Converting VHS tapes to Digital - which way to go? PC or Mac?
 

I just want to state from the start that I am quite inexperienced at video capture and the more I read the more inadequate I feel. I have only recently discovered this forum and have spent the last few weeks reading through many posts. I have found this both enlightening and confusing. However overall I feel that you are one of the most informative forums regarding this subject and I value the advice you have given to others

Goal
I have over 100 VHS tapes made by my father that contain invaluable family videos. I suspect my father put them onto vhs tape from Hi8 and normal 8mm tapes by connecting his video camera directly to a VHS recorder and recording them onto tape. The tapes are each 2-3 hours long and are in excellent condition as he did a duplicate set for archival purposes that have not been played more than once or twice

I would like to digitize these tapes for three purposes
1. Archival – best quality
2. Editing in PremierePro CS6
3. Publishing best quality to dvd or data files on a harddrive for playback on a computer and plasma tv

I am working in PAL

Before I discovered your forum I was advised that the best way to do this was using the ADVC110
My intended workflow was to:
1 Capture straight from my VHS player (specs Samsung DVD/VCR 6 Head Model DVD-V5500) through the ADVC 110 which is connected to my iMac (specs: 64 bit OS X 10.7.5, 2.5GHz Intel Core i5, 8 GB 1333 DDR3, Graphics-AMD Radeon HD 6750SM 512 MB)

I do have another iMac which is a year older and am not sure whether I should use this one instead for capture as it has a more powerful cpu but less RAM (specs: iMac11,3 OS X 10.6.8, 2.93 GHz intel Core i7, 4 GB 1333 MHz 1333 MHz DDR3, Graphics card - ATI radeon HD 5750)

2. Use iMovie 11 as the capture software

3. Copy the dv file from the iMovie events folder and archive as is

4. import this dv file from the iMovie Events folder into PremierePro CS6 for editing

5. Output edited file from Premiere into Encore as a MPEG2 for burning onto a DVD

Where do the following fit into this workflow and are they still recommended? A bit confused here
- Matrox's FREE MPEG-2 I-Frame-only at 25 Mbps
- HcEnc Encoder
- Mainconcept Reference - is this the same as Premiere's MainConcept SDK encoder?

I did do one experimental run exporting the file from premiere as a DVPAL in a quicktime container but the file was huge (32 GB for aprox 3mins of video) am i doing something wrong here or is this the size i should expect for this?

Since then however I have discovered that the dv format is lossy and am aware of its other flaws I want the best possible capture quality from the VHS tape as I no longer have the original Hi8 tapes

After reading your forum I discover that Macs aren’t really recommended for the job and I should be using a PC for the best quality lossless capture and a workflow like the following:
1. Capture the VHS using the ATI TV Wonder™ HD 600 USB
2. VirtualDub
3. Saving in Huffyuv

Problem is the only desktop PC is one I built 5 years ago (specs: Intel Core Duo 3.16 GHz, with only 2 GB RAM, NVIDIA Geforce 9600 GT graphics card and is a 32 Bit system running win 7) I don't know if its up to the job

Somewhere along the way in both workflows should I also be using a TBC?

Some people recommend archiving as hi bitrate MPEG2 broadcast – but I don’t understand why as this is also a lossy format like dv

So do I just go ahead and use the ADVC 110 or use my old pc with the ATI TV wonder? Or buy a new PC altogether? If i go the Mac path is it really going to be a painful process and will there be a huge noticeable difference in quality?

Its just that this is going to be a fairly big project and i want to start off on the right foot and im feeling pretty confused at the moment

Ty

I hope this didn’t sound too garbled

Macs suck for video capture
the windows PC you listed is fine and will work with the ATI600
it would be even better is you wiped it and installed windows XP SP2 and bought an ATI AIW card

the ADVC also is not good - it only works in 4:1:1 DV which is awful

you best captures will be lossless using Virtualdub

you should invest in a good stand alone TBC like the Datavideo TBC-1000

it is too bad you dont have the 8mm/hi8 tapes still
they are far superior to VHS

Just as a point of reference... I assembled a purpose-built machine about a year ago specifically for capturing video because (1) I wanted to use XP and (2) I'm using an ATI AIW card, and I didn't want to install either of those on my main computer at home.

I built it with the following components:

Intel Pentium G870 Dual Core @ 3.1 GHz
4GB DDR-1333 RAM
Very basic Z77 motherboard (MSI Z77A-G41)
7200RPM 1TB Western Digital Blue HDD

I assume you meant the Core 2 Duo E8500, which has a Passmark CPU benchmark score of 2,291. The G870 I use has a benchmark score of 2,871, so it's not that far ahead of your processor by that measure.

I'm using the ATI AIW as the graphics card because it doesn't give you any other choice. It was made in 2005/2006 so it can't be any better than your NVidia (I think I have a 9600GT laying around somewhere, haha).

And I wouldn't worry too much about the RAM. When my ATI AIW card was made, 2GB would've been a LOT of RAM.

Your old PC should be perfect :)

EDIT: You should probably install WinXP though. You can dual boot 7 and XP if you do it correctly, just google it.

In my old age, I've become more lenient. Mac is not great, as DV is the only option. But in the age of Chinese USB capture stick (Easycap aka EasyCrap), DV looks better. So I won't fault it overly harshly.

On Windows, even WinVisat-10, you have better choices, included USB ones.

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