Does Grex really work on VHS MV?

[kodec]

Well surely I won't be buying used TBC1000, looking at the prices of recently sold they go for about $400 and more

Ended auctions from few years back, they were sold even for under $200.

[Adrian Hepker]

The seller rekons if he has a good vhs /Svhs deck it’s like gold to those out there who are doing archiving/ capture ..
So they are riding us & considering its original value of 2000 usd or 1000 usd they are saying there’s a demand so I’ll hold my price not give it away for 50 usd


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[kodec]

The seller rekons if he has a good vhs /Svhs deck it’s like gold to those out there who are doing archiving/ capture ..
So they are riding us & considering its original value of 2000 usd or 1000 usd they are saying there’s a demand so I’ll hold my price not give it away for 50 usd


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Well then, if buying anything more ATM it will be either GREX or that blueish CBT-100. Still waiting for themaster tho for further impressions on the Grex.. and of course it would be nice if Pinto would return to the topic with the detailed info on registry

[lordsmurf]

They fall into just two equally-annoying categories: true "pro" TBCs from the Jurassic period that once cost $5000 but now sell for $100 on eBay, and TinkerToy crap like the AVT and DataVideo that were never more than "adequate" on a good day (and drive you up the wall on a bad day). The old "pro" gear is hopelessly worn out and not good with VHS or MV, the cheaper newer prosumer stuff has wide quality control variation.

That's not accurate.

The ancient "Big Bertha" rack mounted TBCs expected clean broadcast/studio source, and had features like genlocking. Consumer analog sources like VHS were dirty, and don't play nice with the old gear. And the old gear is old -- really old -- and from near-abusive environments. Those sell for $100 on eBay, but it's honestly $100 too much. It's a tool for a task that no longer exists.

The late 90s and early 00s saw the need for VHS/Betamax/Video8/Hi8 transfer, and so TBCs for that tasks were made. But I'd not call any "Tinker toy crap", aside from Big Voodoo (which was Big Crap). The DataVideo unit were metal, and you could probably run over them with a car, or throw them against a wall. Odds were good they'd still be okay. The Cypress units were fragile plastic, would overheat from ~10 hours continued use, and had flawed chipset post 2010.

TBCs were always $400+, and that's for the base model. Many were closed to $1k.

People that complain about costs need to remember this: buy it, use it, resell it. You'll get most of the investment back.

most TBCs that you audition are not gonna perform dramatically better than a Grex: all these boxes are riddled with their own collection of bugs.

That's only true if you buy a unit known to work poorly with VHS, like a clunky huge rack mount unit from the 80s for $100 off eBay. Not the TBCs designed specifically for the noisy type of source you get from consumer analog tapes.

Well then, if buying anything more ATM it will be either GREX or that blueish CBT-100. Still waiting for themaster tho for further impressions on the Grex..

Well, good luck with that. The Cypress blue-silver TBCs have flawed chips with ghosting and sticking frames. And then the Grex will give you chrome/luma/IRE/color problems.

You'd do better to just use a capture card that ignores MV (though noting the fake video error that is "copy protection" may still give you grief. And then it'll do nothing for dropped frames, and potential audio skew from said frame drops.

[cypher-one]

Finally my videos have come back to life after 30 years. I had tried several methods to capture them such as: direct recordings to the computer, or DVD and other techniques, sometimes with worse results than the original video itself. The wait was worth it thanks to the HDML CLONER BOX PRO and the PANASONIC DMR EA38V. Do not expect wonders because it is a VHS and implies implicit low resolution video. But I am very satisfied with the result.

[kodec]

They fall into just two equally-annoying categories: true "pro" TBCs from the Jurassic period that once cost $5000 but now sell for $100 on eBay, and TinkerToy crap like the AVT and DataVideo that were never more than "adequate" on a good day (and drive you up the wall on a bad day). The old "pro" gear is hopelessly worn out and not good with VHS or MV, the cheaper newer prosumer stuff has wide quality control variation.

That's not accurate.

The ancient "Big Bertha" rack mounted TBCs expected clean broadcast/studio source, and had features like genlocking. Consumer analog sources like VHS were dirty, and don't play nice with the old gear. And the old gear is old -- really old -- and from near-abusive environments. Those sell for $100 on eBay, but it's honestly $100 too much. It's a tool for a task that no longer exists.

The late 90s and early 00s saw the need for VHS/Betamax/Video8/Hi8 transfer, and so TBCs for that tasks were made. But I'd not call any "Tinker toy crap", aside from Big Voodoo (which was Big Crap). The DataVideo unit were metal, and you could probably run over them with a car, or throw them against a wall. Odds were good they'd still be okay. The Cypress units were fragile plastic, would overheat from ~10 hours continued use, and had flawed chipset post 2010.

TBCs were always $400+, and that's for the base model. Many were closed to $1k.

People that complain about costs need to remember this: buy it, use it, resell it. You'll get most of the investment back.

most TBCs that you audition are not gonna perform dramatically better than a Grex: all these boxes are riddled with their own collection of bugs.

That's only true if you buy a unit known to work poorly with VHS, like a clunky huge rack mount unit from the 80s for $100 off eBay. Not the TBCs designed specifically for the noisy type of source you get from consumer analog tapes.

Well then, if buying anything more ATM it will be either GREX or that blueish CBT-100. Still waiting for themaster tho for further impressions on the Grex..

Well, good luck with that. The Cypress blue-silver TBCs have flawed chips with ghosting and sticking frames. And then the Grex will give you chrome/luma/IRE/color problems.

You'd do better to just use a capture card that ignores MV (though noting the fake video error that is "copy protection" may still give you grief. And then it'll do nothing for dropped frames, and potential audio skew from said frame drops.

Luckily you're such a deal breaker for anything, after reading your reviews I feel like quitting the hobby altogether .. But tell me, then why do you recommend the smurph blue Cypress CBT-100 in your other threads and guides? Is there another one than this one I was asking about?

[kodec]

An additional info, after reading the guides I have emailed an authorized Cyp vendor somewhere in the world about the grey-smurph blue they sell and the answer just arrived:

"... Thank you for your Inquiry and yes, the products we sell are qualified Cypress products and the ID#48 is the original "green" Cypress model you refer to."

The point is, I was avoiding searching for the black just as LS advised in his numerous guides and replies but now he says other colours suck as well, ha ha. Lord, I'm not trying to kid you, just trying to get to the bottom of the things before and if I cough up my hard earned cash.. whatever I say and ask is totally good-spirited and this is the best site ever for the hobby

[kodec]

Just to name the workflow in case anyone might have further TBC suggestions based on that (I'm where the PAL is):

JVC HR-S8700 (or Panasonic NV-HS860) - > (VICE 1000-2 in case of MV) - > Pioneer DVR-560-H > AverMedia PCI-E A707 (or AverMedia PCI-E A177, both never ever dropped a single frame).

[kodec]

Anyway, you can see in my earlier YT link what VICE 1000-2 does with MV of a tape from 2002, in that workflow. The only thing left is some little vertical stutter totally irrelevant to the average YT consumer, relevant only to me ... If none of these gadgets we discuss here can't outperform that just let me know and let's get the thread over with.

[lordsmurf]

why do you recommend the smurph blue Cypress CBT-100 in your other threads and guides? Is there another one than this one I was asking about?

An additional info, after reading the guides I have emailed an authorized Cyp vendor somewhere in the world about the grey-smurph blue they sell and the answer just arrived: "... Thank you for your Inquiry and yes, the products we sell are qualified Cypress products and the ID#48 is the original "green" Cypress model you refer to."

From about 2000 about 2010, Cypress made TBCs. AVToolbox bought some in a green shell with black accents, and this is all North America (NA) got. Cypress sold some direct as the CTB-100 in a light/dull gray box with Smurfy-blue accents, for sale outside NA. Some non-mainstream countries got things like a TCB-100, in various shell colors, sometimes modified as composite only, from various no-name brands.

Then something change in the chips. Something bad. All Cypress TBCs now have ghosting and frame-sticking problems.

From 2010 to now (and FYI, production will cease soon, no more Cypress TBCs), TVOne/AVToolbox has black shells for NA, and outside NA you had/have Cypress in silvery grey (not gray) with muted royal blue accents. Not Smurfy, no vibrant enough. This is the crap you easily find on eBay, from B&H, etc. The good TBCs are gone.

The green units have been gone for almost a decade now. I'd more likely believe that the person you wrote at CYP was colorblind (seriously colorblind, not just a joke). And outside of USA, outside of AVToolbox (which wasn't yet TVOne), green units didn't happen. Another option potential, something I was always afraid of, is that some shyster at Cypress has decided to swap colors on new units, rather than fix the fubar chips -- but not sure of that feasibility, especially since the CTB-100 is now EOL production.

PM me about that vendor, let me look into it. But I completely doubt the accuracy of what you've been told.

Luckily you're such a deal breaker for anything, after reading your reviews I feel like quitting the hobby altogether

I get aggravated by hardware costs, too. But it's a hobby, and all hobbies have costs. Or profession, and ditto.

What a lot of people don't understand is that I've looked for non-TBC options for most of the 25+ years I've been doing video. Anytime something was suggested as potential, I bought one. I tried it. And I was almost always disappointed. Sometimes it could be returned, sometimes resold (and at a loss). Very often, I just read marketing tech specs, sometimes R&D specs, before randomly buying something new-to-market, as I was the guinea pig that others looked to for my findings.

The DMR-ES10 is still my best find, and for almost 15 years people have been seeking it. I found that undocumented hidden feature, and it still proves valuable to this day. But still not a true TBC, allows some errors to pass (namely anti-copy).

All of this junk you're looking at, Grex/etc, is stuff I dismissed more than decade ago as crap.

Far more info on TBCs is located at the digitalFAQ.com forum, my home site.

[KarMa]

Could get a capture card that just ignores macrovision.

[lordsmurf]

A card that ignores MV can help, but you'll still have issues resolved only by a TBC: timing, dropped frames, etc. That sort of card only ignores areas of the signal that are not meant to contain data, which is the main method that MV/anti-copy works. But that's not all that's going on in the signal. Most anti-copy is so strong, or malformed, that it will still cause issues due to to timing problems. Again, remember, anti-copy (of which Macrovision is most popular) is an artificial video error. So the video has errors injected into it. AGC corruption is most common, set off by the extra data, but it's not necessarily where the errors stop. It screws with sync, and there are consequences to it. But as with capturing in general, a TV was more lenient about it, and did not require a perfect signal. So you never knew it, watching on TV. It's when trying to capture, or even copy VHS>VHS, that it became evident and obvious.

(Some anti-copy is so rotten that it even causes TBCs to wretch, but it's very infrequent. I have at least 2 tapes like this. Know that it's tape-based, not titled-based.)

I have several cards that ignore MV, but none is a TBC replacement. Probably 2 in 5 tapes have some sort of side effect fro those cards -- and 60% is probably a really generous success rate stat.

[KarMa]

The most common type of macrovision just puts white bars at the top of the frame (out of view for most TVs) for a few seconds and then removes the white bars, in a cycle that continues during the entire playtime. This is pretty much all it does and was designed to screw with the luma when attempting to record from one VCR to another. My capture card simply ignores this and I never see any kinds of rising and lowering of luma. While I rarely care for copying protected VHS tapes, it's most helpful to me when copying home movies on tape, as I've had equipment and software in the past falsely block my home movies because they thought they were macrovision protected when they were really just degraded/dirty. There is another type of macrovision with color bars but I have never encountered it in real life.

Having a card that ignores MV is certainly helpful but won't correct problems with wiggly images, which only a full-frame/line TBC can correct. But since OP only seems to be talking about macrovision, then a card that ignores it would be my recommendation. If OP wants to correct wiggly lines (timing issues) on a VHS output then some kind of TBC is needed, as not even the Grex seems to claim to be a TBC.

I use the WinTV-HVR-1250 internal tuner card. There are a few different versions with this card and some seem might get triggered by MV but mine does not. The one I have comes with a S-Video jack (which can also be uses as a yellow component w/ adaptor), a coax jack, and 3.5mm audio jack. No yellow component jack. I've heard that later version of this card do get triggered by MV.

[orsetto]

Just for the info, wanted to check it out but seems there is no TBC1000 currently sold on eBay.

They pop up every now and then for around $200 used, you just need to be patient and search "newly listed" every couple days. They seem to get listed in clusters: either a dozen are available any given month, or none. When just one or two are available, the price heads north to $400, but when some competition appears you'll see them drop closer to $200. The original selling price brand new was approx $350 - $450 at places like B&H. Re the modification to bypass its troublesome distribution amp: instructions are around somewhere, I think it was first mentioned in a TBC-centric thread here a few years ago (or perhaps on LordSmurf's digital.faq site). It isn't that difficult but does require a bit of soldering.

The TBC1000 falls into that "gotcha" category of gear that has an eBay "cult value" out of all proportion to their innate value, based solely on the fact they are the only items of their class mentioned on forums like this. People tend to seek the brand/model they see recommended in the first three threads they read. You can sometimes get a better price by casting a wider net: I've been amazed to see higher-end DataVideos regularly sell for less than the prosumer TBC1000. In any event, expect to pay between $200- $300 minimum for a worthwhile used TBC unless you stumble onto a lucky deal.

The ancient "Big Bertha" rack mounted TBCs expected clean broadcast/studio source, and had features like genlocking. Consumer analog sources like VHS were dirty, and don't play nice with the old gear. And the old gear is old -- really old -- and from near-abusive environments. Those sell for $100 on eBay, but it's honestly $100 too much. It's a tool for a task that no longer exists.

Totally agree: the old pizza box pro TBCs were not optimized for the dramatically less stable consumer tape formats. Most can't even clear MV consistently, and are older than the people now asking about them. I've tried several common variations (i.Den, Panasonic, For.A) and all made matters worse (one For.A was so laughably bad it made everything look third-generation: opened the lid and found several insect cocoons in it). We used Hotronics successfully at my last video gig some years ago, but the ones I see on eBay are much older and I can't remember the newer compact Hotronic model # we had.

[lordsmurf]

They pop up every now and then for around $200 used,

TBC-1000 is rarely below $350 these days. I've seen some climb to $475 in recent months, insane bidding wars, close to new MSRP. What's truly scary is that many come from recyclers or estate sales (ie unknown history), are missing parts, not tested, etc. So you must be very careful buying something, especially if you're not 100% familiar with it.

"cult value" ... based solely on the fact they are the only items of their class mentioned on forums like this.

Nah. The reason is because it's a respected device, usually built like a tank, made specifically for this sort of source. "Cult" status is when something is getting undeserved respect, and that's not at all the case here.

and are older than the people now asking about them.

This always amuses me.

but the ones I see on eBay are much older and I can't remember the newer compact Hotronic model # we had.

There's a lot of gear I never see anywhere anymore.
Examples: TBC-100 PCI cards, ATI AIW PCI 64mb cards, SignVideo/Studio1 detailers

It's one reason I'm hanging onto some of my gear that I may never needed again. But should I need it, I can't re-buy it easily, or at all, or in this condition. This is why things like AG-1980/1970 decks are getting scarce. Pricing has gone from about $300 to $600 for a deck in less than 2 years.

[orsetto]

What's truly scary is that many come from recyclers or estate sales (ie unknown history), are missing parts, not tested, etc. So you must be very careful buying something, especially if you're not 100% familiar with it.

It is tricky, but for those with a little tech savvy there are still occasional good deals on the TBC1000. Those recyclers and estate sale sellers are oddly a good source for this particular item: the "bargain" DataVideos that sell below $200 are typically from such listings, sold without the power brick. Strangely, OTOH, you'll also see units without the power brick selling for astronomical prices from private sellers. Another bizarre buying factor: the power bricks alone are apparently not that scarce and usually sell cheaply.

Granted, you need to know what you're buying, and be willing to roll the dice on a gamble. But this is one possible way to acquire a DataVideo without selling a kidney: estate sale main TBC unit sans power brick, and get the power brick cheap from another listing (buy the power brick first, obviously). There is some risk any unit will have issues, but most are OK or easily fixed in bypassing the troublesome distribution board (most problems are caused by the shoddy wiring quality of that tacked-on board, or at the power input). Don't forget, eBay now prioritizes buyers miles ahead of sellers: the seller can plaster their listing with a dozen "as-is, no returns" banners but eBay will still make them choke on it if you receive a grossly defective TBC1000 and want to return it. Paying via credit card gives you another layer of protection.

Again, don't overlook "higher-end" DataVideos that can sometimes appear for the same $ range as the TBC1000. As you move up the line, DataVideo just took the same basic TBC circuit and added more features (two TBCs in one box, genlock capability, various efx modes, etc). The extra features are useless for our current purposes, but since no one is aware of or actively looking for these other DataVideos there is less bidder competition (and sometimes cheaper Buy It Now offerings).

[LMotlow]

I now recall the day back in 2004 when I corresponded with a member in this forum who suggested I run down to B&H Photo in Manhattan and buy an AVT-8710 temporarily on sale, marked down by $25. At first it seemed like a waste of an hour and a subway ride, but I got that black-and-green 8710 home and hooked it to my capture setup. Voila! A copy protected retail tape played flawlessly through the capture chain, dropped and skewed frames and AGC effects disappeared, and I had a sharp, snappy, contrasty image.

I recently found about 20 tapes that i thought were lost. The old 2004 greenie got plugged in, and is still working, good as ever. Captured to lossless huffyuv for 7 hours, no problems.

It's the damnedest thing, that people in this forum were saying for years how VHS transfer should be done. At least once a week in this forum, somebody shows up with a "new"and "better" way that doesn't work. Meanwhile my AVT will have its fourteenth birthday in October. I still have the original plastic box. No telling what it'll be worth in a few more years. but I don't think I'll be able to allow myself to let go of it.

I tried the Grex a few years ago. Garbage.

[themaster1]

Just a follow-up, I have enabled mode 003 (such as described in the faq) and the color stripe has disapeared now

[orsetto]

Circling back to kodec's original question:

All this chat about TBC and Grex-like devices is absolutely pointless if you only have a handful of MV-afflicted tapes to transfer. IMO, it is a complete utter waste of time and money to DIY transfer such tapes: just buy the damned official DVD re-releases. If we're talking less than 50 such tapes, buying the commercial DVDs will cost less than a decent used TBC and save a tremendous amount of time/aggravation. You'll also get a far more enjoyable end result: just because you have a box of chips that can "clear" MV doesn't mean the cleared video is going to look good (the very act of contaminating the signal with MV wrecks it from the get-go).

Unless you have literally 100 or more tapes you need to transfer, it is just silly today to bother with. If you have time to kill, and don't honestly think you'll ever seriously watch any of it again, then perhaps its worth the trouble to save a few bucks: otherwise, go to Best Buy or Amazon and scour the discount bins. Any movie made prior to 2012 is available for $5 or less, the majority of TV series (other than HBO-Showtime) go for a comparative pittance.

Investing in aging, endlessly-annoying hardware is only worthwhile if you have a ton of taped videos that are not easily replaced with affordable commercial releases (or you have lots of personal camcorder footage).

[kodec]

why do you recommend the smurph blue Cypress CBT-100 in your other threads and guides? Is there another one than this one I was asking about?

An additional info, after reading the guides I have emailed an authorized Cyp vendor somewhere in the world about the grey-smurph blue they sell and the answer just arrived: "... Thank you for your Inquiry and yes, the products we sell are qualified Cypress products and the ID#48 is the original "green" Cypress model you refer to."

From about 2000 about 2010, Cypress made TBCs. AVToolbox bought some in a green shell with black accents, and this is all North America (NA) got. Cypress sold some direct as the CTB-100 in a light/dull gray box with Smurfy-blue accents, for sale outside NA. Some non-mainstream countries got things like a TCB-100, in various shell colors, sometimes modified as composite only, from various no-name brands.

Then something change in the chips. Something bad. All Cypress TBCs now have ghosting and frame-sticking problems.

From 2010 to now (and FYI, production will cease soon, no more Cypress TBCs), TVOne/AVToolbox has black shells for NA, and outside NA you had/have Cypress in silvery grey (not gray) with muted royal blue accents. Not Smurfy, no vibrant enough. This is the crap you easily find on eBay, from B&H, etc. The good TBCs are gone.

The green units have been gone for almost a decade now. I'd more likely believe that the person you wrote at CYP was colorblind (seriously colorblind, not just a joke). And outside of USA, outside of AVToolbox (which wasn't yet TVOne), green units didn't happen. Another option potential, something I was always afraid of, is that some shyster at Cypress has decided to swap colors on new units, rather than fix the fubar chips -- but not sure of that feasibility, especially since the CTB-100 is now EOL production.

PM me about that vendor, let me look into it. But I completely doubt the accuracy of what you've been told.

Luckily you're such a deal breaker for anything, after reading your reviews I feel like quitting the hobby altogether

I get aggravated by hardware costs, too. But it's a hobby, and all hobbies have costs. Or profession, and ditto.

What a lot of people don't understand is that I've looked for non-TBC options for most of the 25+ years I've been doing video. Anytime something was suggested as potential, I bought one. I tried it. And I was almost always disappointed. Sometimes it could be returned, sometimes resold (and at a loss). Very often, I just read marketing tech specs, sometimes R&D specs, before randomly buying something new-to-market, as I was the guinea pig that others looked to for my findings.

The DMR-ES10 is still my best find, and for almost 15 years people have been seeking it. I found that undocumented hidden feature, and it still proves valuable to this day. But still not a true TBC, allows some errors to pass (namely anti-copy).

All of this junk you're looking at, Grex/etc, is stuff I dismissed more than decade ago as crap.

Far more info on TBCs is located at the digitalFAQ.com forum, my home site.

It's an authorized Cyp dealer selling the same grey-blue unit sold on e-bay currently for about 200 USD or so. But gave up on it altogether since it's outside the EU and the income tax is abnormal where I live for a unit that most in the know say it's probably crap, ha ha. If it was from inside the EU I would even buy it what the heck but to pay an arm and a leg of an income taxes on top of it for something that maybe wouldn't work at all would make me feel like a complete moron

[kodec]

Could get a capture card that just ignores macrovision.

Name me one PCI-E or USB capture device that ignores it AND not forcing you to use their compressed format. You can even PM.

[kodec]

The most common type of macrovision just puts white bars at the top of the frame (out of view for most TVs) for a few seconds and then removes the white bars, in a cycle that continues during the entire playtime. This is pretty much all it does and was designed to screw with the luma when attempting to record from one VCR to another. My capture card simply ignores this and I never see any kinds of rising and lowering of luma. While I rarely care for copying protected VHS tapes, it's most helpful to me when copying home movies on tape, as I've had equipment and software in the past falsely block my home movies because they thought they were macrovision protected when they were really just degraded/dirty. There is another type of macrovision with color bars but I have never encountered it in real life.

Having a card that ignores MV is certainly helpful but won't correct problems with wiggly images, which only a full-frame/line TBC can correct. But since OP only seems to be talking about macrovision, then a card that ignores it would be my recommendation. If OP wants to correct wiggly lines (timing issues) on a VHS output then some kind of TBC is needed, as not even the Grex seems to claim to be a TBC.

I use the WinTV-HVR-1250 internal tuner card. There are a few different versions with this card and some seem might get triggered by MV but mine does not. The one I have comes with a S-Video jack (which can also be uses as a yellow component w/ adaptor), a coax jack, and 3.5mm audio jack. No yellow component jack. I've heard that later version of this card do get triggered by MV.

Yes, only MV... I have posted my workflow, never ever had any problems with dropped frames, and only very rarely with timing but nothing different settings in VDub timing section couldn't deal with. Heck, I'm even 95% satisfied with how Vice 1000-2, which I bought for $20 used, deals with MV. Just want to try if there is anything even better for a reasonbale price, and that means up to $300 including shipping, but only from an EU source, ha ha

[kodec]

Circling back to kodec's original question:

All this chat about TBC and Grex-like devices is absolutely pointless if you only have a handful of MV-afflicted tapes to transfer. IMO, it is a complete utter waste of time and money to DIY transfer such tapes: just buy the damned official DVD re-releases. If we're talking less than 50 such tapes, buying the commercial DVDs will cost less than a decent used TBC and save a tremendous amount of time/aggravation. You'll also get a far more enjoyable end result: just because you have a box of chips that can "clear" MV doesn't mean the cleared video is going to look good (the very act of contaminating the signal with MV wrecks it from the get-go).

Unless you have literally 100 or more tapes you need to transfer, it is just silly today to bother with. If you have time to kill, and don't honestly think you'll ever seriously watch any of it again, then perhaps its worth the trouble to save a few bucks: otherwise, go to Best Buy or Amazon and scour the discount bins. Any movie made prior to 2012 is available for $5 or less, the majority of TV series (other than HBO-Showtime) go for a comparative pittance.

Investing in aging, endlessly-annoying hardware is only worthwhile if you have a ton of taped videos that are not easily replaced with affordable commercial releases (or you have lots of personal camcorder footage).

Obviusly as mentioned before I have VHS tapes with MV that were never released on any other format

[kodec]

Just a follow-up, I have enabled mode 003 (such as described in the faq) and the color stripe has disapeared now

And now try a MV tape and post the results

[kodec]

I can buy a Panasonic WJ-AVE5 in great condition (from the EU even near my home, ha ha).... reading about it, also here in old topics and its manual. Says it has DFS (Digital Frame Syncronizer) and also locks. Wonder how it would serve the purpose. Since it is so cheap (€55, not found on eBay), and some on eBay sell it for €200, I'm on a verge of buying it just for the kicks to post later

[kodec]

I now recall the day back in 2004 when I corresponded with a member in this forum who suggested I run down to B&H Photo in Manhattan and buy an AVT-8710 temporarily on sale, marked down by $25. At first it seemed like a waste of an hour and a subway ride, but I got that black-and-green 8710 home and hooked it to my capture setup. Voila! A copy protected retail tape played flawlessly through the capture chain, dropped and skewed frames and AGC effects disappeared, and I had a sharp, snappy, contrasty image.

I recently found about 20 tapes that i thought were lost. The old 2004 greenie got plugged in, and is still working, good as ever. Captured to lossless huffyuv for 7 hours, no problems.

It's the damnedest thing, that people in this forum were saying for years how VHS transfer should be done. At least once a week in this forum, somebody shows up with a "new"and "better" way that doesn't work. Meanwhile my AVT will have its fourteenth birthday in October. I still have the original plastic box. No telling what it'll be worth in a few more years. but I don't think I'll be able to allow myself to let go of it.

I tried the Grex a few years ago. Garbage.

Thanks for the impressions mate

[lordsmurf]

I can buy a Panasonic WJ-AVE5 in great condition (from the EU even near my home, ha ha).... reading about it, also here in old topics and its manual. Says it has DFS (Digital Frame Syncronizer) and also locks. Wonder how it would serve the purpose. Since it is so cheap (€55, not found on eBay), and some on eBay sell it for €200, I'm on a verge of buying it just for the kicks to post later

Mixers have always been hit-or-miss (mostly miss) when used for VHS. Those expected better pro sources. For example, at minimum, pro S-VHS cameras, as commonly used in high schools and college of the era.

DataVideo, Sony, Panasonic, etc ... all pretty much the same, in terms of the mixer.

Many mixers claimed "TBC" (remember, loose term), whereas "frame sync" (not a TBC) is probably more accurate.

I'd talk him down to €40, and understand it's purely gambling. It might work, might not. Even if it works, understand it's still hit-or-miss for others, or even your own tapes after the initial tested tape(s).

That unit is never sold for €200 on eBay. Maybe "for sale", but not sold. The sold value is always under €100, sometimes as low as €20. And as usual, it's only "powered on", and comes with the BS lines of "from a working environment". Others claim "tested", but the actual image quality output can be anything, and usually is (and not in a good way). You can sometimes read between the lines, and often see somebody bought it thinking it was a TBC replacement, only to have it not work as hoped, and trying to get their money back.

[kodec]

Btw. DataVideo TBC-1000 and TBC-5000 work with 25 FPS PAL source not altering the FPS I presume? I'm reading the 5000 manual and it's not very informative on its front switch buttons and modes to say the least.

[kodec]

Oh yeah, the TBC-5000 working phenomenal, thank you all. In the end I've spent a bit more than I hoped for but it was all for the good cause. Btw. got it half the price, a European store was cleaning its stock and it was the last of the TBC-5000s. Btw. if anyone cares to buy VICE 1000-2 pm me, excellent little device too but don't need it anymore, $50 plus shipping.

[Pinto007]

If you have PCI slot, buy AVerMedia DVD EZMaker Gold card. Then find registry DWORD named MuteVideoMacrovision and set it to 0. Voilà!

Thanks but I have recently bought a new mobo and it carries PCI-E only. But hey, I'm actually using an AverMedia card, maybe it could be set in this one too? I'll check out tomorrow. It's A707 btw, don't know that long fancy name of it, forgot and threw the box away, just know this model name from the driver.

I've bought new mobo with pci-e slots only, and I've bought PCI-Express PCI-E To PCI Bus Riser:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/PCI-Express-PCI-E-To-PCI-Bus-Riser-Card-Adapter-Converter-Hig...c/122910350404
My DVD EZmaker Gold PCI works like a charm.

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