Mitsubishi SVHS HS-MD3000 has MV free output!

[hiptune]

I bought a barely used Mitsubishi SVHS HS-MD3000 which is the white medical unit from Craig's List for $80. I got a several weeks ago but last night I finally got around to doing some VHS Hi-Fi tape transfers with it to AVI captures. The s-video output is not outputting any signs of Macrovision copy protection. I've not yet tried the composite (RCA) output yet because I really like the picture quality of the s-video out as is. I looked around the forums here and found nothing much about this unit. A few negative comments about how it might be this, and it might be that, most comments from folks who have never used this model.

But I did find this comment out there on the internet on the AVS forums. "Like the white industrial Pannys and JVCs, often available now for $100 to $400, that ALWAYS cleared copy protection. They had to, the whole point of these machines was to output true NTSC/PAL video that could be put through a switcher or genlocked system rack".

This unit has the picture enhancement style TBC, which I have not used because my tapes were very high quality and I wanted all the detail and sharpness including the grain - as a first-generation commercial tape has. I actually own a DataVideo TBC1000, but I took that out of the capture chain once I realized MV copy protection was being stripped out of the video by this Mitsu machine, my tapes were tracking perfectly in this deck, and I wanted a really clean crisp and sharp picture with nothing in between the output and capture.

I may have just gotten lucky with the four tapes I tried so far, but I don't think so. These were major studio-produced tapes from the very late 80s. I'll try some more tapes, some WB, or Columbia Pictures movie titles if I have any around and report back.

This deck is really smooth running and a nice sharp picture. Just like the classic Mitsus of the era in fact.

[themaster1]

There are different kind of MV's maybe it bypass the most simple ? The disney tapes are supposedly more painful

[DB83]

Possible that those tapes are not MV protected - there should be an indication of the box.


Here in the UK that was often the case with MV being the exception rather than the rule.


And some capture devices do override it anyway.

[hiptune]

Possible that those tapes are not MV protected - there should be an indication of the box.


Here in the UK that was often the case with MV being the exception rather than the rule.


And some capture devices do override it anyway.

I've captured one of them previously, and it indeed had mv. I've not seen that notice on US VHS packages. They don't want you to know about it, they like to shut down your copy w/o knowing what or how it was done. These are Atlantic and Polygram concert performance tapes. So I am fairly certain both are mv.

In the US it's all majors, for the most part, some of the indies as well, and a very small portion of indie labels are w/o mv.

[DB83]

Ok. I have not owned many US VHS. One tape UK released has a Triangle with the letters 'CP' inside and macrovision written below.

[oln]

On some of the big broadcast decks with TBC they let you set whether to blank some or all of the vertical blanking area, and unlike the consumer svhs decks they typically have full frame TBCs. This one seems to only have TBC on/off setting though.

[DavesArchives]

Very nice write up. I just picked one up off ebay for 180 NIB. Although it only plays SP, I'm curious how well it performs. I also picked up a NIB MITSUBISHI HS-HD2000U. Cost a bit, but both of my ag-1980s died, and I'm needing some reliable equipment before these machines get even more expensive in the coming years that are NIB or good working order.

[hiptune]

Yes, I found the no EP playback a minor inconvenience at first. But I found a free GO-VIDEO duel deck (with one good deck out of the two) that plays EP tapes rather well, and it's a Hi-Fi player too. So I got that covered.

This is the one thing I have noticed about my Mitsubishi HS-HD2000U, the Hi-Fi sound track playback is rather fussy, and sometimes with some tapes I go the dropouts and faint popping as miss-tracked certain tapes. These were tapes I recorded on a very good deck, but normal grade name brand tapes. The higher end glossy Hi-Fi tapes seems to track better (sound). The factory recorded studio releases also track fine more often then not. I keep the screws off the top for easy access to the heads, and cleaning the heads (with 99.9% pure alcohol) would cure the audio tracking issue 85% of the time. Seems some of these tapes dirty up the heads more often than in the old days. Aging tapes I guess. But get this, the audio issues experienced with this deck were not experienced with the GO-VIDEO deck, it's Hi-Fi playback was more often perfect than the Mitzu was. So for an important tape, if I can't get the Hi-Fi to track perfect, I will do a "video (SVIDEO out) pass with the Mitzu, and an audio pass (for the soundtrack only) with the GO-VIDEO. Then merge them in post.

But basically I still think that the HS-HD2000U is a total winner, and I am thrilled to have it as my other older decks all died. And the GO-VIDEO (cheap deck) is fine for EP and problem Hi-Fi tracks that the Mitzu does not cooperate well with.

Your NIB may perform with odd Hi-Fi tracks better than mine seems to.

[hiptune]

On a side note, I find that recording the Hi-Fi output from a VCR deck straight to an outboard recorder (like a Tascam or a Zoom) at 24/48kHz (or if it is music at very high quality 24/96kHz), as a separate file, and then merging / syncing it with the captured video in the editing software results in much nicer cleaner sounding audio at end result. Of course I am using old outdated Canopus ADVC capture devices, but it still would hold true that a good audio recorder with higher resolution bit rates would not hurt at all if you need the sound to be clear as a bell. I capture a lot of VHS tapes of concert material, and many of them sound amazing from the late 80s.

[Eric-jan]

Did you try a passthrough dvd recorder that has component video output, and set it in progressive mode ?