I've finally gotten to spend some time with my new ADVC-300, and find that it seems to switch itself into digital input mode during analog captures. This happens whenever there is a "rough scene transition" on the analog Hi-8 tapes I am attempting to convert. What I mean by "rough" is that recording on the tape was halted by shutting the camera off instead of pressing the record button, and/or the tape was removed to clean the heads or to record to another tape, and then reinserted.

This unsolicited toggling problem occurs in spite if my having manually selected analog mode, and reoccurs later (after manually reselecting analog) for the same apparent reasons. These unsolicited mode changes abruptly halt my captures, as there is "no output" while the ADVC apparently looks in the wrong place (DV port) for input.

Unlike the ADVC-100, the 300 does not appear to have a setting by which one can select and "force" analog capture. Is there a means by which to force/hold analog mode in the ADVC-300, or to otherwise mitigate this problem? This apparent hard-coded "auto mode-select feature" of the 300 will not work for me, as my entire tape library is unfortunately rife with these ugly transitions.

Also, I should think that if I manually select "Analog" the unit should stay that way, regardless of the content of the video. Any insight that you could provide would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks very much for your time and consideration.

Bill T.