Old Porta-Pak recordings need a TBC

[Dasun]

Previously, I indicated that I had some (read alot!) of old VHS videos recorded on a Porta-Pak and because of crash cuts the capturing was not satisfactory on my DAC 100 unit as it took some seconds after each cut to synch-up.

Well,a Nova Systems Novamate TBC (any comments?) came my way and now I can capture the tapes "perefectly". Conclusion these tapes must be dubbed with a TBC!

The weird part is that my el-cheapo $89 VHS player seems to do a better job of playing these old tapes than my hi end JVC-BRS611E SVHS player! Given the tapes are old- like 1979-1985 there is some increase in nosie due to age but on the JVC player it is a heck of a lot worse than the el-cheapo Dick SMith VCR! The detail is a bit better on the JVC player, and over illuminated areas do not burn out quite so much, but the cheaper player looks better because it does not re-produce as much noise!

Really, one has to experiment and the result one gets might prove surprising!

[Sillyname]

Previously, I indicated that I had some (read alot!) of old VHS videos recorded on a Porta-Pak and because of crash cuts the capturing was not satisfactory on my DAC 100 unit as it took some seconds after each cut to synch-up.

Well,a Nova Systems Novamate TBC (any comments?) came my way and now I can capture the tapes "perefectly". Conclusion these tapes must be dubbed with a TBC!

The weird part is that my el-cheapo $89 VHS player seems to do a better job of playing these old tapes than my hi end JVC-BRS611E SVHS player! Given the tapes are old- like 1979-1985 there is some increase in nosie due to age but on the JVC player it is a heck of a lot worse than the el-cheapo Dick SMith VCR! The detail is a bit better on the JVC player, and over illuminated areas do not burn out quite so much, but the cheaper player looks better because it does not re-produce as much noise!

Really, one has to experiment and the result one gets might prove surprising!

Your old deck most likely has a wider space between the tape and the head. The JVC is less forgiving because it's probably got a 19-micron width between the head and tape, causing it to pick up noise that even the original porta pak was not able to discern.

[mikel]

Having access to more than one tape deck is definitely good.
I've been in the long process of transfering maybe 400 vhs tapes to dvd.
Most play well on my JVC9800. but a significant number have
better audio and are much less jumpy on my old Sony SLV R-1000.
Now on my more important transfers I always do a comparison test.

...and I'd sure hate to give up my TBC.

mikel

[Dasun]

As an update,

I discovered a mix of virtualdub filters that really cut back the noise the JVC recorder picks up without blurring the image to badly, the result is an image that is similar to the el cheapo deck - Trouble is it took 13 hours of processing for 1 hour of video on a 1.6GHZ laprtop I had lying around! Decisions, Decisions....

As an aside, these old tapes do not hold up to repeated playings - after 4 caputres one (a TDK) was showing significant dropouts and the first capture had nearly none! This tape would have had less than 20 playbacks in 22 years.

Yeah, TBC's rule! Now has anyone have any comments on a Nova Systems Novamate TBC (I got that for free, so I can not complain about the price).