Not sure what capturing card or device to get for my desktop

[Merdink]

Any suggestions on what capturing card/device to get for my new desktop?
I'm probably just going to cap VHS tapes. I do have a Sony RDR-GX257 DVD Recorder.

Desktop details

CPU: Intel Core i7-7700K 4.2GHz Quad-Core Processor
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i v2 70.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z270-Gaming K3 ATX LGA1151 Motherboard 
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-3000 Memory
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive
Storage: Western Digital BLACK SERIES 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive
Storage: WD Blue 1TB SATA 6 Gb/s 7200 RPM 64MB Cache 3.5 Inch Desktop Hard Drive (WD10EZEX)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 1060 6GB 6GB GAMING X Video Card 
Power Supply: Corsair Professional Gold 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply (RM750)
Operating System: Windows 10 Pro

[Brad]

Use the DVD recorder to convert a VHS tape to disc, ideally at highest bitrate. Cut a short sample from that with DGIndex and upload it here as an attachment.

I say this because if the RDR-GX257 has input TBC, you could record the HDMI output to get an uncompressed signal to your PC. Though I tested the RDR-GX300 (older despite "lower" model number?) and it's really bad with VHS input.

Beyond that, a budget is required to really start listing suggestions.

[Merdink]

I think I did it correctly. Anyways I used my Sanyo VWM-668 VCR to play it.
My budget is about $200.

[Brad]

By "short" I meant 10-30 secs, not 5 mins. There's a slight bend to the left at the top of the image, but it's essentially free of wiggles. If you have or can make a 2nd-gen recording, it would be more of a stress test, but based on this one sample, grabbing the HDMI output from the DVD recorder looks like a good path.

Colors look shockingly accurately for a cable TV recording.

The VCR isn't tracking the tape properly, and every other field has added distortion. Dunno whether that's just a symptom of the tracking, or a worn head...?

[Merdink]

2nd gen recording? Ah, I think I understand. Hopefully I have a blank tape to use for that somewhere.

Yeah sorry, I thought around 5 mins would help in seeing if it would work. Didn't realize it was that overboard.
I do have 2 other VCRs but I'm doubtful they would be any better.

Toshiba VCR W-602
Sanyo VWM-668
Quasar VCR VHQ560 (5 25 1995?)

[Brad]

Around here, there is a thrift store that sells tapes for $0.25 CAD. Last time I wanted to record a test tape, I bought some popular pre-recorded movie that the world will never miss and taped over it. Any added instability from reusing the tape is beneficial for our purposes.

You don't need a "better" VCR for a tape to track better. And playing this TV recording in a different VCR should at least confirm whether that field issue is a playback problem.

[Merdink]

I really hope this upload works this time or I'm gonna go nuts wasting hours trying to upload 6 clips, and they are an average of 50MB each.

[Brad]

Apart from the waviness in the Sanyo 2nd-gen, the Sony is doing a good job.

$20-50 for S-Video capture from the Sony passthrough: several options of roughly the same quality.

$50-90 for HDMI capture from the Sony passthrough: you could set up an eBay Saved Search for the AVerMedia HD DVR aka MTVHDDVRR aka C027. You only need the card itself; the analog input cable is useless IMO because the composite/S-Video side of the card isn't good. You probably also need a $10-25 splitter that can remove HDCP. This wouldn't be required if you had a Win7 PC and could do the C027 "HDCP trick".

Up to you what you want to do. With leftover budget, you could look into adding a Panasonic passthrough as well, if you run into tapes that produce results like the Sanyo 2nd-gen or worse.

All three VCRs show the alternating-bad-field issue. I guess it was a problem with the VCR that did the recording. The Toshiba appears to have the most neutral sharpness: the Sanyo is softened, and the Quasar is sharpened.

[Merdink]

What Panasonic would I be looking for?

[Brad]

DMR-ES10 is claimed to have the best correction, though no one has shown this head-to-head. ES15 is usually cheaper due to having less notoriety. ES25 is ES15+HDMI output; more expensive. There are other models too, but most or all have HDD, so are more expensive.

The disc drive needn't work.

[usually_quiet]

Note that since the DMR-ES10 doesn't have HDMI out, someone wanting to use one as a pass-through needs a good analog capture device. As already stated, the current version of the AVerMedia AVerTV HD DVR C027 is not good for SD analog capture.

[dellsam34]

You could use one of the variation of legacy Pinnacle devices, I have the 500-USB and works like a charm in lossless capture, They do require a driver though, installing a trial software from their website got me the driver for free even after the trial expiration. Here is a sample if you don't mind downloading few hundred megabytes. I got it on youtube but the quality is degraded little.