VHS capturing problem - embedded copy protection?

[cobra967]

Hello, I am trying to backup my VHS movies in DVDs, however, when attempting to play back the captured video the first frames of the video display repeatedly. The audio, however; play correctly. Alternately, the loop may be the first few frames of the video followed by green frames.
For what I know, this symptom will occur if an attempt is made to capture video from a video which has embedded copy protection. Many pre-recorded video tapes and DVDs (i.e. movies) are copyright protected and include a mechanism to prevent duplication. The ATI TV Player from Multimedia Center detects copyright protection and if an attempt is made to capture the material, the image will be scrambled or continuously loop.

Anyone knows a work around to this problem?

Thanx

[Marco33]

Have you captured at all from vhs?

Meaning, have you captured video (& audio) that was perfect.

[celtiber2]

If you have a DV camera that supports passthru (from A/V inputs to Firewire PC connection) then this is the easy way to back up VHS tapes as the Firewire interface doesn't support Macrovision and strips it off.

[solarfox]

I'm afraid that's not entirely true, Celtiber2.

Obviously, Firewire can't support Macrovision, since it's a digital data bus while the MV copy-lock process involves tinkering with portions of the analog video signal to confuse an analog VCR's automatic-gain-control circuitry. However -- many DV camcorders contain a circuit which detects MV on the analog inputs and stops the camcorder from recording or passing through the signal if it sees it.

The only sure way to overcome this is to get a Macrovision stripper and connect it between your VCR and the recording/digitizing device. Such devices are not too hard to find; a simple Google search will point you to a half-dozen different vendors of them.

[celtiber2]

@Solarfox

I generally agree with your observations but I would make the following points:

1. Trying to record to the Camcorders own tape generally doesn't work for the reasons you've mentioned. That's why it is important to be able to use passthru rather than trying to record on the DV tape (some camcorders don't do both).

2. I have used this method many times with my Sony PC9E to back up my kids VHS tapes and I have had no problems. I can't talk about other camcorder types as I haven't tried them.

So if someone already has a DV camcorder that supports passthru then they may as well try it. That way they might save on the cost of the other boxes you mention

[Marco33]

In the old days. When you wanted to make a backup of a VHS that was copy protected.

You had to pass it through a dummy VHS.

So, the first one plays, you pass through the cable through the dummy then record in the third VCR.

Maybe you could pass it through a dummy before your capture card.

[pluche]

converting via firewire to avoid macrovision works only well for DVD video to DVD-R (for example with an analog-DV convertor) doing this with protected tapes still gives problems on the final DVD-R (mostly kind of regular flashes)
However both video tapes and DVD-video can be copied using an exterior time base corrector (+- 300 usd)

[madwok]

Well, if you have a Video out on your TV, you can feed VHS to TV then out to capture input to bypass Macrovision . Work for me .

Also BestBuy have that gadget Perfect Copy to do this too for $ 50.00
and it works well with VHS .

[peterc]

Cobra 967,

I am probably going to get hammered for my suggestion but I can only tell you my experience. It was just a short while ago that I was on the same pursuit as you.

I am not sure what version of the MMC that you are using but if your video card is pretty recent, the softare that was delivered with the card "should" have either 7.5 or 7.6. That is what you will need for this to work.

All I done was completely remove all of the ATI stuff using the purging instructions located here

http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?s=bbb463a40e321f65810a1913a367896f&threadid=33630746

Dont follow all of the instructions though, substitute the software versions with the version located on the original cd. If you don't have that, I think you can dig around on ATI's site and find the older stuff.

After you have uninstalled everything reinstall the software according to the above instructions. Then after all is said and done and you are back up and working again, go to the tools section located on this site and download the following tool:

ATI AIW MMC 7.5/7.6 Reg Tool

Extract this using WinRAR and ignore all of it except for the Disable Macrovision zip file. Extract this and follow the included instructions.

After reboot, this works like a champ. After doing this I am able to do just as you were requesting above as well as capturing backups of DVD's from a standalone DVD player connected to my capture card.

I lost "NO" functionallity from backleveling my software version, but I am not saying that you won't because I am not aware of what all you use your system for.

Just my .02
Thanks

PS - This sounds a lot more complicated than it actually is. Its easy, try it. Just follow instructions and all is good.

[cobra967]

Thank you all for the overwhelming response.

I found the last recommendation, from peterc, to be working just fine for my video card.

Thanks.