VCRs with separate video/audio tracking?

[Relayerman]

Are there, or were there, any VCRs made (VHS) that have separate tracking controls for the video and audio? I've got a huge amount of VHS tapes, many of which contain movies that I want to convert to XviD. My problem is not a new one, but the tracking is off on a lot of the older tapes. I can get ga ood picture, but static audio or vice versa. I can go the non-hifi audio route and get mono to solve some of that issue, but I was just wondering.

Relayerman

[Almost Human]

On a HiFi VHS VCR the audio trak overlays the video track diagonally - so the sole tracking control does both at the same time. I doubt there is a consumer VCR that has the ability of separate traking controls.

[Epicurus8a]

I've never heard of a machine like the one you describe.

[robjv1]

It would take some time -- what I do in these situations is capture the video in the best quality I can to my DVD recorder and disregard the audio. Then I do a second pass and do the audio in the best I can get it. Then I take a frame accurate MPEG encoder (like MPEG DVD Wizard) and pull both into the timeline and match up the audio (easy to do in this program, just un-mute both audio tracks and drag them until they are lined up and have no echo in either direction). Then mute the audio on the video track and save the file -- and no re-encoding necessary.

[JohnnyMalaria]

I suspect it might have more to do with your VCR's heads.

The video and Hi-Fi stereo audio exist on the same part of the tape (the audio is actually deeper into the same part of the magnetic layer - the video is on top) but separate heads in the drum are used.

[Bix]

The high-end JVCs have a separate "audio monitor" setting that can downmix to mono, which often eliminates the pops only audible in hi-fi.

[R. Allen Gilliam]

I have this same problem with HiFi tapes recorded on different machines. If you adjust the tracking manually, you can tell that the overlap of good video and good HiFi audio tracking is very small. This leads to occasional static on audio or video or both. I think it only happens in EP/SLP mode.

My tapes seem to divide into two groups. Ones recorded on my dead Sharp VCR and my Sony play well on my Sony. Tapes recorded on my dead JVC play well on my working JVC HR-S9800U. This high end S-VHS VCR doesn't help at all with this problem, BTW.

There's no way to adjust the relative tracking of video and HiFi audio. You'd have to move the heads on the spinning drum relative to each other.

There are two solutions: Record audio and video separately with different manual tracking adjustments and join them in software, which is a time-consuming pain in the ass. Or buy a different brand VCR to play the tapes. If you've got a nice VCR with TBC, you can get a lower-end VCR and pass its signal through your good VCR for TBC. Be sure not to get one with crappy TBC because it'll prevent your good TBC from working.

If anybody has more information on which brands have which alignment, post it to this thread:

https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/276369-Optimal-tracking-for-video-!-optimal-tracking-for-audio

[hech54]

I have this same problem with HiFi tapes recorded on different machines. If you adjust the tracking manually, you can tell that the overlap of good video and good HiFi audio tracking is very small. This leads to occasional static on audio or video or both. I think it only happens in EP/SLP mode.

My tapes seem to divide into two groups. Ones recorded on my dead Sharp VCR and my Sony play well on my Sony. Tapes recorded on my dead JVC play well on my working JVC HR-S9800U. This high end S-VHS VCR doesn't help at all with this problem, BTW.

There's no way to adjust the relative tracking of video and HiFi audio. You'd have to move the heads on the spinning drum relative to each other.

There are two solutions: Record audio and video separately with different manual tracking adjustments and join them in software, which is a time-consuming pain in the ass. Or buy a different brand VCR to play the tapes. If you've got a nice VCR with TBC, you can get a lower-end VCR and pass its signal through your good VCR for TBC. Be sure not to get one with crappy TBC because it'll prevent your good TBC from working.

If anybody has more information on which brands have which alignment, post it to this thread:

https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/276369-Optimal-tracking-for-video-!-optimal-tracking-for-audio

For your first two posts here you dig up 7 year old threads?