There needs to be a thread for things that make you smile and really annoy you.

I have some old videotapes that need digitising. I have a crap digitiser that used to work after a fashion. A recent thread here inspired me to finally see what I could do with it. 

I also have a LOT of old junk. Somehow I just seem to keep accumulating it. Anyone want some 20 year old laptops that were top of the line in their day?

So I dug out the digitiser and some laptops. Every single laptop seemed to have a different problem that made it unusable for this project. I finally selected the least worst one (the only one I could get the digitiser to install on). It is an HP running Vista, only 10 years or so old. It has a Grub bootloader on it after a failed attempt to turn it into an Android muscle machine. It still loads Windows.

What followed was DAYS of curse-laden effort. I won’t even try to describe it all. But after the first couple days I decided I could only carry on if I got rid of the godawful software that came with the damned digitiser. First I tried updating the USB2.0 capture driver. I was so fed up by this point that I did something I normally never do. I let Windows spend hours and hours looking for the driver. To my utter amazement, it found one. Even more surprising, the driver works!

Then I turned my attention to Ulead, the creators of which should burn in hell. After another day of frustration (it kept insisting on reverting to NTSC in spite of my PAL system), I decided that it had to go too. I looked at VLC but couldn’t get it to work. I have never been able to get VLC to work for anything. 

Then I remembered the fantastic OBS software, which I use for screen captures but which can do so much more. With some fiddling I was able to get the video capture to work. That was a big, big step forward.  

But I couldn’t get the audio to work, no matter what I tried. I went down multiple rabbit holes. I tried inputting the audio directly to the laptop. I tried doing yoga on my head while chanting ummmmm. I even tried an external USB audio device.

After more days of frustration, I finally got tired of seeing the useless default Windows drivers that kept mocking me every time I looked at the audio input settings, and decided to hell with it. Having nothing to lose, I uninstalled them and gleefully instructed Windows to permanently delete everything associated with them. Suddenly the videotape audio came through loud and clear! Damn Windows. Damn it damn it damn it.

So now everything works, better than ever before. I am free of that awful Ulead. I have a much better USB driver. OBS is a dream to work with. Videotapes are digitising smoothly. All of this makes me smile. 

But damn, am I ever annoyed at all the crap I had to go through to get here!
 

@Rikkitic I reckon you actually got a hell of a kick out of doing all that and solving the problem - the wonderful feeling of self-satisfaction many of us get when we successfully repair something. 👌😃

eracode:

 

@Rikkitic I reckon you actually got a hell of a kick out of doing all that and solving the problem - the wonderful feeling of self-satisfaction many of us get when we successfully repair something. 👌😃

 

Next up will be adjusting it to keep the audio in sync with the video, since VHS decks are not known for the consistant framerate being that its got something mechanical in the loop.

Wife called IRD, she was unable to complete her MyIR registration.

A very polite gentleman sorted everything in a few minutes, the $2K tax return was also a bonus :)

That I only need 16 more +1's and I will have 8,000!

Rikkitic:

 

That I only need 16 more +1's and I will have 8,000!

 

 

 

There ya go. Have one on me :)

Rikkitic:

That I only need 16 more +1's and I will have 8,000!

Yay. Only four to go.

neb:

Rikkitic:

 

That I only need 16 more +1's and I will have 8,000!

 

The significance of that depends on whether you're going by the original or the Remastered Uncut Funimation dub, where it's "Over 9000!", not 8000.

To get to over 9000 I first have to get to over 8000.

One more! Who is going to have the honour?

Rikkitic:

 

One more! Who is going to have the honour?

 

 

 

Me, merry xmas :)

networkn:

Rikkitic:

One more! Who is going to have the honour?

 

Me, merry xmas :)

Handle9:

 

Starts searching for posts to remove +1s...

Meany :)