Best S-VHS To best Capture card

[samturner01]

Hi you all. You have a BIG TIME HORROR MOVIE BUFF here. and a long time reader/contributer here of the forum (if you guys ever need money just let met know : ). But right now im trying to go from VHS to DVD as cleanly as possible.. I have a Pnasonic AG-DS555 S-VHS VCR and its been going straight for about 3300 hours (watches the whole indian jone trilogy on it, In ALMOST DVD QAULITY IN MY OPINOIN. But what im looking for is advice on a capture card. I have windows xp home, 1.9 mhz intel processor, 256 mb circa 2002 NVIDIA grapix card 1GB RAM.. and a cleaned up (FULLY optimzed) 1.9 Mhz Computer(I mean ive spent YEARS fully optimizing this sucker.). This computer is as cleaned up as its gonna be for 1.9 mhz.. What im looking for is the best capture card for a 1.9 mhz machine.. And if possible the best s-VHS deck i can get under 2000 Dollars. Let me know ok guys, because i have about 4400 horror movis that arent releasead on DVD and alot of them are CULT FAVORITES, And its a BAD ASS COLLECTION. That i would like to get on DVD.. So you guys let me know OK. I want to know the best Panasonic S-VSH vcr for the best 1.9 Mhz intel processor....

what i want to know uis the best capture card for my system.. and the best S-VHS Deck from Panasonic... Im looking for Near perfect S-VHS Quality.

Thanks Guys

[jman98]

I would recommend either the Hauppauge PVR-250 or PVR-350 cards. The 350 contains TV out but that's the only difference between it and the PVR-250. Both cards contain a hardware encoding chip, so they'll work fine on your PC and put no strain on the CPU - the card will do all the encoding. What I typically do is encode at 8100 CBR and then use CCE to re-encode down to a lower VBR value so it fits on DVD. I do this for laserdiscs and I'm really happy with the results. If you want to go that route (high bit rate original encoding followed by a further VBR encode to the correct final bit rate), do note that the Hauppauge cards ALWAYS record video as bottom field first, but due to some bug the video header says it's top field first. ALWAYS do any re-encodes from the 250 or 350 as bottom field first regardless of what Gspot or any other programs say (they will all say the video is top field first, but they are wrong - like I said, it's a bug).

Can't help you with the S-VHS question.

[indyram]

Best VHS to Digital card that I have experience with is

Canopus ADVC 100

I don't know whether it is still available or not

That is the best I know of

Indy

[jagabo]

do note that the Hauppauge cards ALWAYS record video as bottom field first, but due to some bug the video header says it's top field first.

??? My PVR-250 records top field first and the MPEG stream is flagged top field first.

[Video Head]

Avid makes very good capture devices. Pricey but pro results...you sound like you are not scared to spend some money on this project.

www.avid.com

[dadrab]

Well, I don't know about all the TFF vs. BFF stuff for the PVR350s - I use dual layer discs when necessary so I don't have to re-encode and risk losing quality. I capture at a rate of 8,000 CBR and that's what goes on the disc.

Snoop around in the capturing forum some. What you'll find are endless discussions about what SVHS devices are best for playing back for capture. Suffice it to say, JVC ranks very highly with a couple of Panasonic models thrown in for good measure. Check my profile for the model number of the JVC I have. It works very well.

Now, there are a couple of other things you need to contemplate additionally.

With 4,400 flicks, I'm assuming at least some of them are factory made tapes. That means some of them are copy protected - which usually means Macrovision.

Another plus for the PVR250-350 devices is that they ignore Macrovision.

You will probably also need a TBC (time base corrector). As you peruse the capturing area of the site, you'll undoubtedly pick up a recommendation or two for those as well. Because of their costs, I have not yet invested in one, but seriously need to as I believe my capturing efforts would be better with one. Copy protection will not be an issue with a TBC.

Happy reading. 8)

[harley2ride]

Lots of options. Some good ones above.
Others include a JVC S-VHS which has tbc, ADS PYRO AV/Link instead of a Hauppage card. I like the ADS PYRO, as it is portable and I can use it on any system I want. It bypasses macro protection too.. It all depends on your needs. You might even look at something like the go-sima devices, and go from S-VHS, through sima device (macro bypass), then to a dvd recorder. Almost any of these will do a great job for you.

[classfour]

PVR-150 (and I assume PVR-250 and PVR-350) ignores macrovision. I've recorded straight from a JVC Pro vcr without MV issues. Even on the PVR-150, the output from the JVC (since I cleaned it), is near DVD quality.