WTB: Wellington, VHS Player

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michaelmurfy

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Topic # 237482 4-Jun-2018 22:18

I've been wanting to digitise some old home movies on VHS for my parents for some time. This is likely a long shot but does anyone in Wellington have a VHS machine in working condition I can either buy or borrow for a bit?

Shipping can be rather expensive hence why I have limited it to Wellington only but am open to offers from others outside of Wellington if you have a way of packaging and sending.

Michael Murphy | https://murfy.nz
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Reply # 2029501 4-Jun-2018 22:23

I have one that you can borrow. It was working the last time I checked.

Send me a PM with your contact details.

System One: Popcorn Hour A200, PS3 SuperSlim, NPVR and Plex Server running on Gigabyte Brix (Windows 10 Pro), Sony BDP-S390 BD player, Pioneer AVR, Raspberry Pi running Kodi and Plex, Panasonic 60" 3D plasma, Google Chromecast

System Two: Popcorn Hour A200 , Oppo BDP-80 BluRay Player with hardware mode to be region free, Vivitek HD1080P 1080P DLP projector with 100" screen. Harman Kardon HK AVR 254 7.1 receiver, Samsung 4K player, Google Chromecast

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Rikkitic

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Reply # 2029502 4-Jun-2018 22:29

I have a dual DVD player/VHS recorder-player that hasn't been used for a long time. Not mine to give away but a loan would be no problem. However, I live in Hastings and do not have a shipping option. All I can say is I am closer than Auckland if you can't find anyone else.

How many tapes do you have? Is there anything confidential on them? I might be able to do the transfers for you which would solve the shipping problem. If they are precious you should make copies before sending. I have done this before for other people.

Edit: Looks like you have already found a better option but I will keep the offer open as a back-up.

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michaelmurfy

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Reply # 2029504 4-Jun-2018 22:34

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Awesome thanks @lchiu7 - PM coming your way!

@Rikkitic Nothing too bad however it is old movies from when me and my sister were little kids. Not sure if I want that leaking out :)

Michael Murphy | https://murfy.nz
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Bung

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Reply # 2029556 5-Jun-2018 07:24

Try loading a sacrificial tape first. On some machines any slowness in parts of the mechanism because the lube has dried out will result in a bird's nest of tape.

richms

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Reply # 2029558 5-Jun-2018 07:45

Do everything with the tape you dont care about. My old sony worked fine a few years ago until it came time to rewind while playing. That triggered something that let all the tape out.

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Reply # 2029564 5-Jun-2018 08:14

Ill check and make sure, I have one in my workshop that I think survived the last cull, yours if you want it

gehenna

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Reply # 2029566 5-Jun-2018 08:17

I've also got one you can borrow if other options fall through. I did something similar a few years ago with a Hauppauge tuner in my PC. Took an age (can you believe we used to have to sit through the whole thing to copy something onto tape? LOL).

michaelmurfy

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Reply # 2029595 5-Jun-2018 09:32

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Thanks @gehenna and @Brunzy - looks like @lchiu7 has got me sorted!

Yes, the next step is having to basically watch through the tapes. I'm sure my mother is going to get a bit of a surprise when they suddenly appear on her Plex.

Michael Murphy | https://murfy.nz
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lchiu7

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Reply # 2029596 5-Jun-2018 09:35

I captured a ton of tapes (some VHS but mainly Hi-8) using a Canopus ADV110

https://www.cnet.com/products/canopus-advc-110-video-capture-adapter-firewire/specs/

and into a Firewire port on my PC. Apart from having to copy in real time :-( it worked fine. That PC is gone now and my latest ones don't have have Firewire. So I maintain an older laptop with a PCMCIA slot and a Firewire card for the rare occasion I want do dub videos (as I find them in the closet when I am cleaning out boxes of stuff).

The device creates uncompressed DV format video which is easy to edit in Premier or Vegas so you can make compression decisions after the fact, not during capture.

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richms

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Reply # 2029646 5-Jun-2018 09:58

DV format is quite heavily compressed, its very noticible on areas of repeating texture where the blocks stand out badly.

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Reply # 2029715 5-Jun-2018 11:00

Me Too … if all else fails I have a VCR available. I did a few of my own tape-to-DVD conversions a few years back using an EasyCap dongle … worked a treat other than as @ghenna said, it is all in real-time.

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Reply # 2029805 5-Jun-2018 13:32

richms:

DV format is quite heavily compressed, its very noticible on areas of repeating texture where the blocks stand out badly.

Getting a bit OT but I must admit I have never noticed any issues. But then the source material being VHS or sVHS wasn't that great to start with. Even Hi8 seem to transfer okay.

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richms

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Reply # 2030001 5-Jun-2018 18:44

lchiu7:

Getting a bit OT but I must admit I have never noticed any issues. But then the source material being VHS or sVHS wasn't that great to start with. Even Hi8 seem to transfer okay.

Try using a DV camera as a capture device off a retro computer and you will see it drop down to virtually illegiable text and massive blocking. Seems to be the sharp edges do it. Also using an old SD DV camcorder on a microscope gave much better results over svideo to a cheap capture device than over fire wire when in live view - recorded both were as bad as each other.

Fuzzy low quality VHS seems to get vertical lines between the blocks that are very noticeable as the picture shimmers sideways slightly because of lousy tracking.

Richard rich.ms

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Reply # 2030483 6-Jun-2018 08:51

Sort of related, the company I work for does heritage digital conversions, and can do VHS. I've got no idea what the costs involved are but if you are interested in getting it done professionally PM me and I can get a sales person to get in touch.

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Reply # 2030614 6-Jun-2018 10:41

Ive done quite a few VHS to DVD conversions

the quickest & easiest way is VHS player to DVD Recorder . Push 2 buttons, come back in a hour . The VHS recordings are often now really bad quality, so dont worry about
conversion quality
Once you start trying to edit etc, you'll just be wasting alot of time on something may only be seen once, if that :-)

DVD recorders can sometimes be bought dirt cheap on trademe, no one uses them any more.

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