Hello! George are you there? So sorry I mean STEVE!

heinz-oz · Post by **heinz-oz** » Mon Jul 24, 2006 12:24 am

Just had a look at the cam spec's for the JVC GR-D350. It looks as if the camera could support pass through but I wouldn't take a salesmans word for it.

The chip size and lens do not come into the equation but on board processor power does

After all, the little thing has to take the analog footage and has to convert that to digital, no mean feat.

Not having tried it, who is going to tell you it will work satisfactorily?

BTW, in your post you are referring to RAW AVI. That's a totally different kettle of fish again. It's completely uncompressed digital video, over 60GB per hour of footage

I don't think you would want that and the pass through function would not be able to generate that kind of data throughput. It's DV-AVI that you are after.

Angler · Post by **Angler** » Mon Jul 24, 2006 4:23 pm

Hello Heinz,

Thanks for responding.

I wish I could afford the Panasonic, but I cannot. So, I will
heed your advice and check closely to make sure the cheaper
minidv's do in fact have a pass through feature. Also, I did mean
dvAvi as opposed to raw avi, thanks for pointing that out.

As long as the camera has an AV-In port and an iLink Out, you can still use it. You may have to copy the analog video onto MiniDV tape first. Once you have done that you can easily capture DV-AVI through the iLink aka firewire aka IEEE1394 via a firewire cable and a cheap PCI firwire card in case your PC doesn't have a firewire port.

Ah, ok, thanks for this.

I'll try the JVC ( making sure the store has a refund policy ) if
it has a pass through feature. As you mentioned, what I'm trying
to accomplish might be a bit much for the chip on board.

Thanks for your help Heinz!

Angler.

sjj1805 · Post by **sjj1805** » Mon Jul 24, 2006 4:34 pm

Angler wrote:.......... I will
heed your advice and check closely to make sure the cheaper
minidv's do in fact have a pass through feature........

This various between models even from the same manufacturer so you would need to check each model individually. Some do pass through some don't.

Angler · Post by **Angler** » Wed Jul 26, 2006 4:00 pm

Well, after another 5 hours of research on the subject, I've come
to the conclusion....it can't be done.

The JVC 550 looked very good for a while, until I read the very bad
reviews about their reliability.

The lower end Canons have motor noise issues, and do not come
with AV 'in'.

The lower end Panasonics come with none of the ports I'm looking
for.

I am also relegated to purchasing locally. Should the camera be
a dud, I would want to return. This left me with very limited options.
The option being the Canon Elura 100, at $600. Too much for me
at the moment.

So, in conclusion....I'd say to anyone looking to transfer their
VHS's via a cheap camera. It doesn't seem to be possible.

There is also the matter of the chip as Heinz pointed out. Even
if I purchased then Canon locally at $600, how do I know what
quality of image I will recieve?

So, I looked up the Panasonic Heinz has, and yes, it is a beautiful
unit, given full marks in many forums.

I did mention I didn't trust article writers. I will have to temper
that somewhat. This site I trusted a little more because they did
allow for follow up comments from people to the original article.

Here is something that might of interest:
http://www.camcorderinfo.com/content/Ca ... t-2005.htm

Well, I tried : )

Thanks for the input gentlemen.

Angler.

sjj1805 · Post by **sjj1805** » Wed Jul 26, 2006 4:44 pm

If you simply want to transfer your VHS onto DVD with little or no editing then another option you can consider is a TV card. There are some TV cards that 'do avi' I can only speak from the experience of my own TV card which is a Hauppauge.

There are several models of Hauppauge TV card mine being a PVR (Personal Video Recorder) model 350 which has what is termed a hardware MPEG encoder. What this means is that the TV card has turned my computer into a television set - you have to hook it up to a TV feed such as a co-axial TV cable to an aerial or to your satelite or cable reciever.

The hardware MPEG encoder enables you to record to your hard drive much like you record onto a VHS tape. Because it is a hardware encoder the computer does not do the conversion to MPEG format - the TV card does and so there is no issue with the computer being powerful enough to keep up with the conversion process.

You can obviously connect your VHS tape recorder to the TV card in the same was as you would connect it to a TV set so you can record your VHS tapes into your computer.

The drawback with my Hauppauge TV card is that editing MPEG files can be a problem - there are plenty of posts in this forum where you will find that a large number of users take the view that MPEG files are for viewing and not editing.

Having said that I am not saying they cannot be edited but that it is better to keep to simple straight cuts - avoiding transitions - or use a purpose built MPEG editor such as Womble or VideoRedo.

You can then use the various Ulead products to author a DVD from these MPEG files.

Another advantage to the TV card system is that you also get the teletext functions of a TV set - in fact with most TV cards the teletext is far superior to that you get with a teletext TV set.

maddrummer3301 · Post by **maddrummer3301** » Wed Jul 26, 2006 5:07 pm

Angler · Post by **Angler** » Wed Jul 26, 2006 7:38 pm

Sjj1801: yes, *all* ( what a loaded word that has become ) I want to do,
is get quality avi into my computer.

Heinz observed that my original post was long. He was right. It was long, and
the reason was, I had just spent about 5 hours researching and after partial anwsers to partial questions from several forums I needed to be thorough.

In it, I wrote that USB 2 was out of the question since many had remarked that over time the audio video synch falls out. Also, I had mentioned that I didn't want to use up a PCI slot. The reason being, PCI slots are funny things, in that they sometimes share IRQ settings with other elements of the computer. This is the extent of my technical knowledge, and I learned this because I freaked when I put an innocent USB 2 card into my PIII computer and it booted up in Safe Mode!! NOT GOOD. Thankfully I tried my last available PCI slot and it just happened to work.

So, I thought...no pci slots on my new computer because I already do pro audio on it. But the Asus motherboard comes with a Firewire slot! Great.
Tried the awful Dazzle 90, which installs drivers. Well, that software killed 2 computers. Mine and a friends. After removing the software, neither of my cdrom drives showed up. I found a fix after 2 hours.

Then, I read about the Canopus. It seemed ideal. No drivers, conversion outside of the pc, firewire in, superb reports......except.......it encodes to Mpeg 2.

And for the reasons you stated, I did not want to be working with mpeg
2 files, only avi...so I could do some editing.

I heard the good things about the Hauppage....and, it's looking like I may have to go that route.

Maddrummer: I live in Canada, so, by the time the Canon gets here, after duty, taxes, shipping etc...I'll be up to $600. Might as well buy locally, then I can get a return if the image quality isn't up to scratch. Thanks for the link anyways.

This Canon does what you want, discounted to $350.00 us dollars.
You can't always go by some writeups (motor noise etc). Some writeups are poorly written.
http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.process?Product=4077620

No disrepect intended here at all Maddrummer, but, I've done some research, and when you here 30 different people say, "yep, motornoise,
nope, mines fine" over and over again...you can bet as someone said,
it's a bad batch. It happens. Tigerdirect sells some of those 'bad batches'
my Asus motherboard was one of them. So, I need to go local should I end up with one of those Canons.

Jeeeeees, how hard can this be. Honestly.

I want a box, outside my computer, no pci slot, firewire in, good quality image, to transfer my VHS to avi. That's it. And I can't find it for around $400.00 Canadian. This is getting silly.

I think I'll call up the folks at Canopus and ask if their little unit ( which
has received rave reviews, but apparently encodes in mpeg 2) has an
option for avi. Is doesn't state so on the site. But, who knows.

If not. Well, I'll take my chances and grab a Hauppage and use up a pci slot and prey it doesn't interfere with another IRQ setting.

Thanks guys.

heinz-oz · Post by **heinz-oz** » Wed Jul 26, 2006 11:13 pm

No offence intended but I think you are a bit paranoid about PCI cards. Just because of a bad experience you had with these.

I built my own computers from parts I buy at local computer stores. My first approach would be PCI slot before I look at anything else. The only time I had some issues with PCI was when I used fairly old cards on a new mobo and once because I had 4 of the 5 available slots occupied and wanted to load a fifth. Shared IRQs come into it then. BTW, XP Pro does an excellent job with managing these from what I have experienced.

As long as you use XP Pro (don't know about the latest Win OSs but can't believe these would go backwards) I would not expect any trouble with PCI cards unless you use a really cheap, below par mother board.

The Hauppauge card mentioned by Steve is a good unit from what I can gather. I'm going to use one of them in the near future when I hook my PC up to my cable connection. Be aware though (not sure about VS, don't use it and haven't checked) most Ulead programs have patches to install for Hauppauge cards. If your version is an SE (bundled) version, it might not work with your particular version.

I'm not saying it won't, just to do your home work before you buy. And don't forget, this card is capturing to mpeg2.

maddrummer3301 · Post by **maddrummer3301** » Thu Jul 27, 2006 12:20 am

Angler · Post by **Angler** » Thu Jul 27, 2006 11:36 am

Hey guys,

Called up my local computer dealer yesterday and spent half an hour on the phone with him about this issue. He was shouting out to his coworker about this too, checking the available options with Hauppage, Plextor, Canopus ...even he was impressed, no avi. Then he said," go make it" .... lol.

Hmmmm, not a bad idea. Maddrummer, if you're an electrician, maybe you can make yourself a quick buck. ; )

Heinz, I realized after finishing the last post that I had forgotten the Hauppage encoded to Mpeg 2, so it's a no go. About PCI slots, I learned that bit from the pros over at the Sonar forum. Every single part of my audio machine is built from parts they recommended, and they said, 'keep the PCI slots clean'. Ok then.

So, how about that eh?

A minidv is the way to go.

Looks like I'll have to save up for that Canon.

Someone make a converter!

And I'll expect one at no cost of course

Bignosetw · Post by **Bignosetw** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 11:21 pm

Just two things, skimming through this (very interesting) thread:

Could you not BORROW a camcorder from someone for the time it will take you to transfer your tapes? Since the camcorder doesn't actually need to be running, there is very little wear on it....

Perhaps you could do a little test - buy a CHEAP MPEG 2 PCI card, and jsut try it ... capture to MPEG 2, and edit in VideoStudio. Ulead has been doing MPEG editing for a long time - starting in the day when veryone said it couldn't be done. We've become quite good at it. Quite frankly, VHS is never going to look like pristine DV - I transferred about 20 of my most prescious VHS tapes to DV with the pass-through method (my old Sony TRV-900), and it still just looks like .... old VHS.

Regards

Tobie Openshaw
Ulead Taiwan