Hello. I'm wondering what the easies and cheapest way to convert VHS tapes from a cam corder/VCR to DVD or any format used on a PC? Can I just use a V-Card TV-out/capture cabability? I don't want one that you buy that isn't for a PC, and I don't want to send my tapes to someone to get them done. Thanks V.S.
All external devices have limitations, usually because of the USB 2.0 specs for speed. This can limit your framerate and aspect ratio during capture, no matter how fast your computer is. I would recommend three things, especially if you have a lot of projects (VHS tapes). 1) A standalone DVD recorder. The quickest method, but you may have troubles with macrovision copy protection on commercial VHS. Advantages: Quick and easy. Disadvantages, no TV tuner, no editing. 2) A hardware mpeg-2 encoder internal PCI card. These produce near-DVD quality mpeg-2 files on your hard drive, ready to author and burn. Quick, and relatively painless. Audio is in sync. You can have some issues with lines on the top or bottom of the captured video, from misaligned heads in the VCR, but this usually ends up in the TV overscan area, so you don't see it anyhow. Advantages: Less time, TV tuner included, easy editing. Disadvantages: Misaligned VCR heads/cheap VCR can produce poor quality video. 3) A TBC such as the Canopus ADVC-110. This will dramatically clean up the source video, but will only capture via firewire to DV-AVI, which you will then have to encode to mpeg-2. Can be very time consuming, but with superb quality, remembering that you cannot improve quality, you can only maintain it. Advantages: Best quality. Disadvantages: Extremely time consuming. Extra software purchases. If you're serious about quality, and time constraints, then the Hauppauge PVR-250 internal PCI hardware card is a great start. If time doesn't matter, but quality is utmost, get the TBC.
So all I need is Hauppauge PVR-250 and I will be able to copy my VHS to DVD and record tv shows off the TV? Is this the only piece of hardware I will need or are the cables ect. I might need. Thanks V.S>.
The card comes with all the necessary software. All you need to do, is get a splitter, and a patch cord (regular cable type) for your normal cable TV line, and run it to the back of the card. It screws right in, just like the cable does to your VCR or TV. You can hook up a VCR to the card this way, set the card to record on channel 3, and play the tape. This works, but is not the best quality. You PROBABLY want to record from VCR differently. The card allows for S-Video inputs as well. To do it this way, requires you to purchase the proper cable, from whatever outputs your VCR has (on the back, usually RED, WHITE and YELLOW, to the card's input. In this case, RCA (Composite) to S-Video. Most electronics type stores sell these for a few dollars, depending on the length you need. Some VCR's also have S-Video OUT. If yours does, you can just get an S-Video patch cord, and go directly from VCR to the card. The 3rd option, is a Composite cable from the YELLOW on the VCR directly to the YELLOW on the card. This does VIDEO only, and you will have to get a COMPOSITE to STEREO MINI converter cable. The composite audio RED and WHITE go into a stereo mini plug, which plugs into your sound card. It doesn't matter which way you choose, the card, and the software, take care of all the recording settings.
Actually, with the Hauppauge, you should create a separate channel for recording. I have the 350 card and made a channel named VCR. I also got new cables to connect to the card and have it set as Composite 2 to capture from my VCR. It works well.
If you're recording via composite, why do you need a channel? If simply using the VCR cable out to cable in, the tuner software MUST be set to the output chan of the VCR (just like a TV would be), usually channel 3. Composite or S-Video input is completely different.
This is exactly what I needed. Thanks for everyone for all your help. That card is top on my list. V.S.
