OMG! Panasonic AG-4700E for just 44 euros!
 

I hope I'm not in a wrong section.

This morning at a local thrift shop I saw this beauty for just 44 euros :yikes: and I had to buy it immediately.

I was hoping (not that much) that it can have no issue and surprisingly it seems to work like a charme. :eek:

It's the first time I use a VCR like this so I have few questions:

- Do you know what kind of TBC it has onboard? (line, field, frame)
- I guess image quality shoud be better than my JVC HR-S7700. Is it right?
- Can you suggest me something specific to check?

Thank you everybody (pics coming soon)

I've done some tests (using my crappy pinnacle card) and it's hard to say if the image is better or worse than the JVC, it's simply different: richer (colour), smoother and more 'solid' on the JVC, more detailed, a bit noisier and pale on the Panasonic.

I've cleaned all the guides with isopropyl alcohol (erase head was quite dirty) and tomorrow I will clean also the drum heads to see if I can reduce the noise.

The tape loading mechanism works fine and all seems to be in good condition (no bad caps symptoms at the moment).

I have to admit that both VCRs have very stable image (also without TBC) with good VHS and that JVC TBC+DNR seems more aggressive and noticeable then the Panasonic one.

I have few VHS-C to capture with a JVC metal adapter (repaired because of a battery acid damage) and AFAIK panasonic transport mechanism should handle the tape better, isn't it true?

It also seems that TBC is not working on passthrough. Do I have to set something?

Congrats, that's a really nice find!

The AG4700 seems to be very similar to the NV-HS1000 other than being grey instead of black, though there could be other differences.

If it's similar to the NV-HS1000: Don't think it has any sort of noise reduction filter (unlike your JVC). There is an "AI" function that's basically an automatic sharpness adjuster, something I've turned off on our NV-HS1000 as it tends to oversharpen the image. If it's set to off you can adjust sharpness manually. It's very good at picking up detail, though the image is also more noisy than the JVC as you mentioned.

Don't think the TBC works on passthrough. Barely any VCRs have a TBC that works on passthrough as far as I know, outside of possibly some broadcast decks (Only one I know of is the betacam deck we got.) and the TBCish functions in some of the late model VHS/DVD-recorder combos. I think the Y/C filter is active though, at least on the NV-HS1000.

Wow, I wish I could find one of those for that price! :woot:

Here some pics after a good cleaning:
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Attachment 9033

I cleaned the heads that were quite dirty and I removed the automatic head cleaner that was almost black
Attachment 9034
Attachment 9035

The bad news is that this unit maybe suffers of the "cold start noise" reported by others also in this forum (strong noise for the first minute or two) that means dying caps. I've said "maybe" because (at the moment) this happens only if I remove and plug again the power cord :hmm:

Update: I've called the official Panasonic repair shop in my town and they can do the full recap for about 120 euro. I don't know what to do. The picture seems fine now so I can do my captures hoping it will last enough, but those caps are clocking bombs... I could also repair it myself but I don't know if I will ever have the time to do so and maybe it's a task bigger than me.

Good find!

I have never had capacitors go bad in this model, there are no surface mount types used. In fact the only issues I have had are worn video heads which make for more picture noise as they wear. Also the pinch roller can suffer with a worn bearing which makes for wobbly linear sound.

I would clean it, throw out the head cleaning roller and replace the pinch roller if you have one. Make sure it is genuine Panasonic spare part, cheap ones often skew the tape.

Yes,

the Panasonic AG4700 is the pro version of the consumer SVHS deck Panasonic HS-1000.

I have only the HS-1000. He has the sharpest picture (but more grain) I have seen from any other SVHS recorder.
The TBC is a line TBC. An old movie magazin says a 6 line TBC. But during capture the TBC produces errors. All in all the tbc isn't useful for capturing. During the capture process yo should turn off AI and the editing control button should be on "passive" (passive= edit mode). The recorder has no noise reduction.

If you say the TBC has no effect, and to disable all the NR, then what's the point of having the deck?
That doesn't sound right.

The TBC works quite well on the NV-HS1000 we got here at least, and doesn't have the vertical jump/jitter issues that the JVC deck ones do. I very much disagree that it doesn't work for capturing, haven't noticed it producing any errors outside of extremely bad tape sections where half the screen is noise anyway. The deck does however seem very sensitive to smudge and other stuff from tapes and clogs easily, and it doesn't seem to have much compensation for tape dropouts like most newer VCRs do.

The EDIT switch is to change how the VCR reacts to edit commands from the edit cable, other than disabling the OSD if it's turned on, it won't really matter for capturing.

Oh and maybe it's just the one we got, but it likes to use a lot of force when ejecting VHS-C adapter, so make sure you hold your hand in front of the VCR and catch it when ejecting, otherwise it may end up on the floor.

On german videoforum have a few different members reportet that when the TBC is turned on the picture sometimes jump to the left and to the right (one of them was the user goldwingfahrer who was a professional). I have seen the same effect on my captures with the HS1000.

You should use the "passive/edit" mode because it turns the VHS HQ image enhancers like the chroma line averaging and the lowpass off. You can improve the capture later with better results with avisynth/Virtual Dub.

The AI improve the picture for playback and to watch it on television. But for capturing it's better to turn AI off.

Not all errors can be fixed in software (at all), or as good as hardware when it is possible.
Others are the same either way.
Some software filters are better than hardware filters.

It really depends on the error.

If we talking about jitter correction you're right. But if you want a SVHS Player with a good Line-TBC the Panasonic AG4700 (Panasonic HS1000) is the wrong SVHS deck.
Detail which is lost before you have capture it, will be lost forever (Edit mode on/off).

If you search for a SVHS recorder just to watch your SVHS/VHS movies then the Panasonic AG/HS is one of the best, but not for capturing.

Thank you for the answers.

The pinch roller seems to be in quite good condition, no cracks on the surface, the rubber is not too shiny and it has a good grip. I've just put some grease on the pinch roller sliding pivot. I've also looked for issues on the linear audio track and it sounds great.

I can't see any difference between "player", "recorder" and "passive" except for the colors that looks much better in "passive" mode: good saturation (not oversaturated) instead of the pale looking of the other two modes.

Without an external TBC, I think it's better to me to turn it on.

Good to know :congrats:

I've made small captures for testing purpose and I'm surprised of having neither drop frames nor audio sync issues. Soon I will see the behavior with loanger captures.

One more thing: do you think it's safe to put the JVC on the Panasonic?

Apparently I didn't read the manual properly, you're right, setting it to "passive" means "The picture quality best suited for editing is selected" (whatever that means) in addition to disabling the osd and other stuff. The service manual also explains that AI may do a bit more than just adjusting sharpness.

JVC HR-7700 (TBC) vs PANASONIC AG-4700 (TBC/Player) vs PANASONIC AG-4700 (TBC/Passive)

Here some screenshots to compare (captured using Pinnacle 300i while waiting for a AIW 9600):

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On my Eizo the Passive mode seems to have also bit of edge enhancement and a slightly better dynamic range (see white building against the sky) or maybe i'm just a placebo effect. :D

Update: sharpness slider on the Panasonic is positioned in the middle

Analysis of above sample images:

That exact Pinnacle card is somewhat muddy from what I've seen, so ATI AIW captures will be needed to see truer quality. However, going from what you have posted, and just keeping muddiness in mind...

The JVC is likely true to the tape. It almost always is for the S-VHS decks of late 90s / early 2000s (aka modern) lineage.

Panasonic does tend to have higher contrast, and it's not always a good thing. Proc amp, of course, can adjust either VCR to achieve better levels -- usually. Sometimes the Panasonic runs afoul of base IRE/luma/gamma, and screws up the image. Not often, but happens.

The image you've attached is severely reduced color quality. It could be caps, heads, or just typical Panasonic. Hard to say. The image requires either proc amp or software adjustment in post-capture. Some may consider the Panasonic "sharper" here, but they'd be very wrong. You can quite easily see the sharpening noise in the sky and right-half tree line. The edge haloing is very obvious on the man, and it creates likely-uncorrectable chroma offset; minor but present.

The colors are boosted on the bottom image (of 3), and otherwise appears unchanged from the 2nd image.

This is why I prefer JVC, and constantly say it is cleaner. It is. It's not "softer", but simply lacks the artifical sharpeness of a Panasonic. On the AG-1980, you can adjust the sharpness right/less, and undo the artificialness. Even without sharpening, the Panasonic is just noisier.

The DR (dynamic range) between the JVC and Panasonic isn't changed. VHS doesn't have much DR at all anyway. What you're seeing here is placeo effect as caused by the noise created from sharpening. Most people see "detail" where none actually exists, but it you're looking for the posterization caused by lower DR, it's just being hidden. (If you want to see severe DR loss, posterization, check out the ES10/15 units, even with NR turned off. Very stark and obvious.)

Eizo, DR ... you know photo, don't you? And at a serious level. ;)
Nice monitors, but pricey.

The main reason to use a Panasonic is the transport, the tracking quality, not the image quality.

The 9600 is still in California... It will be a long way to Italy... I can't wait :depressed:

Maybe someone can clarify this thing.

Not too serious. Photograpy and video editing it's just an hobby for me. My EIZO is a good narrow gamut IPS monitor, it doesn't belong to beast of the EIZO CS series, those are very pricey.

As I said once before "passive/edit" mode turns the VHS HQ image enhancers like the chroma line averaging and the lowpass off. On passive mode the sharpness slider has no function.

The 3rd picture is the raw picture as it is on the tape.

The player/recorder mode use the VHS HQ image enhancers like every SVHS/VHS deck has since 1985 and with the sharpness slider you can blur or sharp the image. But if you set the sharpness slider to strong your image will have halos.

If I look at the picture with the man I see more detail on his beard from the panasonic capture. The JVC capture looks blur. But this discussion you can find on many video forums which one is better. Some prefer the JVC and other people Panasonic recorder or any other brand.

You should capture the same small part with every recorder. Put the files on the timeline in your editing software have a look at the waveform and vectorscope and compare them on a calibrated studio monitor. Now you'll see the difference which one is better.

It can't be raw. The false sharpen halos give it away. You cannot easily "unhalo" an image to arrive at the JVC image. Panasonic is known to process an image, even with everything "turned off", as is the case on the ES10/15 recorders, and apparently this unit as well.

At very most, if it is supposed to be a raw "as recorded on tape" image, then the noise and artifacts in the image must be from a fault somewhere.

Panasonic gear is extremely good at what it does, reason I have so much of it, but don't tell yourself that it's somehow better/truer to what JVC gear products. It's not. It can be bad, it can be good, it can be neither. But above all, it's just different. JVC and Panasonic are also not the only two companies that differ in their approach to playback and processing.

I just have watched my testfiles from all my recorders which I have made and compared the Panasonic against my JVC HR7600. The Panasonic push the luminance range (contrast) and the chroma. The JVC push the chroma too (but not as strong as the Panasonic) and the luminance range is between 16-235. The panasonic is between 0-255. That's why the panasonic looks more sharper. If I use a YUV curve for the panasonic the test files looks more similar.

Yes there are more companies out there with good SVHS recorders. Philips,LG,Grundig,Hitachi,Nordmende,Blaupunkt,Ori on....
But often inside is a JVC,Panasonic clone.
My favourite I had said this before is the Hitachi 390. It doesn't increase the chroma and after the use of the YUV curve the picture is still sharper as from the JVC 7600 or from the JVC 4700 I have, too.

But we shouldn't forget one thing, that not every recorder plays every tape well. It's better to have some different recorders, capture small test files and then compare them.

For myself I can say I don't use the HS1000 very often to capture something I would only use the recorder to watch movies on televison.

Yep, so very true. :congrats:

Specifically, do you mean that Hitachi S390E S-VHS VCR?
Does it have an NTSC equivalent?
Line TBC?

The good news is that I've no longer issues of any kind at machine start, also after the unit was left unplugged for few hours. I don't know if the previous behavior is normal when a unit is not used for long time.

Today I've removed the bottom panel of the VCR to inspect the toothed belts that are actually in very good conditions (very elastic). I also inspect the boards as much as possible without disassembling all the VCR and I cannot see any visible damage or problem.

I've also notice that all the moving parts (both plastic and metal) have good grease applied so I guess some maintenance was done not too far ago. The thrift shop dealer said that the guy who brought him the AG-4700 was a (former?) employee of the Italian national broadcasting company (RAI) that was dismissing old equipment. I don't know if the story is true and of course I don't know if the VCR was a business or private unit. It's true that Turin (where I live, in north-west of Italy) was the first RAI headquarter when it was just a radio broadcaster and today there are still: a production center, a research center (CRIT) and a research and restoration center for the audio/video archive (TECHE RAI) that uses hundred of machines to digitalize the analogic material.

Just slept to nights over the answer from Lord Smurf.
Maybe I haven't find the right words and there is some missunderstood of what i have written.

In passive mode the output from the Panasonic AG is the raw picture as the Panasonic can give it out. Without any improvments. The blur/sharpness slider has no function.

If AI (Analysis Intelligenz) is on the recorder tries to find the best compromise between sharpness and grain for the tape. This works during playback and recording. The sharpnes/blur slider has no function too if it is on.
If you caompare the output from player/recorder mode and the blur/Sharpness slider is in center position you will not see a big difference.

But only in passive mode with Ai off it's the true output without any improvments from the panasonic AG4700/HS1000.

But remember every recorder have there own properties, that's why true/good professionals have a few different recorders (I'm not a professional but have 10 SVHS/VHS recorders). For example the output from the Panasonic FS200 in edit mode is diffferent and it will be diffferent with a JVC or any other too. Some increase chroma, luma, colour shift 1 or 2 lines or other things.

Yes, that's my favourite. He has no TBC but an edit mode.

In most cases I use the canopus nx to capture. If the jitter correction isn't good enough from the canopus I use a dvd recorder in passthrough mode with the canopus or an dvd recorder with HDMI Output in passthrough mode to the HDMI Input of the Blackmagic Intensity Shuttle. Before someone say that's not recommended hardware. I live in PAL country and what I have read here and on other forums some hardware works better with NTSC and some with PAL. (For example I have an external TBC and 2 ATI cards a 7200 and a 9000,too).

I have found a video on youtube and the Hitachi VT-S772A looks quite similar with the pal version. He has the "magic" door opener too.

One thing I have forgotten to say. The player is only the first device in the capture chain. If the capture card produce errors (for example clipping, audio out of sync, moire or any other things....) the best recorder in the world couldn't help.

Do you know what A/D converter chip the canopus nx card uses? From what I've seen the older canopus DV boxes used a Philips/NXP SAA7114H chip, though it seems that chip would be a bit outdated when the nx cards were released.

You might know that 2 version of the card exist. For the PCI-X bus and PCI Express. I have both cards but the PCI Express card is in use so have I disassembled the PCI-X card but I think both have the same chips.

I couldn't find any Philips chip on the board. It looks like that it use a NEC chip. But have yourself a closer look at the pictures.

Ah, looks like there's an Analog Devices chip, can't spot which model though, that would explain it's ability to correct some jitter. Blackmagic intensity and Aja Kona also use ADV chips.

Yesterday I inspected the AG-4700 better, looking for issues or bad electrolytic SMD capacitors.

I have to admit that it has been a quite scary experience, because the mainboard is heavy, full of small boards welded and "thousands" of wires (some very short) pulling in each direction.

Attachment 9061

I had to take out the TBC, the front panel, the display board and the VITC board before I was able to remove the mainboard (it has been a pain).

Starting from the TBC everything seems fine and there are no SMD capacitors.

Attachment 9060

Regarding the mainboard I also could not spot any electrolytic SMD capacitors on the other boards (the Y/C board was hard to inspect) and I think this is the reason why the deck is still working.

Unfortunately I could not take any photo of the other boards because my hands were busy at holding the mainboard and I didn't want to unplug all the wires and cables and put all together back again.

Surprisingly this morning the AIW 9600 arrived. I have not installed the board yet but I can confirm it's brand new.

AG-4700 is HS-1000 with different color and higher price tag. Same video head, same mech. From my memory, all the PCBs look the same.

I know that AG-4700 and HS-1000 are the same machine. I was just saying that maybe these boards are a bit more reliable compared to other panasonic VCRs such as the AG-1980 (full of SMD caps)

This is not statistically significant, but.. I had maybe 3-4 FS200(AG-1980) and half a dozen HS1000 or clones. A couple of FS200 had the cap/psu problems atleast, no problems with HS1000 in that area. HS1000 is also more recent so it has that advantage.

I just read in a video magazine the difference should be a more thicker capstan a different better head drum.

On a spare parts list the Panasonic HS-1000 head drum has number E-378 and the the head drum for the AG4700 number E-347.

The industrial capstans are blue colour - easy to spot the upgrade, and the head has the part number stamped on it so you can verify that too.

The blue capstans are hardened but not chromed, which resists erosion, polishing and slip after 1000's of hours use.

Which list is this? In the service manual I haven't seen either of these codes. In the earlier picture of AG4700 you can see VEH0651 which is also HS1000 drum (there is another compatible upper drum model too but can't remember the part no. right now)

The NV-HS1000 we got here has the same VEH0651 upper drum.
Maybe there is some variation between different versions of the same model, in this thread there is a picture of one that looks markedly different. There does seem to be a few sub-versions of both the NV-HS1000 and the AG-4700. The differences are probably mostly related to tuners and with/without NICAM but I guess there could be more. There's also a similar NV-HS800 that seems to lack some features like the TBC.

I've changed the drum versions between HS1000's and they work fine without any adjustments. IIRC HS-950 has same upper drum also and you could get them for 50€ in good condition, when new drum as spare part cost like 300€. :)

On this spare part list:

http://www.gummimeyer.de/Audio%20Vid...rsatzteile.pdf

Maybe it's only the order number because my HS1000 has the number VEH0651,too.

That doesn't surprise me at all. The AG-1980O was the same way. Some Panasonic models had a long shelf life, and production changes midway is common in every industry. Sometimes the change is good or transparent, sometimes bad (as we saw with the post-2010 AVT-8710).