vhs => digital ?

[bugsbunny14]

hi ,

i want to digitize my archive which consist hundreds of vhs tapes .

i know that there are so many ways to do that and i have used most of them .

but now i want something more , because i have so many tapes and i want to finish the job quickly i want to attach 3 vcrs to my pc so i can convert 3 tapes at the same time , is there a way to do that ?

please help

[yoda313]

I guess that would be conceivable with three capture cards and preferably three harddrives.

You would want independent harddrives to ensure things don't get messed up.

or you could borrow dvd recorders if you know people who have them. That might be better for quick and dirty captures.

[redwudz]

Maybe if you had 3 hardware capture cards, like Hauppauge 150s, and they didn't interfere with each other.

But for the price, you could pick up 3 DVD recorders and do it that way a lot easier.

I wouldn't try it with software capture cards as your CPU would be maxed out too easily. And I don't know that you could run three software capture cards without interference.

Hard drives wouldn't be that big of a problem with a hardware capture card, but I would still use additional drives.

[yoda313]

you could pick up 3 DVD recorders and do it that way a lot easier.

That is what I was thinking. Also you could still copy the finished dvd's to your pc for editing and menu work later if you don't like the stock menus the recorders have.

[lordsmurf]

Operating 3 transfer jobs at once sounds a lot easier than it is, just FYI.

[edDV]

Amazing what becomes possible with TB drives. Bulk conversion from multiple hardware compressor cards becomes possible. When I try this with a single capture drive it crys out loud as the head rapidly seeks but it doesn't drop frames. I wonder if this wears out the head arm?

Separate drives make most sense. This keeps files continuous (less fragmentation)