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  1. I have a collection of bootleg concert videos on VHS and I want to convert them to some sort of avi type files. I'm not looking to do anything fancy, just 1:1 copies of the videos.

    I have a high(ish) end sony vcr and a hauppauge 150 capture card. I have the hardware set up and working properly.

    But I don't know what software and process to use. I've tried looking around on this site and others for guides but to be honest I am completely overwhelmed (and sometimes underwhelmed) by the stuff I find. Imho, they don't really explain what to do.

    Thanks
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  2. Originally Posted by blud View Post
    ...just 1:1 copies of the videos.
    There's no such thing. Your thread title,
    and your also stated, "I'm not looking to do anything fancy", are contradictory. You can do it easily but not optimally (just use the software included with the card to capture MPEG-2 video), or you can do it best.

    Lordsmurf has written some guides to doing it 'best'.

    http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/video-restore/1567-vcr-buying-guide.html
    http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/video-restore/2251-tbc-time-base.html
    http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/video-restore/

    Also, look around for and read the several threads floating around these days regarding the restoration of video tapes. There's no way I'd consider a captured VHS tape as done or finished or good enough.
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  3. I own a different capture card but what options does yours give you? You should be able to set up a capture using the software which installed with the card. I can capture to standard formats such as DVD, or to AVI or MP4 etc using installed system encoders.

    As VHS is basically in the same format as 4:3 DVD I've be very tempted to capture directly to DVD compliant mpeg/vob files if you can while keeping it interlaced. I'd use the maximum possible bitrate. I'd keep those files as the "master" copy, and from there convert them to another format such as AVI.

    In my case my capture card will also let me capture to a lossless format such as uncompressed AVI. They'd probably be even more ideal as "master" copies but they'll also require a lot of disc space.
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  4. I shouldn't have used the word "Best". What is 'best' for me is something that looks as good as the vhs tapes and is relatively easy to do. I'm pretty sure those guides are overkill for what I'm looking to do (although I won't know that for sure till I see the videos I capture and see what they look like)

    The hauppauge 150 only comes with this software called WinTV. I didn't even really think of using it to capture the video since it looked more like a tv viewing program, and it looked kind of crappy so I assumed it wouldn't do a decent job.

    So I tried to use Virtual Dub, but, ran into problems. When I captured uncompressed video with it I couldn't open those videos in VLC and I couldn't even open them in Virtual Dub because they both complained about the format. So I tried to install huffyuv and capture to that format, but, either huffyuv refuses to install or virtual dub won't recognize that it's installed. (Still haven't solved that yet, but I made other thread(s) about that)

    But yeah, thanks for the idea hello_hello. I'll try using WinTV and see how that goes.
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  5. Yeah, WinTV seems to record them just fine. I don't know why I didn't figure that out right away, I guess I was just caught up in my broken VirtualDub problems.

    I am recording at the top quality WinTV is capable of, MPEG2 12.0MBit/sec (CBR) which I assume is going to have no noticeable loss in quality from the source.

    Now I just have to figure out what's a good way to filter the video to improve the quality. As manono suggested, I am doing that over here: http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/video-restore/4088-recommendations-vhs-filtering.html
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  6. Member hech54's Avatar
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    The Hauppauge 150 with it's original WinTV software are easily capable of giving you damn near identical copies of your tape.....WITH the proper settings. Blud mentioned it's 12.0MBit/sec capabilities already(if your version of WinTV has that option). I've found out over the years that this setting is an overkill AND it is not DVD compliant.
    Stick to 720x480 or 720x576(for PAL format) MPEG2 and you'll do fine. Anything less than that IS LESS as far as quality goes.

    And as for you mentioning "some sort of avi type files"....unless they contain H264 video....you can kiss all of your hard work at retaining as much quality as the original out the window.
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  7. Originally Posted by hech54 View Post
    Blud mentioned it's 12.0MBit/sec capabilities already(if your version of WinTV has that option). I've found out over the years that this setting is an overkill AND it is not DVD compliant
    Even though it is overkill, if I captured all my video in 12.0MBit/sec with WinTV, I could still convert those files into something that is DVD compliant right? (I assume the answer is "of course", but, just checking!
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  8. Member hech54's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by blud View Post
    Originally Posted by hech54 View Post
    Blud mentioned it's 12.0MBit/sec capabilities already(if your version of WinTV has that option). I've found out over the years that this setting is an overkill AND it is not DVD compliant
    Even though it is overkill, if I captured all my video in 12.0MBit/sec with WinTV, I could still convert those files into something that is DVD compliant right? (I assume the answer is "of course", but, just checking!
    Yes....but it's NOT difficult at all. It's still MPEG2, it's just that 12.0MBit is too high for DVD specs.
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