a few other names. (But there are some knock-offs that are flimsy, so beware.)

99% this. :thumb:

Noting that "accurate" is what matters. Beware boosted video/audio levels. Panasonic can be guilty of boosting.

The two audio captures seem similar to my ears and instruments. But being of a loud recording any VCR borne background noises will be covered up by the wedding guests' loud chatter, in both machines. So this 7 second sample tells us very little about how "low noise" are these two machines. For that we would need an audio recording which is itself very quiet. The OP could upload only the audio of such a much quieter sample.

This issue of VCR audio background noise has been discussed at various times on this forum. Just because a deck is high end in terms of picture quality, doesnt mean its audio playback is also exemplary.


Obviously the best person to tell us that is billct97 but if this sample has linear audio, it was likely shot at SP speed because LP linear audio, which was often used on the short VHS-C tapes would not have the high frequency clarity I seem to hear here. LP linear audio is a tough test for a playback deck because as with the LP picture it's a weaker recording and more exposes a machine's own audio limitations. The more low quality the recording, often the harder we have to work to extract the signals cleanly.

Too much to reply to during the work day but let's see if I can hit most of the questions and comments.

Tape was recorded in SP.

I thought I had read the VHS-C adapters (other brands) in general were poor but my comment was how solid this JVC adapter is!

Shame on me for not doing any A/B comparisons of both VCR's before this.

I've also wanted to deploy some audio gear to better manage the audio but have not yet. Question, can putting an amplifier in the audio record path work for adjusting levels or would that risk the video and audio being slightly out of sync?

I thought I solved the herringbone problem when I replaced the TBC 9VDC power and added the UPS. It was significantly better after the PSU was replaced. I will look closer at my S-Video cables (and yes probably remove the JVC S-Video switch box I am using).

Great... now I have a pile of new projects to do before I capture my next tape. It's like going to the doctor for an annual checkup and finding out you have a terminal illness! OK, not quite that bad but before posting this I was blissfully unaware of any problems and now... :)

I'd leave it up to the colorists, but my guess is the AG1980 chroma levels are off to some degree and could be either adjusted in post, or by using a proc amp during capture, but could also be that is more representative of what is stored on the tape, hard to say. Usually I find the chroma levels to be more vibrant on freshly refurbished AG1980's than the JVCs by quite a bit, so I don't know that I'd say the AG1980 is a good representation of them in general.

I do like the JVC VHS-C adapters though and those are what I use in all brands of VCRs myself. I think the bigger issue tends to be how well tapes in adapters track in different machines (rather than picture reproduction) as the rigidity and mechanism itself can play into how well they play.

I wasn't looking specifically at the beginning and end but saw no difference while playing and the color edge to the JVC only when I opened both in 2 instances of VirtualDub to compare frame by frame. No dropouts or glitches either but again I wasn't looking for that other than to watch (on a TV) while capturing and noticed no such problems. Keep in mind this tape is probably as perfect as it gets. The adapter and tape were obviously carefully stored for 30 years and probably played just a few times.

Tape was recorded at SP.

Considering my tapes have also been stored well and have only been played ~5 times, some have never been played, I think I should expect similar results then. Obviously the condition of the camcorder when they where recorded is a big factor too.

This has been very helpful though. I'm still curious to how well both machines handle a poorly recorded/damaged tape.

I've gone ahead and purchased a ag-5710 I had my eye on from eBay (I know). It was inexpensive relative to other listings, and it was the only one that was listed as "used" instead of "for parts" so if I get it and after inspection it's totally worn out and junk, I can return it. Seller claims it "accepts and ejects tapes" so that's already a lot better than 90% of what's on eBay. Wish me luck....

Obviously I'll be replacing ALL the caps if the mechanism is in good shape. To some it may be a waste of time, but if it wasn't a VCR, I'd be repairing something else for fun anyway. If it works out I'll have a working unit for less than a quarter of what a "professionally restored" one would cost.

Thanks again to billct97 for the comparison, and everyone else for their input. I'll post an update when I can do some test captures on my own machine. (if it works out)

I'll add my 2 cents.
Not too long ago I broke the rules and from EBAY got an absolute new-in-the-box JVC S7800u. P r i s t i n e .
That machine just did about 60 VHS-c using a CP7u and performed without error.
Of course I was using a recommended workflow, but still, I wouldn't spring for a Panny 1980 unless it was an irresistible bargain.

I know Deter used to advice people to contact him before an eBay buy and then let him talk to the seller then ship it directly to him to avoid further shipping cost. I don’t think eBay is a bad place to buy a Panasonic 1980p from ideally if you contact someone that knows about them first and just plan on it needing a refurb. Buying a cheap 1980p from
eBay seems a lot better than buying one “lightly used” from eBay and the seller wants the moon for it then you still have to refurb it. I don’t think Deter is an option right now.

Good luck.

Ah, yes, accurate on both. VHS-C adapters = mostly bad, JVC = good.

Get a Mackie mixer for $99: https://amzn.to/3D0sHcU
That's cheap!
There's a $69 version, but it removed function/features.
Don't buy non-Mackie for under $100, you'll be sorry.
You'll need audio cables to convert RCA to stereo 1/4. The RCA in/out is bypass on the mixer.

Those are noise generators, more than not.

As long as you know. :laugh:

It's not always that easy.

Did you know that eBay gives the seller not only your shipping address, but also your phone number? And if you have alternate billing address (or phone number), eBay customer service is dumb enough to be social engineered to give those out?

Now imagine a crazy eBay seller
- writing you threatening eBay messages
- sending emails
- mailing threatening letters
- phone calls at 1 am

All screaming that you ripped him off, broke his "good" stuff, and stating that he "may have to fly down to visit you" at some unnamed time. Of course, the item was mail to you with no padding, in a free box he got from Aldi (complete with rotten banana smell). But it's your fault! Scammer! Scammer!

eBay does nothing about this.

Worth it? --- Especially since you know the odds for this item actually being good is so low?

Even if the seller is sane, the returns process (and actually getting the refund) can take more than a month. Meanwhile, you still have no VCR, and your funds are tied up.

Enjoy! :)

I can see this. It's lower risk, less can go wrong with it. It doesn't happen over, but less than "never".

That was definitely not recent. He/I/others are not accepting eBay-bought random gear/junk anymore. The pandemic era newbies ruined tons of gear, botched repairs, and it get relisted to eBay constantly.

He's still closed, from what I know. I think he got burn-out. It's happened to quite a few of us in recent years. Even 12voltvids tends to rant and throw stuff in his repair videos these days. Some of this gear is downright frustrating.

These should be good for your Mix 8 if you get one.

https://amzn.to/4ippYbX

https://amzn.to/3Xs363w

It’s probably best not to get https://www.parts-express.com/1-4-St...r-Plug-090-314. It pulls too much on the input especially if you have thick heavy audio cables.

This could be a good choice too https://amzn.to/3DngjUc

I read it in a post he made years ago. He probably has changed sense then.

-- merged --

That good to know about Deter not wanting to take eBay buys. I wonder if Deter still takes 1980s that have previously been refurbished by Tgrant.

On that topic... I bought my AG-1980 in 2018 from TGrant with the impression that they were a reliable source. Has that changed? Were units back then not being fully refurbished/caps replaced/aligned? I've been happy with mine except for the video I shared this week where the color was a bit weaker than on my JVC 9800.

Did you leave your 1980 plugged in without a UPS?

A UPS would help but even if you did have the power running through a UPS Tgrant is not considered a reliable source anymore.

I use something like this. :congrats:

Correct. He was doing a lousy/incomplete recap job, only replacing "bad"/failed caps, not all caps (ie, failing caps not yet fully failed). Furthermore, he was cheaping out on the caps used, according to Deter/others (because of them having seen his prior work).

Deter refused to service one of my TGrant decks, it was internally a mess. :(

Many of us were initially happy, then pretty pissed once we learned what was (not) done. He wanted big bucks to re-repair decks that he should have re-capped fully/properly the first time. We felt fleeced. You see TGrant buyers from time to time, posting on this forum, and sometimes others.

At some point, after the backlash, before/during the pandemic, he supposedly now fully re-caps decks, but wants $1400 for it, which is insane.

Yeay... So far the AG-1980 hasn't given me any trouble so fingers crossed. The display is bright and everything responds as if it's a healthy machine. Time will tell. If it's just a recapping that I might have to do myself someday, that's not beyond my skills as long as they aren't surface mount. Does anyone have handy a list of which caps should be replaced? Any common issues to look out for? I cleaned the heads on the JVC (the right way) but am terrified to open the AG-1980. I should probably just rip the band aid off and realize there's nothing to be scared of in there.

On side note... I had thought all I had was 125 VHS tapes, 2 quality VHS decks, a bunch of low end, low usage VHS decks for FF/RW/risk mitigation and a decent workflow. I should be in good shape. In the last few weeks I now have 4 VHS-C tapes from my neighbor, a dozen 80's and 90's VHS borrowed from a friend who archives audio, 2 tapes from a thrift store (no mold) and a tape of 90's TV shows from my sister in law. Plus my sister in laws low end Sony VHS and the neighbors VHS-C camcorder. I can see how this hobby can get out of hand! LOL.

Update: Received my AG-5710 in the mail, its very clean. Somebody has had the front face off because the cassette door was trapped shut, had to take it off and install it properly.

Opened the unit up and it looked pristine, even the little sponge for cleaning the heads looked like new. The machine would accept a tape then immediately eject it. The guide rollers where not pulling the tape out of the cassette. You could hear the loading motor slipping.

I got it working and playing tapes by temporarily super-gluing the infamous loading motor coupler which was cracked, and greasing the pinch roller assembly as it was so dried out it wouldn't move. No audio at the moment. Video looks ok, some weird noise.

Power supply squeals pretty bad, needs caps. The whole machine needs all the caps replaced but we already knew that would be the case.

The head drum is audibly noisy when it spins up, possibly the bearings, might just be down to bad caps though.

Tape path looks good while playing, but when seeking in reverse the tape crumples a bit on the audio head, will have to address that but I don't want to mess with the guides if I don't have to.

Over all, I think I got a pretty good deal on a possible low hours unit, I guess I'll know for sure once it's re-capped. Not bragging here, I'm just happy that it appears to be a good repair candidate and not a pile of junk.

Also, as far as these being difficult to work on, I got it playing and ejecting tapes in under 2 hours. The mechanism comes out with 3 screws.

I haven't really run across "no audio" in the 30 or so machines I've worked on - usually audio section doesn't need to be touched, but could be bad power supply caps making a voltage missing that is only needed for audio specifically I suppose.

Glad you are happy with it. Let us know how the refurb goes.

I wonder how 12voltvids feels about these VCRs... :laugh:
https://youtu.be/ho_GIFR2NhA?t=634
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYzVgr_B3l4

I'm going to attempt a re-cap of my AG-1980. I don't do electronics for a living, but I've done my fair share of hobby work and I'm willing to do it a bit at a time over the course of a few months and be very methodical and deliberate about it. My unit actually seems to function just fine, no obvious image problems, so I think it's a good candidate for a "proactive"/"preventative" re-cap. The one symptom I notice is the intermittent high-pitch whine that corresponds to the flashing of the clock on the front display - so I think problems are imminent.

In the AG1970 repair video, he mentions the AG1980 saying it had the same type of ceramic boards that like to fail, but luckily the AG1980 does not have any of those ceramic boards. He does hate SMT caps in general though since they cause so many failures in general in vintage electronics.

12VoltVids seems to speak highly of the SLV-R1000 and I've refurbed a couple of those - they are really good at creating flagging on just about any tape - so they are good to test external line-TBC performance, but pretty unusable unless your capture card or chain corrects those. That'd actually be a good one to try with a hardware DV converter since I think they do act like a line TBC, but haven't gotten around to it yet.

Head cleaning day for my AG-1980 (TG purchased in 2018). The attached pictures confirm what you guys have been saying. Hopefully they got the ones that matter!

Are you using paper on the video heads? I tried chamois swabs before and didn’t like them. I might of got bad chamois swabs. I’m not sure. I use paper now for the video heads and not often at all.

Printer paper soaked in 99.9% Isopropyl alcohol on the video head, light pressure, turning counterclockwise. Foam swabs on the audio head and rollers - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BN648GDZ...fed_asin_title

I've been playing foreign tapes a bit more so thought it would be a good time for a cleaning. Looking at the picture it was needed!

I’m Pretty sure you know this but give it a little time to dry before playing a tape. Make sure you don’t go up and down.

:congrats:

Deter just opened up shop until the end of April then he is closing for the year.

I forgot about those stickers. Yeah, that SOB. "others OK" = BS, half-assed job. :rage:

I saw that today, too.

He closed around July last year, said he'd be gone until end of year. End of year came, went. So 9 months, no Deter. All those poor 1980 owners were SOL, or had to DIY, though newcomer Aramkolt has filled some of the voice. (Deter is still available for PM/email, at least from me. He's just not doing refurb. He didn't disappear.)

Deter does excellent AG-1980P work, so anybody considering him should take advantage of this window now, ASAP. If he gets too many requests, he may close that window early. I've let him repair all of my 1980s for at least 7 or so years now.

I know he's getting as burnt-out as I am at hardware refurb. Those AG-1980P are such a PITA that even I won't touch them -- though that's mostly due to my MS, robbing me of dexterity over the years, fine tasks like soldering are hard. But age catches up with all of us, eventually, and in different ways.

I remember when I first met Deter in the late 2000s, and he knew nothing about any of this stuff. I taught him as much as I could, both in public and private, and he just ran with it. I really do think he knows more about AG-1980P internals than I do now! (But I still have some knowledge/tricks on usage.) I know people say "the student become the teacher", but it's so odd to see that student-teacher then essentially retire! So, in a way, I now feel the need to educate the next-next generation, and I think Aramkolt will be that person.

I'm certainly finding out how much of a PITA these are lol. Those connectors are so tight I thought I was gonna break them.

So far I got the power supply, head amp, and RF board recapped. I think I might be developing a sensitivity to solder smoke, gonna need some better ventilation.

I've heard aramkolt say that recapping the audio II board hasn't made a noticeable difference to anything. I might skip this one to avoid that daughter board with all the SMT caps. Hopefully my no-audio issue isn't related to this board, if it is, I'll inspect and fix it.

LS, do you know if anyone has done a photo guide or video guide (even partial) of recapping these? I haven't found anything on YouTube or anything comprehensive/consolidated here or elsewhere. I did find the spreadsheet of capacitors and Digikey/Mouser part # cross references posted by Mr Pete in 2022.

While almost anyone with soldering abilities could do it using the service manual and enough time/determination, the lessons learned the hard way, and from working on many units, are most valuable. If well-documented by those experienced in these repairs, the info will help others now and in the future restore these VCRs and hopefully keep more of them in working order for years to come.