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  1. So quick backstory: Last summer I found a Hi8 camcorder and finally started backing up old tapes with it. I bought this and it was working fine but half an hour in, the video started suddenly cutting out/becoming grainy/black and white, etc. Turns out the s-video port somehow got pushed in so the camcorder was broken, bad timing?

    Anyways, just today I got a new PAL Sony Handycam. My tapes are all NTSC but I hooked it up to my TV and it worked perfectly, sound and video were fine. On the side panel that flips out, the tape also plays fine and still looks/sounds good.

    Here's the problem, I tried using the capture card I posted above again and it's going black and white again. The second I plug it in I see it appear just fine and in colour for a second, then it gets black and white. The sound still seems ok but I don't get why the video quality is like this.

    I'm looking at the honestech 3.0 (the program it installed) user guide and it says you can change the video standard to PAL, I tried it since I'm using a PAL camcorder but it makes no difference. Is there something else I'm doing wrong or does the capture card just suck?
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  2. Member
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    PAL 60. You need to get an NTSC camcorder.
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  3. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    To add to that, playing & viewing are much more lenient than capturing. When viewing PAL on a supported NTSC display and PAL player, the player will still show PAL but at 60~fps instead of 50. The display will adjust.
    When capturing, a final decision has to be made about what format it is meant to be, NTSC or PAL, not some hybrid. So it is giving you the best it can given the constraints of that hardware/software.

    When capping, the best way is always to have your system be consistent throughout - all PAL or all NTSC. And since your source is NTSC, you need all the other links in the chain to be also.

    Modern equipment has greatly improved on much of this, but there are still areas it is unforgiving. And this is one.

    Scott
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  4. One last idea I thought of: recording straight through the TV with my laptop?

    I was given a Dazzle Capture Card recently so I have that as well btw, I just need to test it because I don't know if it works. Anyways, I know people used to record things like video games straight from the console, and I realized older consoles basically have the same hookups. For example, PS2s just have the red/white/yellow cables going into the TV, this camcorder I have just needs one audio cable and a yellow/s-video. Shouldn't I realistically be able to somehow record in the same fashion?

    Could I do something like plug one of these into the TV and run one of the capture cards into one end and the camcorder in the other? I assume I need one for audio and one for video. Think this might work?
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  5. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    No.
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  6. Capturing Memories dellsam34's Avatar
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    Do you have a menu like in the picture bellow? If so have you tried NTSC 4.43?

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  7. Originally Posted by dellsam34 View Post
    Do you have a menu like in the picture bellow? If so have you tried NTSC 4.43?

    Image
    [Attachment 49278 - Click to enlarge]


    No unfortunately, the menu looks like this.

    At this point I might have to try selling it to any Europeans nearby who have the opposite problem (PAL tapes but no PAL camcorder) and put the money towards a NTSC camcorder. It’s basically brand new so there might be a taker.

    If the Y-splitter thing doesn’t work the only other thing I can think of is pointing a camera the TV and recording but the quality would probably be terrible.
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