VCR, capture card to digitise VHS/S-VHS PAL?
 

Hello everyone,

I am planning to digitize some VHS PAL tapes. Most of them contain home movies recorded with several different VHS camcorders in the 80s and 90s. In some cases I still have the original VHS-C tapes, in other cases only copies on regular VHS/S-VHS. There are also a couple of recordings of German TV broadcasts from 80s and 90s (my father worked in a profession where he was on TV fairly often back in the day, so these broadcasts are also part of the family history).

About 10 years ago, I already digitized some of the tapes using a Canopus ADVC-110 as the converter. Shortly thereafter we moved house, my wife and I had kids, and I abandoned the project because of lack of time. I’m going back to it now. I can’t use my old workflow anymore because I no longer have my old Win7 PC, and my new Win10 PC does not have the Firewire port to connect the Canopus ADVC-110. This might not be a bad thing, however, because having done some research on the forum, I now understand that using a DV box as the converter is not recommended, anyway. Having said that, the Canopus did produce better quality captures than the cheap “Easier Cap” USB device I also bought years ago, which is truly horrible.

So, trying to get decent results now that I’m planning to digitize the whole collection, I have two questions to start with, one about the VCR and one about the capture card:

1) VCR: I still have a Panasonic DMR-ES35V video/DVD recorder my parents used to own. I’ve read mixed opinions on how good it is – the gist seems to be that it’s not terrible, but not great, either. What bothers me the most is that, apparently, the DMR-ES35V is not a “real” S-VHS deck. A quote from this thread: “It doesn't have proper Separate Y/C video out from the video IC like a S-VHS deck, the VHS part is connected via composite internally [...] to the digital/DVD part. So, what you get is the composite out from the VHS part that has gone through the internal digitizer, it's a bit like a standard hi-fi VCR hooked up to an ES15.”

Do I understand correctly that what comes out of the S-VHS port of the DMR-ES35V is not a real S-VHS signal, but merely the composite signal that has gone through the internal digitizer? So, basically, the advantages that S-VHS would normally have are lost in the case of the DMR-ES35V?

2) Capture card: Building a WinXP or Win7 legacy PC, scouting for capture cards from the 2000s and getting it all to run would, in all likelihood, use up much more time than I have available for this project. So, I want to try what results I get with a decent USB card. I am currently looking at the IOData GV-USB2, which I’ve read good things about, and at the Pinnacle USB PAL cards on sale here in the Marketplace. I’d be grateful for feedback on how these two compare when it comes to my use case, i.e. capturing VHS/S-VHS PAL video.

Thank you in advance!

First you'll need a VCR that is PAL or multi-system. An NTSC VCR cannot play PAL tapes.

I'm in Germany, and my parents bought this VCR here some 20 years ago, towards the end of the VHS era. It definitely plays PAL. On the front, it says "PAL NTSC", so I believe it is multi-system.

The problem I see with the Panasonic DMR-ES35V, however, is that it doesn't seem to be a "real" S-VHS deck. According to info in this thread, what comes out of the S-Video out port is actually the composite signal that went through the internal digitizer. If that is correct, I suppose it means I have to get an actual S-VHS VCR for better capture quality, correct?

Welcome. :)

Tip: Convert both the original VHS-C, and the VHS copies. I've seen edge cases where the copies are better. Rarely, but still a non-zero % chance.

Correct. :congrats:

Also accurate. :congrats:

Analogy: You want good conversions, good food. You want steak, but may settle for hamburger.
- Canopus DV boxes are Alpo (dog food).
- Easycap devices are rotten meat (or roadkill), not even edible.

Correct, it is not. It's a plain mediocre consumer VHS VCR, with "SQPB" at best. SQPB (Super VHS quasi playback) never works well, often looking worse than a plain VHS tape in the same deck. It's almost like the analog version of an Easycap conversion. Although I don't believe the Panasonic combos even have SQPB.

Perhaps you meant "s-video", and not "S-VHS"? S-VHS (Super VHS) and s-video (separated video, where Y/C is on separate carrier wires) are not synonyms.

Yes, almost all consumer "combo decks" (VCR+DVD) internally composite the VHS, process/digitize, and then output whatever (s-video, HDMI, component). It's almost entirely pro-end combos units, what few exists, such as NTSC JVC MV line, that properly process and output s-video (Y/C) along the entire pathway. (But noting those JVC decks can have challenges of their own. So don't anybody go random buy one, expecting perfection.)

The Pinnacle cards I have in the marketplace are what you want.

Those GV-USB2 cards are somewhat "meme'd" online, undeserved positive feedback. It has an overly vocal (and small) fan base, who ignore problems. I've lost count of how many bad GV-USB2 cards I've replaced with Pinnacles, and then the person can capture without problems.

I'm not aware of any multi-system Panasonic consumer combo unit. I wager that it actually has that quasi-NTSC playback, which is not true NTSC (nor true PAL), and cannot be captured or played well. It's considered either "PAL-60" or "NTSC-50", both non-formats. Capturing is the first challenge, but then players don't like it either. The framerate/color is mismatched.

Correct. :congrats:

Either NTSC, or PAL, or both. There's a reason many of us own NTSC JVC/Panasonic S-VHS (with line TBC), as well as the PAL versions. And it's not because we like to spend money, or do things the hard way. These are the tools that give you the best quality. Or any quality, actually. As you've learned, there are many ways to achieve non-quality conversions.

I like to eat steak (or a hamburger). Not Alpo, not roadkill. It seems that you're like minded. :laugh:

IIRC, the S-video jack first appeared on S-VHS VCRs, and thus was often called an "S-VHS output", at least up until the mid-1990s.

You mean S-Video, Do your own testing, don't take anything you read online as facts, I've read that this recorder gives good results from component out, I'm not suggesting anything here, do your due diligence, capture 3 short samples from composite, S-Video and component and post here for members to analyze, test and experiment otherwise you will be at the mercy of other people's opinions most of whom don't know what they don't know, especially on YT.

But he cannot do his own research, as he doesn't have access to any known-good s-video decks.

He's referring not to the deck output, but the internal processing.

Deck output can be doubly bad, if composited again. So testing the deck to itself is not really a test.

I have this model deck, though NTSC. It's mostly a hot heavy ES15, with a generic mid-grade (at best) VCR attached. It's not ideal, and you can do both much better and much worse.

Actually, s-video (Y/C) pre-dates S-VHS. It's just the S-VHS made it more known. And Y/C is/was how VHS data was actually recorded. Cheap VCRs were composite, not the tape data.

Aside: Laserdisc was composite on optical platters. But, as I always point out, composite itself is not inherently bad. It's the implementation that usually sucks, and reduces quality. Those is why Domesday86 aka ld-decode is the best quality for Laserdisc conversion, as it bypasses lousy LD hardware players. Just extract it. (However, this does not carry over to vhs-decode, which is visually inferior to quality S-VHS VCRs with line TBC. Though that same method may be viable for tape non-VHS/non-8mm analog formats where only lousy players existed.)

latreche34 obviously meant that the OP should test all the outputs of the Panasonic DVD/VCR unit they've got, to see which one looks the best. If its S-video output is just adding on a comb filter to composite video, then it may not necessarily look better than the comb filter built into a good capture device.

Yes, separated luma/chroma video dates back to at least the 1970s, such as on the Atari 800 and Commodore 64 computers, but I meant the 4-pin mini-DIN connector associated with S-video. AFAIK, it first appeared on S-VHS decks, and then shortly thereafter on ED-Beta and Hi8.

Yeah, perhaps. :)

I also think this is the case, but I can't say for certain. I'd not be surprised if Y/C using mini DIN was on some obscure device prior to S-VHS decks.

BTW, I don't really trust Wikipedia anymore, garbage is being copy/pasted there from ChatGPT/whatever more and more. Horrid feedback loop of wrong info. Not that it was much better pre-AI. Either malicious edits, or power-trip ego edits.

Nah. You just don't know how to cook it.
:laugh:

Thank you for your replies.

That is a very interesting tip. However, I believe that, unfortunately, I usually have *either* the original VHS-C tape *or* a VHS copy, almost never both.

I was between 16 and 19 when I filmed this footage, and although I enjoyed the creative aspect of making videos, I had very little technical knowledge and it didn't occur to me, for instance, that a copy might be significantly different from the original. I recorded on the VHS-C tapes that fit inside the camcorder, and when the tape was full, I would copy the footage to regular VHS (or later S-VHS) and simply overwrite the VHS-C tape with new footage. Except in a handful of cases where the footage was really important, where I actually might have kept the original and a copy ... I'll have to check.

Yes, I meant "s-video", where the Y/C is separate. If I understand correctly, that is the preferred set-up, and capturing regular VHS benefits from it as well, not just S-VHS.

Alright, I'll get a proper VCR, then. VCRShop has quite a selection. I'm not affiliated with them, it' just that they are in the EU, so I can get their stuff with lower shipping costs and no import taxes or delays in customs.

I'll have to do some research on what VCR to get. Looking at your list of recommendations, it's a tough choice, because the picture quality of JVC is said to be generally cleaner while Panasonic is better at EP/SLP playback. I archived some of my home movies in "long play" format back then, because as I said, I didn't pay enough attention to the technical side (I realised there would be some loss in quality, obviously, but I thought it wouldn't be too bad).

Maybe I should get both a JVC and a Panasonic S-VHS and compare them for both "short play" and "long play" tapes. They can be rented at VCRShop as well, so I wouldn't have to actually buy both.

Alright, since you seem to know what you're doing, that seems to be the way to go. Are there significant differences between the Pinnacle USB PAL cards you sell, or are the differences negligable when it comes to my use case?

It may very well be that type of VCR, and if that is so, it's one more reason not to use it for capturing.

Basically, yes. Although in this particular case, I think I'll settle for a good hamburger instead of going for the filet mignon. I've also read up a bit on frame-sync TBC, and while I think I understand the advantages, I'm not sure how much my use case would really benefit from it, and when I gauge that against the price of these things, which is well over $1k ... It is quite daunting!

I watched a video by Video Capture Guide on the subject of TBC, and he reports that, without frame TBC, in a test capture of 4 hours and 30 minutes, he had 92 inserted frames, and the audio was still perfectly in sync because VirtualDub compensated for the inserted frames by resampling the audio. Is that an average scenario? Because if that is what I could expect in a 4 hour 30 minute recording without frame TBC, i.e. a couple of seconds' worth of dropped frames and still no audio sync issues, then I can very well live with that. All the more so because frame TBC is not just so expensive, I also worry that I won't be knowledgable enough to use it correctly - the consensus seems to be that, while it's great to have, it can also introduce new problems, and that is a point that makes me uneasy.

So, my focus is on getting a decent VCR and a decent USB card for now. I'll see what results I get with those, and once I've gone that far down the rabbit hole, I might take another look at frame TBC. I think that's a reasonable approach for me to take.

For your purpose you need Panasonic NV-FS200 or NV-HS1000. NV-HS1000 is a bit sharper so you may need manually adjust sharpness. And good original VHS-C adapter.

One way to find out if the DVD recorder takes video from composite and then process it into S-Video and component, If the quality looks worse or the same over S-Video and component than that's the case, If it's slightly better then the engineers designed it the way it supposed to be designed, I already know one or two members in the past tested it and S-Video and component out did produce a slightly better picture, So the theory of processing out of composite is not holding very well, but we need more samples.

Since you already have it, you might as well try using the DVD recorder for its intended purpose, to record the tapes to DVD (ideally at the highest quality setting it offers), and then rip the disc on your computer using a program like DVDVob2Mpg.

Thanks for the recommendations. Is it because I also have some VHS-C types? Are these two VCRs especially good for capturing from these tapes?

I still have two original VHS-C adapters, fortunately.

But as far as I understand, the DVD recorder compresses the video when recording it to DVD, whereas I could do a lossless capture if I use a capture card. So wouldn't using a capture card be better, genereally speaking? Or does the DVD compression not matter given the (lower) quality of the VHS sorce, anyway?

Yes, Panasonic G or K mechanism is recommended for those. FS200 has excellent G2 (latest with 2 belts) mechanism, but it is older, so should be serviced properly and carefully. HS1000 is later with K mechanics. Both are good. But on HS1000 you probably should reduce sharpness manually a bit. There are really not so much options for good deck, no matter Panasonic or JVC. Do not mess with those combo units or units without line TBC. It is a waste of time.