Is it possible to trick a "Digital Video Stabilizer" into passing S-Video?

[Brad]

The common "black box" Macrovision removers only have an RCA input intended for composite. Could one get around that by using an S-Video to 2x RCA breakout cable to send only luma into the box?



Then ultimately recombine modified Y with original C using a similar cable on the capture side?



I don't know whether:

1. The chroma signal has sync that could carry Macrovision.
2. A YC delay could be introduced.

[jagabo]

The luma signal contains the vertical and horizontal sync pulses. So passing luma through the stabilizer should get rid of the forms of Macrovision that screw with the sync pulses. But some forms of Macrovision play with the color burst signal. I think it will work for that but I don't know for sure.

But be careful about the cabling. You want the luma channel to go through the stabilizer and the chroma channel to go straight from the source to the destination. Those cables may molest the signal since they are designed to combine luma and chroma to composite. You may need to make your own cables.

[Brad]

Those cables may molest the signal since they are designed to combine luma and chroma to composite. You may need to make your own cables.

Is it actually possible to do S-Video to composite with a passive cable? I thought that was one of those scams like the "HDMI to YPbPr" cables that only work with some random graphics card somewhere that happens to allow HDMI pins to carry analog.

In the case of the first one pictured: "Hosa VSA-356 Video "Y" cable splits the video signal into its chrominance and luminance channels." Blue Jeans Cable describes theirs in more depth, but unfortunately only offers BNC connectors.

[jagabo]

I believe the Blue Jeans breakout adapter is what the OP wants. That just routes the s-video luma and chroma through separate RCA cables. Use one of those adapters at each end. Run the luma through the stabilizer, and a normal RCA cable for the chroma.

Note that a composite signal carrying a greyscale video is exactly the same as the luma signal of s-video. So since the stabilizer has to work for black-and-white movie it has to work for s-video luma. In this case the chroma channel carries no information.