vhs to dvd

[jgreg]

I have several old vhs movies that I would like to convert to dvd I have a panasonic vhs/dvd combo recorder I keep getting an error that will not let me copy Can any one help me Thanks in advance

[jman98]

We get this all the time. Commercial VHS tapes are protected with Macrovision. DVD recorders won't record a signal with Macrovision. What you need to do is insert a TBC (Time Base Corrector) between the VCR and DVD recorder, but since you have a combo, that will probably be impossible. Note that TBCs are quite expensive too. A decent one will probably cost more than your combo unit did.

[guns1inger]

Thanks for being so vegua and not providing too much detail. I feel in need of a challenge.

My guess is that you are trying to copy a commercial video tape which has macrovision protection, and your recorder is designed to stop you doing this. The other alternative is that your tape is so old and damaged that it looks like it has copy protection. Either way, the only way to fix the problem is to put a TBC (Time Base Corrector) or signal cleaner in between the player and the recorder. In most combo units this is not possible.

[jgreg]

My panasonic has inputs for sd card and usb 2.0 it also has front inputs for audio and video plus super video

I have an dvd player if that would help It is also 1080 p and has both tuners astc and nstc I am not sure if I got the spelling correct on the tuners but it does have a lot of bells and whistles

Thanks in advance for your help

[jgreg]

Some one mentioned running the vhs tapes thru a digital cam corder then recording He did not give me more info Do you know what he have meant

Thanks

[yoda313]

If the camcorder has passthrough than I believe you would take the vhs output and feed it to the camcorder. Then from there you would take the camcorder output and feed it to the dvd recorder input.

I don't know if that would override any recording problems but that is how it would be configured.

[jman98]

Why would another DVD player help when you are wanting to use a DVD RECORDER????

You are not really listening to what we are telling you. You got 2 responses that said the same thing (mine and guns1inger's). I'm responding only because of your PM to me. The bells and whistles are useless. Read my post and guns1inger's again.

You HAVE to insert a TBC between the video output and the DVD recorder input. It's up to you to figure out if this can even be done in a combo unit (I doubt it). It could be done if the VCR was separate. Please think carefully about what I said because you've been told what to do and if you continue to ignore what you've been told I'm either going to ignore you (if you're lucky) or start getting insulting (if you're not lucky). As a general rule we're not rude to newcomers, but it's really starting to piss me off about how many dumbasses (I'm NOT calling you one - at least not yet) refuse to pay attention to what we tell them. I replied twice to a guy and told him exactly what he needed to do to fix a problem and he refused to listen to what I said and only after somebody else repeated the same thing did he say to that guy "Thanks for telling me what to do". I had told him exactly what to do earlier, but he was too blind to see it. Please do not go down this path of not paying attention to what you are told here.

[tinker]

The problem could be your combo unit. You need to output VHS signal and input to recorder, I do not think that unit will let you do that.
On top of that you need a "Video Stabilizer", just Google that and you get suppliers. I use one for $40 and it works fine. The unit is to remove a Macrovision protection and it has to be placed in video signal path.
If you have a camcorder with Firewire output to capture to hard drive, check its manual if it can be used as a digital converter. In that case you run video from VHS player to camcorder and output to firewire port on your computer. You still have to use stabilizer.
Other option is to purchase Pinacle box, which will act as a digital converter for recording to hard drive

[lizardm]

I'm another newbie and have a question on what the original poster asked (I'm hoping this might work). I understand I need to disable the macrovison by getting a converter thing. Also trying to record copyrighted material onto DVD for personal use.

I too have a combo (DVD writer/player & VHS player) It's a panasonic (I read in another forum that panasonic might allow you to do this without another player, maybe that's not the case) so if so, would it work to have a 2nd vhs player, and put the macrovision thing between the two? ie:
VHS player, output - converter thing- input to combo vhs/dvd writer and record that way? my computer has no space on it to try the other way.

Thank you.

[vhelp]

Q: Can I copy a commercial vhs tape with a DVD/VCR combo unit ?

Moving forward, accept this as the rule:
A: If your equipment is a DVD/VCR combo, the answer is NO.

To [s:d8a47b3c5b]copy[/s:d8a47b3c5b] transfer a (commercial movie on tape) to another format, in this case, a DVD, you will need in most cases:

1. separate vcr, prefereably with s-video output connection
2. separate TBC (or other gizmo for bypassing mv signal)
3. any one of these: dvd recorder; capture card; hardware mpeg capture card; etc
4. dvd authoring software

a1. put tape in vcr and press play
b2. turn on tbc or other unit
c3. if device, turn it on and setup for recording, or if capture card, turn pc on, load windows up, lounch your capture software, and press record
d4. if 4 above, then after you capture/encode to an mpeg-2, you will need to author to a dvd disk.

That will either:

A) if {device in 3} will record your tape to dvd disk -- done
B) if {capture card in 3} will capture/record and encode to an MPEG-2 video file, but will then need to be authored to a DVD disk using steps 4 above.

-vhelp 4923