Panasonic DMR-ES10/ES15/ES20 PAL-N compatibility

[Crisrodd]

Hello, I'm from Argentina and we use PAL-N for TV Broadcast (still). (We also have ISDB-T HD TV)

Searching for a inexpensive device to use as a passthrough TBC, I found many recommendations in using the Panasonic´s DMR-ES10/ES15/ES20.

If I were to buy a UK´s equipment where they use PAL-I, would it be PAL-N compatible?

I'm also looking for correcting NTSC too, because all VHS(C) handycams where NTSC.

Thanks for the help in advance.

[lordsmurf]

Q: If I were to buy a UK equipment where they use PAL-I, would it be PAL-N compatible?
A: No.

[Crisrodd]

Thank you LS for your response.

Could be PAL-B compatible instead?

Its easy to convert PAL-B to PAL-N an vice versa.

How could I resolve the problem of TBCing in PAL-N and NTSC with the same equipment? (No stand alone TBC anywhere for sale nowadays)

Thank you your highness.

[lordsmurf]

Maybe?

The signal has to be PAL-B prior to ES10, but the problem becomes that the signal may not longer be correctable by the ES10/15 TBC(ish), as the flaw was digitzed (baked in) during the N>B conversion. Either convert at the TBC (PAL>PAL variants fine, unlike NTSC/PAL conversion quality), or post-TBC. Not before.

There's a slight chance something only alters the chroma aspect, but I'm not aware of any such item that doesn't wholesale digitize to convert, thus negating any subsequent correction (TBC).

[Crisrodd]

Hi LS, I think that the transcoder I have is the type that alters only chroma.

Is very simple and analog. I'm including some photos, the suspected schematic and DS of IC.

Strangely, the IC modulates a baseband signal to an RF channel, so the implementation is very different of what was intended.

I want to learn more about the details on how the TBC knows what to correct, because it strongly depends on noise levels, gliches, signal levels, etc.

Also understand the different types of TBC, like Line oriented or Full frame oriented. If you have some papers, please share.

In the future I would like to implement a TBC on CUDA by sampling the baseband video with an SDR.

Kind regards.

Crisrodd

[oln]

The European DMR-ES10, ES15 (and HDD equivialents) work with both (normal) PAL and NTSC. The Canada/US ones is only NTSC. I don't know what models were sold in South America, can't find the manuals for those.

It seems the on-tape format is the same. Difference is the frequency of the color carrier and the color space, the color encoding is otherwise the same. Presumably a tape recorded from PAL-N would play in a normal PAL VHS (not PAL-N) with slightly wrong colors (which may be correctable in post) and one could use a PAL-capable ES10 with that, but I don't have any personal experience with it.

Your converter box looks like it operates in analog (rather than having a chain o f A/D converter -> digital processing -> D/A converter) like is common in boxes that do conversion between PAL and NTSC so that may also work fine. Granted, since it's composite video it's a possibility that there could be some Y/C artifacts remaining from the conversion process.