Capturing S-VHS in High Bitrate

[braxus]

I currently have an AverMedia 310 capture card, but dont know the specs on it. I dont know what bitrate it saves the files at, but Im guessing its 1.5 mbits/s which is really low. I have a Panasonic DVD-R deck that uses 5 mbits/s in SP and 10 mbits/s in XP. SP mode the video has compression artifacts and looks bad, but the 10 mbits/s XP mode looks great. But I dont want to have to save everything to multiple discs at 1 hour each. I dont want to save to disc at all if I can help it. I just want a high bitrate conversion. What device allows saving in high quality high bitrate? I'd love something that is as good as my Panasonic in XP mode, and that deck also has a TBC and noise reduction/ sharpening as well. I dont mind spending a bit of money to get something decent. If its a USB device, I want USB 3.0. What do you recommend today that works under Windows 10 and 11? I will be using OBS Studio for the capturing.

[dellsam34]

There are some stable USB capture devices that capture analog tapes in lossless AVI 4:2:2 with a very high bitrate, then encode later at any bitrate you want, You want to use vdub or AmarecTV not OBS, OBS is a modern streaming/screen capture software, It can be made to work with analog video but it was not designed for it.

[braxus]

Can you recommend which usb device you were suggesting? There's so many of them out there and I'd want to get the one you suggest.

[Sharc]

My experience is with I-O Data GV-USB2 and Hauppauge USB-live2. Either is good for providing decent analog captures togehter with a VCR with TBC, or with a VCR+ recommended DVD recorder in passthrough. One should be familiar with analog capture basics though, like video levels and proc-amp adjustments. For less experienced users I would give the GV-USB2 a slight plus over the USB-live2.

[lollo]

In addition to what Sharc and dellsam34 properly said, also consider that the most important element for a good capture is the player.

[braxus]

I have a JVC 9800 deck for that.

[Sharc]

I have a JVC 9800 deck for that.

Assuming that your model is a JVC HR S9800U (?) which provides TBC you should be able to capture in perfect quality - if you do it right.
You should connect the S-video OUT of your JVC - with TBC enabled - to a recommended capture device, and use AmarecTV (or VirtualDub) with a lossless codec such as huffyuv, UTVideo or Lagarith for example as your capturing tool for capturing into lossless YUV 4:2:2 interlaced format.
Search the forum. There are plenty of posts explaining the procedure in more detail.
And as has been said forget OBS for capturing of analog video.

[braxus]

Yes that is the JVC I have. It doesnt like playing tapes in EP speed though due to the cheap plastic transport the deck uses. Its a known issue with that deck. But I use it for transferring everything, because it really does give the best picture for the format. I also have a Panasonic semi pro S-VHS deck with TBC, but I have never used it and can't confirm if it even works. I also have a stand alone TBC, but its stored away at the moment. I normally use S-Video yes. Next time I transfer, I'll try your recommendations.

[aedipuss]

in my experience all jvc vchrs hate EP. never worked well on any jvc unit i tried.

[Tracer93]

Back in 2002 my days of messing with S-VHS ... I recorded VH-1 classic videos with a Sharp HI-FI VCR >>> VHS tapes. My other equipment was a Panasonic EH50 with a 100 GB hard drive in it. I used it to make a copy of the VHS tapes. I recorded with highest bitrate. I then burned the show to a DVD-RAM 4.3 GB disk. I then put it in my PC Panasonic DVD Burner that can read DVD RAM disks and transfer the video to my hard drives. I then edited the audio & video. I recorded Martina McBride concert way back in 2001 on a VHS tape and I used that transfer method. I did have a bunch of Martina McBride videos on YouTube but I got hacked and I lost all my YouTube videos ... my wedding videos were on there.
Here is a video I created way back in 2001 ... I still have it and I put it back on YouTube & I used some AI to clean up the video. Looks good to me. Sherrie Austin - Jolene .................. this is my favorite version
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjwpPI72QiM
Merry Christmas ... I did this one too ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvkWqrIAe78
it was originally a 320 x 240 avi video that goes way back to 2001. I am pretty sure I used my Sharp VCR to record this. I also used a Mitsubishi HI FI VCR ... it was able to read the tapes from my worn out Sharp VCR

[dellsam34]

No offence but those videos look like crap, While AI can enhance videos just as good as any other video tool, if it is overdone it turns video into poop. I think your first mistake is editing out of DVD, MPEG2 is not a good codec for editing, you should have kept the lossless AVI files that you have captured from the VHS tapes, Second mistake, The resolution of analog video converted to digital should be 720x480 for NTSC (720x576 for PAL/SECAM) not 320x240 regardless what VHS is capable off natively. 3rd mistake, Since you had the S-VHS capability you should have recorded at least in S-VHS ET on regular VHS tapes, but I remember back in that decade S-VHS tapes were not that expensive compared to regular VHS. Lollo one of the members here that recorded in S-VHS, check out his YT channel to see what you have missed.

[rgr]

Back in 2002 my days of messing with S-VHS ... I recorded VH-1 classic videos with a Sharp HI-FI VCR >>> VHS tapes. My other equipment was a Panasonic EH50 with a 100 GB hard drive in it. I used it to make a copy of the VHS tapes. I recorded with highest bitrate. I then burned the show to a DVD-RAM 4.3 GB disk. I then put it in my PC Panasonic DVD Burner that can read DVD RAM disks and transfer the video to my hard drives. I then edited the audio & video. I recorded Martina McBride concert way back in 2001 on a VHS tape and I used that transfer method. I did have a bunch of Martina McBride videos on YouTube but I got hacked and I lost all my YouTube videos ... my wedding videos were on there.
Here is a video I created way back in 2001 ... I still have it and I put it back on YouTube & I used some AI to clean up the video. Looks good to me. Sherrie Austin - Jolene .................. this is my favorite version
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjwpPI72QiM
Merry Christmas ... I did this one too ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvkWqrIAe78
it was originally a 320 x 240 avi video that goes way back to 2001. I am pretty sure I used my Sharp VCR to record this. I also used a Mitsubishi HI FI VCR ... it was able to read the tapes from my worn out Sharp VCR

Hmmm.
https://imgur.com/a/j7dBImd

"AI" doesn't work with VHS. I found out about it, now you know it too

[braxus]

I use Topaz Video AI and agree that VHS uprezzed looks like crap. Even DV uprezzed doesnt look very good either. I find it has to be at least 1080P to look decent at higher rezs. VHS doesnt have detail that AI can work with. Even S-VHS doesnt look all that great today. I have been using S-VHS since the late 80s, so I have some tapes with that format. I had to use video I dubbed over to DVD-R in XP mode in an editted video. I left it at the native rez, but the video I posted was in 8K. The VHS material turned out rather well being the 8K video kept the quality of the VHS tape (since the 8K video was 160 mbits/s) and it still looked like VHS on my larger tv. It wasnt uprezzed in terms of creating more detail like AI does. One thing I like about Topaz as it has a deinterlace feature and it works very well. I used it on previous DV tapes I dubbed over.