PAL vhs to ntsc dvd is there a way?

[joejoems]

I would like to convert a PAL vhs tape to ntsc mpeg2 or avi. The vcr that I have is a ntsc not PAL. Is there a way to do this. There is a foreign vhs movie that I want to buy, but because of the region coding, I will have great difficulty playing it in my vcr. So I'd like to convert it to dvd so I can watch it.

[Dennis1968]

look at forum https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=171315&highlight=
Another person has a very similiar problem. what country was this produced in Germany? France? Japan? Brazil? etc?

[FulciLives]

I would like to convert a PAL vhs tape to ntsc mpeg2 or avi. The vcr that I have is a ntsc not PAL. Is there a way to do this. There is a foreign vhs movie that I want to buy, but because of the region coding, I will have great difficulty playing it in my vcr. So I'd like to convert it to dvd so I can watch it.

I'm assuming you live in the USA
I do as well and just about ALL video devices sold in the USA are NTSC only.

First you have to buy a multi-system VHS VCR. There are two kinds. One kind has a converter built-in and one does not. So with the built-in converter you can play a PAL VHS video and output it as NTSC. With the multi-system only VhS VCR you can play a PAL VHS video but it will output as PAL. A normal NTSC USA model VHS VCR cannot play back a PAL VHS video AT ALL.

You can also buy a stand alone digital video converter. This will allow you to use a multi-system only VHS VCR in that the VCR will output a PAL video signal that you pass through the digital video converter which will convert it to NTSC. Usually the combo of a multi-system VCR with an external stand alone digital video converter will give you superior quality to the multi-system VHS VCR units that have a converter built-in. For whatever reason most of the all-in-one units do not do a very good job at doing the PAL to NTSC conversion.

However, for the BEST quality I suggest you get JUST the multi-system VHS VCR and do a computer capture using a capture card that supports PAL. Some captures cards in the USA only support NTSC but many will also support PAL.

Once you have your PAL VHS capture (use huffyuv AVI format or DV if you have a DV type capture device such as the Canopus ADVC-100) you can use a simple AviSynth AVS script to read this into your MPEG-2 encoder (I know of one such script that works wonders with TMPGEnc) and do your conversion to NTSC while doing your MPEG-2 encoding.

The computer method will give you the BEST quality. Much better than ANY of the stand alone converters even.

Please note that a 4 head (consider a 6 head if you have the money) Hi-Fi Stereo multi-system VHS VCR will probably cost you at least $200 if not as much as $300 for a NICE model.

Do a google search for "NTSC PAL multisystem" or something like that. You will find a TON of on-line stores (many in the USA) that sell multi-system video equipment.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[lordsmurf]

The best one I ever found was the one I eventually purchased, the SAMSUNG 5000W. It does NTSC, PAL, and SECAM, and converts from any format to any other format digitally. You can then capture as desired. Costs on these machines typically run hundreds of dollars though. How much is this movie worth to you, and will you ever do more?

[FulciLives]

The best one I ever found was the one I eventually purchased, the SAMSUNG 5000W. It does NTSC, PAL, and SECAM, and converts from any format to any other format digitally. You can then capture as desired. Costs on these machines typically run hundreds of dollars though. How much is this movie worth to you, and will you ever do more?

THAT is a GREAT point.

If this will be a limited THING for you then you might want to look into using a SERVICE that will convert the VHS video for you from PAL to NTSC. There are many services for converting VHS to DVD and I'm sure many of them can do that AS WELL AS doing the PAL to NTSC conversion. You might have to pay as much as $50 but if this is only a one time thing that WOULD be a HELL of a lot cheaper than buying all the equipment yourself.

Also if the movie you are interested in can be bought on PAL DVD then that would be the BEST thing to do as you can easily RIP the movie to your COMPUTER then do the conversion to NTSC and create a new DVD-R that will play in ANY stand alone NTSC DVD player. You don't need any special hardware otherthan a computer with a DVD burner. As for software you will be using mostly FREEWARE programs except for TMPGEnc which costs all of like what $50 or $60 as I recall? Hell if you are HERE on THIS forum you probably already have and use TMPGEnc.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[Dennis1968]

a service that offers PAL VHS to NTSC DVD sounds wonderful. I have yet run across any service company that will do PAL VHS to NTSC DVD. Many will do PAL VHS to NTSC VHS and NTSC VHS to NTSC DVD but not the ideal combination. Could it be legal issue?

[joejoems]

Thanks everybody.

[FulciLives]

a service that offers PAL VHS to NTSC DVD sounds wonderful. I have yet run across any service company that will do PAL VHS to NTSC DVD. Many will do PAL VHS to NTSC VHS and NTSC VHS to NTSC DVD but not the ideal combination. Could it be legal issue?

Well alot of video companies offer PAL to NTSC with the source being a PAL VHS video. Many of the place companies also offer NTSC VHS to NTSC DVD. I can't imagine it being very difficult for them to hook up their multi-system PAL capable VHS player/converter to the DVD recorder. Most such services use a stand alone DVD recorder so they COULD do it ... just depends on if they feel like hooking things up accordingly.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[lordsmurf]

a service that offers PAL VHS to NTSC DVD sounds wonderful. I have yet run across any service company that will do PAL VHS to NTSC DVD. Many will do PAL VHS to NTSC VHS and NTSC VHS to NTSC DVD but not the ideal combination. Could it be legal issue?

I offer all of these service. Prices are reasonable. I wouldn't call myself a "company" but I'm no newbie.