Current setup, recommended fake TBCs for use case?
 

(I read in the FAQ of DigitalFaq that you can apparently ask for certain people like LordSmurf to answer your questions. So I would appreciate it if they could also provide their answers on this post)

This is my first post on DigitalFAQ. I recently became interested in digitalizing VHS (PAL, I live in the Netherlands) tapes and tested out Lordsmurf's VirtualDub package with the following setup (summarized):

VCR: JVC HR-S7500
Capture card: WinTV HVR 1250 (on the label it mentions: ATSC/QAM NTSC 79571LF) (it has a Conexant CX23885 chip. I use the S-Video and Audio port)
Codec: Lagarith (lossless)

So after reading the "recommended settings for VirtualDub" DigitalFaq post, I took a capture of 5 minutes and there were no framedrops. The recording looked decent and I also had cropping on (though some sides still seemed to be yellowish, is that just the Pokemon 4Ever VHS tape being bad?). It seems like the capture card I am using can only capture up to 25 FPS but using the "bob" filter seems to do its job and in most aspects, the "bob" filter makes the video look better. It has been a week since I used VirtualDub so I do not remember in what aspects it did not make the video look better.

Regarding the 25 FPS cap, I am still investigating that as I commented on a video of a Youtuber that has the same card but could at least use VirtualDub to capture at 29.33 FPS. I am still waiting for a reaction. Also, it seems like at least two other users (on this forum and on reddit) had a similar issue where there FPS with this card would be capped, though they mentioned 24 FPS.

Also have an issue with VirtualDub not saving the Sharpness level setting which is somewhat irritating.

Anyway, to get to the point, it seems like there are multiple fake TBCs being 'recommended' on a low budget across the internet. Here are the following I found:

Panasonic DMR-ES10/15
Pioneer DVR-649H-S (but I think just the whole 640 series)
Sony RDR-HXD870

So I have a couple of questions; could this fix these yellowish sides I was referring to earlier? I also read that some Fake TBCs have additional settings for tweaking (also something about turning video into "progressive" or something?) and I am planning on digitalizing just some Disney tapes (Ducktales), Pokemon tapes and some VHS tapes that are completely in black and white.

What "fake TBC" would be recommended for my setup?

Thanks in advance.

Welcome. Hello. Yes, I will answer this. :)
Replying as I read...

That equipment isn't best.
- Ideal is to replace it with better.
- Non-ideal is to salvage the situation.

Your current gear:
- The JVC 7500 is a non-TBC VCR. (NTSC 7500 has line TBC, PAL 7500 has no TBC.)
- That's just a terrible capture card. It's one of the "PVR" style cards from Hauppauge, and was only good for digital antenna (ATSC) recording TV. Not capture analog videotapes.
- No TBCs, neither frame nor line.
- Lagarith can work, but it has well-documented issues with random noise/junk frame insertion, when used for capture. Huffyuv is the safer choice. (Not Huffyuv 64, MT, CCE hack -- the original plain Huffyuv.)

There are settings within VirtualDub that effectively disable dropped frames counters, so I'd want to see a screen capture of your timing settings. In effect, you can ask VirtualDub to lie to you.

Never on-the-fly deinterlace, it looks bad. You want to capture VHS tapes interlaced, then QTGMC deinterlace post-capture if needed. (And deinterlace is often not needed, mostly just for Youtube/streaming usage. Even then keep the interlaced capture, make a deinterlace copy for the other use. Never dump the interlaced master file.)

It's just a terrible card, you need another. (This is exactly why I have capture cards in the marketplace.)

Also: Youtube and Reddit is often just random people, so always be wary of advice in those places. Sometimes it's "the blind leading the blind", not a reputable source that truly knows video. Very often, they have as much knowledge as you do, or even less. I run into a that a lot with non-video topics, too.

None of those are TBCs. Those are DVD recorders, with some line TBC passthrough abilities. Panasonic ES10/15 is well known, having strong and crippled line TBC, with non-TBC frame sync. Pioneer gives mixed results. Certain Sony are often discussed by the user "Bogilein", and his advice is generally good.

The problem with DVD recorders, used as cheap/fake TBCs, is all of them add noise. All of these badly adjust color/brightness/contrast -- and it cannot easily be fixed later in software, if at all.

You never want progressive. None of the DVD recorders (fake TBCs) really have useful settings. It's just a dumb box for passthrough. Signal goes in, signal comes out with TBC(ish) and noise added.

A cartoon collector, one of "my people". :)

Ducktales and Pokemon are both released, so I would only bother to capture the commercials. Or certain episodes that were banned, censored, or later edited.

I made Ducktales and Pokemon DVDs back in the 00s. Mine are in a cabinet, untouched for at least 10 years now. Several years ago, I ripped the DVDs to ISO my archive DVD HDD -- and don't watch those either. I'm proud of my early work, projects like this, as those are what led me to being noticed by TPTB (the powers that be), and started my accidental video/studio career. But the released versions are much better (both DVD and streaming), excluding any banned/censored/edited episodes.

Re-doing content already available is not worth the effort.

I would defer to Bogilein, and I believe he most suggested the Sony RDR-HXD870. Unlike NTSC ES10/15, the PAL adds excessive luma issues. The Sony does not do that (quite as badly).

Still not a TBC, still not as good as S-VHS VCR line TBC, still no frame TBC. But these "fake TBCs" are better than nothing.

Your proposed workflow = :
- Your S-VHS VCR is decent for a non-TBC unit.
- Sony DVD recorder as TBC(ish) passthrough.
- You still need a better capture card, that Hauppauge you have is awful.

Then you can do decently.

And I want to see your cartoon captures! :D

Thanks for the reply! I am going to comment on a couple of things you mentioned.

The reason I am using Lagarith is because I am temporarily using my brother's main Dell Precision M4800 laptop (which is on Windows 10) with his Express Card to PCIe adapter lol. And I could not get Huffyuv recordings to play in any playback software (e.g. VLC, Windows Media Player and mpv iirc). I also tried his HP Desktop with (iirc) an i5-2500 running Windows XP, but it's not very fast.

He actually has two M4800 laptops (which have a 4th generation i7 iirc) and I can use his other one for in the long term but it has 4GB of ram due to DDR3L (the "L" is important, just normal DDR3 ram will not work) memory being uncommon. Would this be a problem? (And of course I would need to put Windows XP or 7 on it).

Interesting, I did not know that. My timing settings should just be the default ones.

So I do not need to use the bob filter if I am not going to upload or stream them to Youtube?

Yeah, ironicly, I bought the WinTV-HVR-1250 because the reddit user nicholasserra who made "The "How do I digitize/transfer/capture video tapes" quick info thread. VHS VHSC HI8 Video8 Digital8 miniDV" post on r/DataHoarder . In an other DigitalFAQ post, you mentioned that this person got most of their information, if not all, from DigitalFAQ. Anyway, the motivating reason as to why I bought the WinTV-HVR-1250 because it was dirt cheap. I bought two of them in box with brackets, drivers, basically everything with it for a total of 10 euros.

These AIW cards are pretty expensive and can be hard to find.

It's true that Ducktales and Pokemon both released. It's important to note that I (myself) actually only owns VHS tapes which already had movies or episodes on them. I personally do not own any VHS tapes that have TV recordings or something. I am too young for that haha.

I probably shouldn't capture the Pokemon tapes but I am curious if the HiFi audio of the Pokemon 4Ever tape is actually better than of the DVD, as the credits music of the Dutch dub on DVD, well... yeah, let's keep it at very very bad.

The old Ducktales series never got released in a proper resolution as far as I know. At least, all the four seasons I downloaded (with Dutch dub) are in a resolution worse than VHS actually.

I also own the only two volumes released here on Europe (one on DVD and one digitally as ISO) but these are just a handful of episodes (and the company/studio behind these two volumes apparently forgot to add the Dutch dub in one or two episodes).

As in, officially? Or as an hobby from VHS recordings? I hope you are not the person who forgot to add these Dutch dubs to like two episodes in the second volume of the Ducktales DVD released in Europe lol.


By the way, my brother has a HR-S JVC VCR that actually has a line TBC iirc. Maybe I can use his but as you said it does not have a frame TBC. Also, thanks for mentioning that I should not deinterlace and that the Sony fake TBC probably would be the recommended one. I was not aware of luma issues with the PAL ES10/15. Hopefully I can find one in the long run.

Do you mean the five minute sample I took that you would like to see or actual proper captures with (when I have) proper equipment?

Wow that was a lot more text than I originally anticipated to write... :sleep:

Oh right, I have a couple of additional quick questions if you do not mind; is there a list of proper capture cards? I know about AIW cards but are there any others that I should be on the look out for? And in case I do obtain a proper capture card, would it be better to record in 50i?

As stated, the cards he is selling on the Marketplace are the ones to pic from. If you're fine with sticking with Windows 7 or Windows XP that is for full compatibility.

And no, record in 25 interlaced frames. Deinterlace to 50 frames progressive after you're done capturing if need be.

If you record in 50 interlaced frames, you'll get dupes.