Welp, that testing was kind of short lived, I think the tape was either not that great of quality or was slightly sticky as it frequently was clogging heads or would slow the drum way down at random points. I might try baking it later, but don't really want to subject my VCRs to more of that than I need to.
However, I was able to grab several different captures with screenshots below. For EP, the 7600 seems best with R3 On. I'd say both the JVC HR-W5 (WVHS) and AG1980 do better though, I'm mainly looking at the clarity of the small text on the lower right and along the bottom. These screenshots are just in quicktime with the ProRes422HQ file still interlaced, so that's why you'll see some jaggies on all of them, though it doesn't matter too much since this is a no-motion scene.
For the AG1980, it is in "normal" mode with the sharpness slider set to the middle.
I'd say in this group of captures, the AG1980/HR-W5 look the best, followed by the 7600 in either mode with R3 on.
Now whether those are preferable over decode, that's up to the end user. I think the above are pretty good results to achieve in realtime for EP tapes without the use of a computer for the capture (Used SDI->AJA KiPro/ProRes422HQ).
Last edited by aramkolt; 08-02-2025 at 09:37 PM.
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Actually, the quality is quite a bit better and they do vary noticeably, but I forgot that DigitalFAQ compresses uploaded images. Check out these in the uncompressed screenshot form.
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Okay yeah, looking at all your examples the Panasonic 1980 looks to be the best imo, and with that I feel like Decode isn't all that better in comparison to it.
Feels like if you enabled Edit mode on the Panasonic all the extra noise would make it practically identically to the Decode capture.
Basically the 1980g sample is the best overall in terms of sharpness, so the decode sample just looks like it but with extra noise and ringing artifacts.
Starting to agree with Latreche/Dellsam with this comment he made on the videohelp thread when Brad posted his own comparison
"I see both samples have the same sharpness, The VHS-Decode (or tape-decode as they call it now since it captures different formats not just VHS) has an extra layer of noise which makes it look sharper but the actual video details are not."
Last edited by Aya_Rei; 08-03-2025 at 02:14 AM.
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Actually, the quality is quite a bit better and they do vary noticeably, but I forgot that DigitalFAQ compresses uploaded images. Check out these in the uncompressed screenshot form.
No, that's not quite accurate.
- JPEGs are not recompressed, unless found to be defective, or over (about) 810 pixels wide.
- PNG is converted to JPEG. I don't like it, but few use PNG anyway.
That's the current limitations. It will be addressed on update.
Quote:
Originally Posted by aramkolt
Welp, that testing was kind of short lived, I think the tape was either not that great of quality or was slightly sticky as it frequently was clogging heads or would slow the drum way down at random points. I might try baking it later, but don't really want to subject my VCRs to more of that than I need to.
Yuck.
Quote:
H I'm mainly looking at the clarity of the small text on the lower right and along the bottom.
Now whether those are preferable over decode, that's up to the end user. I think the above are pretty good results to achieve in realtime for EP tapes without the use of a computer for the capture (Used SDI->AJA KiPro/ProRes422HQ).
That device/workflow seems to degrade quality (blurring) more than normal.
What I see in the decode sample is lots more noise, and boosted contrast. So it appears "sharper" when it really isn't. There's not much in the way it true added detail. (That's ignoring non-VCR device blurring.) And that ringing/halo and ghosting is truly awful. It may seem tolerable in a still image, but in motion the image is infested with distracting ghosting images.
I might try baking it later, but don't really want to subject my VCRs to more of that than I need to.
I know nothing about possible video tape SSS and how they should be baked (for audio tapes there are a lot of technical bulletins). But you can try food dehydrator. I prefer that to remove SSS before digitization, however in Europe it is very rare, on some AGFA tapes only because BASF never used polyurethane binding.
Ah, those original uploads all were PNG's, and all also over 810 pixels wide since QuickTime scales to double the native resolution upon opening the file because 720x486 is only like 2 inches diagonally on modern retina displays. Either way, all of the captures were with the same hardware and display/screenshot method, so the variances should really just be the difference in how VCRs process the image.
Here's an unedited trimmed file of the AG1980 and the W5 captures for those that want to do a more detailed comparison when you adjust the chroma/luma/black levels in post compared to both decode and the original poster's traditional capture.
On the AG1980, you'll see some dropouts that it is masking whereas they really aren't as noticeable on the W5. Since the tape is crappy, I could also see there being variations on dropouts on different passes. There was a paper I read on U-Matic where dropouts were said to actually decrease with more passes, which is counterintuitive, but I will say that W5 capture was about 10 passes after the AG1980. My guess is it has it had more to do with an intermittent or short lived clog on the AG1980. If there are loose particles that can be swept away with passes, the "more passes, less dropouts" could be a real thing I suppose and perhaps the tape gets "less sticky" with more passes also, but I think that also presumes that the tape hasn't been physically damaged by being eaten like this one was.
When the W5 does actually have a line dropout, it's much more poorly masked, so it probably isn't preferable for tapes with lots of dropouts but could also be that those individual lines are more easy to correct in post for those that are avisynth masters. I really have no idea how all the heads are used on the W5 when playing EP, there are a total of 5 pairs of video heads (10 total) plus one flying erase. It could be that it takes multiple passes at each line and then compares to the other reads of the same tracks to get an average or the best signal, but that does seem kind of an advanced technique for a machine that was released in 1995.
To be fair, SP is likely to have far fewer dropouts in general since the tracks are wider, EP here is a worst case scenario. These will all do much better with SP tapes.
Been able to upload 720x480 .pngs before, seems like if it's above 810 pixels then that is when they get downscaled.
Anyway it's funny how they tend to mention the head switching noise is perfectly clean, it isn't, it's cleaner but not fully gone. Worst of all, for this example anyway, is the head switching noise covers up a bit more of the bottom frame. With your Panasonic picture I'd be able to crop off 6 pixels, whereas with the decode capture I'd need chop off seemingly 8 or 10 pixels.
How many pixels to chop is a bit of a tougher subject, my captures are in the
I'm not sure if I've seen a claim about no head switching noise with decode. If it were to work, I think it'd need to be a first generation tape or at least be a higher end commercially produced tape. I think I've seen a JVC BR-S series not have any head switching noise with a commercially produced tape and I think the W-5 can do it as well. SR-MV's are also pretty easy to adjust the head switching point manually, but it'd be a little different for each tape. Conceptually I think it is up to the VCR as far as the head switching point and Decode only taps in after the two head signals have been merged by the VCR which decode would have no control over. Also with my captures, the AJA captures the full 486 vertical lines, so 6 of the lines are kind of a "free" clip. With other capture cards, they choose a fixed 480 of the 486 available lines, which is why you'll see some capture cards showing more of the top image. In your posted decode capture, there are 488 lines, and I'm not sure where the extra two are coming from. Could be that it grabs the few lines right above the standard frame in order to preserve closed captioning maybe, but I also don't see any closed captioning data up top either, but perhaps this tape doesn't have closed captions. I think certain SDI digitizers (snell and Wilcox products come to mind) have a way of preserving closed captioning data without line 21 being part of the capture, but I haven't really played around with it.
Not exactly related, but this guy was pretty impressed that his DVD player could preserve closed captioning when dubbing in both directions (from DVD->VHS and VHS->DVD): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pKjur_tnQE
Yes, ringing was bad on U-Matic, particularly if the footage on the tape was copied via composite. Using dub connectors as well as the later "SP" formulation of the format helped somewhat.
Hello again, after getting a Panasonic AG-1980 from Aramkolt decided to capture a bit of the tape using said VCR, here are the exact same frames as the previous JVC-MV45U and 2022 Decode (Decoded by me in 2025) samples.
Like with the JVC, all I did was crop 8 pixels from the sides and resize it to a 4:3 aspect ratio. Same TBC and Capture Card were used, same settings used for both.
I happen to have both the DK Country and N64 promo tapes as shipped from Nintendo Power. Guess I should pull out my decks and see what I get. If I recall, the N64 tape is one of those cheapo deals where they used small T120 reels (as opposed to the big plastic reels T30s have) with very little tape on them. This tends to cause problems with some VCRs when threading tapes as the tension can be off and confuse the VCR into thinking there is a problem.
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Yeah, afterwards they started having their tapes recorded in SP Mode thank god. Minus the Pokemon one, that sucks.
That probably explains why it, and the Invasion of Nintendo tape I had, have tracking problems on the Panasonic. Yet an EP mode recording of HBO from 1989, in which it was partly taped over with family home video footage, plays back basically fine.
This ain't about decode specifically but I've been running some of my own comparisons between my Panasonic and JVCs (used Edit mode on both, I am really unsure on if I should stick with edit mode on the 1980...) On SP mode tapes (VHS or S-VHS) there doesn't seem to be any quality jump, at least nothing major.
With EP mode tapes, the Panasonic beats out the JVC. I think that is the general consensus? Use 1980 for EP/VHS-C, JVC SR series for SP.
When it comes to Decode, at least in the context of EP mode. It doesn't seem any better than a refurbished AG 1980.
