capturing VHS cassettes that was made in Israel

[kingshay]

Hello everyone,

I have a couple of VHS cassettes that was made in Israel, I would like to capture them with my simple Leadtek Winfast TV2000 XP RM T.V card.

I usually use virtual dub, and my operating system is windows Vista 32Bit.

I have 2 questions:

1. In what bitrate should I encode them (DivX) and I will keep their quality?

2. What FPS should I define?


Thank you!

[jman98]

1. I'd say use at least a video bit rate of 2000 Kbps and use more if you don't think 2000 is enough. Note that some DVD players that play DivX can't handle bit rates above 2000, but if you are just watching on a PC and don't care about that, you might even go as high as 4000 Kbps.
2. Israel is a PAL video country, so your FPS should be 25.

[kingshay]

okay

I tried it all yesterday and the result was pretty good, but with sync problems.

I defined it on 25 FPS, I didn't compress the audio, and the video was compressed to 2000 Kbps.

There were 421 dropped frames out of 32000 frames. (*and like you said, the original VHS is PAL 25 FPS).

What is the probloem here?

[hech54]

Do you have a PAL VHS machine?

[kingshay]

yes.

[kingshay]

okay

I tried it all yesterday and the result was pretty good, but with sync problems.

I defined it on 25 FPS, I didn't compress the audio, and the video was compressed to 2000 Kbps.

There were 421 dropped frames out of 32000 frames. (*and like you said, the original VHS is PAL 25 FPS).

What is the probloem here?

[Abond]

421 frames at 25 fps are about 17 seconds. No wonder you have synch problems. If you encode "on the fly" try not to encode - save it uncompressed and encode afterwards.

[themaster1]

for real time divx/xvid encoding i suggest a bitrate of 8000Kbs could be lower depending of you computer.Frame size: roughly 640x480

[kingshay]

It will not be too big uncompressed? It's about 90 minutes.

[Abond]

Well, I read 32000 frames...

[jagabo]

Capturing with Divx with small file sizes and hoping for any quality is asking for trouble -- and you're getting it.

On the Divx configuration dialog's Main page set the Certification Profile to Unconstrained. Put the codec in "1-pass quality-based" mode and set the quantizer at 1 or 2. On the Codec page set the encoding mode to Fastest. The resulting file will be very big but you shouldn't have any dropped frames or audio sync problems. If you need a smaller file re-encode the video after capturing with settings suitable for smaller files (lower bitrates).

If your video needs lots of filtering you should capture with a lossless codec like HuffYUV or Lagarith. Once captured filter and save as Divx or Xvid.

[hech54]

Every Google image I've come across of the Leadtek Winfast TV2000 shows a sticker on the card telling you if it is an NTSC or PAL card.

My PAL Hauppauge card will not record an NTSC signal....at least not without special 3rd party software and pretty good computer capture knowledge.

Also....check to make sure you have a real PAL VCR and not one that outputs a quasi signal automatically.

[jman98]

Your capture card may be a piece of junk. I have never used that card (I use Hauppauge) so I don't know anything about it, but it may possibly be doing software encoding on the fly. This will take a LOT of CPU power and if you are doing other things on the PC while you are capturing, that is not a good idea.

jagabo and hech54's posts are quite helpful and may be important to your problem. You can try capturing with a lossless codec as jagabo suggests and then encode to Divx, but you'll need a lot of disk space to do that.

[jagabo]

One note about my suggestion of using Divx's Unconstrained profile -- that profile is only available in the registered version. If you are using the free version use the 1080HD profile, even if you are compressing SD material. The profiles, except unconstrained, limit the max bitrate so you won't really get constant quantizer encoding when using them.

[guns1inger]

The capture card is capable of reasonable quality, but has no hardware assisted encoding. That said, your system is more than powerful enough to capture from it. I have a newer model that also has no hardware assist, and was able to capture and losslessly encode in real time. on a 3 Ghz single core pentium. Of course, I also have multiple, fast HDDs. Capturing and compressing to the system drive may cause you problems.

[jagabo]

Of course, there's always the sticky:

https://forum.videohelp.com/topic157660.html

[kingshay]

When I try to encode the audio (to LAME MP3), it becomes very slow and heavy (like big man noice or something) and i can't understand anything... why?

[hech54]

PAL
Short for Phase Alternating Line, the dominant television standard in Europe. The United States uses a different standard, NTSC. PAL delivers 625 lines at 50 fields (half-frames interlaced) per second. The resolution of a PAL VCD is 352x288 pixels, a PAL SVCD is 480x576, and a PAL full D1 DVD is 704 or 720 x 576
https://www.videohelp.com/glossary?P#PAL

NTSC
Abbreviation of National Television Standards Committee. The NTSC is responsible for setting television and video standards in the United States (in Europe and other parts of the world, the dominant television standards are PAL and SECAM). The NTSC standard for television defines a composite video signal with a refresh rate of 60 fields (half-frames interlaced) per second. Each frame contains 525 lines and can contain 16 million different colors. The resolution of an NTSC VCD is 352x240 pixels, an NTSC SVCD is 480x480, and an NTSC full D1 DVD is 704 or 720 x 480.
https://www.videohelp.com/glossary?N#NTSC

Example of a Cheap Multisystem VCR
Sharp WorldWide Multisystem VCR
$114.95
Outputs a normally un-useable(to capture cards and DVD Recorders) quasi signal
http://www.firebird-systems.com/graphics/vcr/multisystem-vcr.shtml

Example of a true high quality "Converting" VCR
Aiwa MX-100
$449
Does a TRUE conversion between NTSC and PAL (and vise versa)
http://www.220-electronics.com/VCR/aiwamx100.htm

Every Google image I've come across of the Leadtek Winfast TV2000 shows a sticker
on the card telling you if it is an NTSC or PAL card.

....can you hear me(us) now?

[kingshay]

I have PAL card and PAL VHS.
what about the audio encoding?

[jagabo]

It would help if you gave more details. Are you compressing with Lame while capturing? Or are you capturing uncompressed anc compressing the audio later? What is the sample rate of the source? Bits per sample? Number of channels? Do those properties of the source match the settings in Lame? What Bitrate are you using? CBR or VBR?

[kingshay]

where can I see the source properties?

[kingshay]

1. I don't have dropped frames.
2. I tried both lame and PCM and I didn't configure anything, How should I configure the audio compression?
3. sample rate? you talk about FPS? It's 25 (made in Israel, It's PAL).
4. I encoded the video in DivX (2000 kbps).
5. How can I know the source's Bits per sample??
6. I think there are 2 channels, where can I find out??

******************** My card is PAL ********************

[jagabo]

When I try to encode the audio (to LAME MP3), it becomes very slow and heavy (like big man noice or something) and i can't understand anything... why?

The most likely problem is that you are capturing audio at one sampling rate but telling Lame the audio is a different sampling rate. For example you may be capturing audio at 44,100 Hz but telling Lame it's 22,050 Hz. This would slow the audio down and lower the pitch.

Digital audio has three main properties:

1) the number of channels, 1=mono, 2-stereo...
2) the number of samples per second, typically 22050, 44100, 48000, 96000...
3) the number of bits per sample, typically 8, 16, 24, 32...

These are set in the configuration dialogs of the capture program. When you select a profile in Lame be sure to select one that matches #1 and #2.

[kingshay]

I tried both on this software and Virtual Dub.
sonething wrong here?

[jagabo]

Ok, you're capturing at 44.1 KHz, 16 bits, stereo. Make sure the audio compression uses the same settings.

[kingshay]

What software for capturing you prefer? What you use?

[jagabo]

I don't use the same capture device so the software I use won't work for you (Hauppauge WinTV PVR-250 and WinTV2000).

The screenshot you posted shows that you are capturing as PCM. That would be uncompressed. The files you capture that way should play properly. Do they?

Try changing the Audio Codec to Lame or some other MP2 or MP3 encoder. Then use the Audio Compressor Config to set the compression parameters.

[kingshay]

I have always worked with Virtual Dub, and I had the sync problems, pitch problems etc.

When I work with Winfast PVR2 (the one from the pic), I don't get any audio. why?

I desperated!

All I want is to make simple AVI from the VHS, someone can give me a simple guide for this?

[jagabo]

From what I understand your capture card does not have audio inputs. So you must be using your sound card to capture the audio from the VCR. This very often causes audio sync problems. I find it's often necessary to record the audio uncompressed with this type of setup.

Make sure the WinFast PVR2 software is configured correctly to capture audio from your sound card. Your sound card may have more than one input (line 1, microphone, etc.) so you may also have to configure the sound card via it's setup applet.

For example, the WinFast software might be set up to caputre from the sound card's "default" audio source. This means you have to use the setup applet to specify which source to record. Or you may be able to configure the WinFast software to capture from a specific port on the sound card. Make sure the audio mixer doesn't have the particular input port muted.

I just noticed in your screenshot that you have Divx set up to use the encoding preset at 10. That is too slow and guaranteed to cause dropped frames. Move it all the way to the left for video capture. Or turn off the presets (you have to have a registered version to do this) and use the settings I gave ealier.

[kingshay]

I changed some things. it's okay here?