sleepykid

i just bought this 5 set of VHS tapes for 200 hundred bucks. since they cost me so much i want to back them up just in case something happens to them (i live in a college apartment so you can never be too safe). anyway, they are encoded with macrovision so the vcr to vcr option doesn't work. is there any way to get passed this copy protection?

also, i was thinking about bringing them in to have them transfered to DVD. i've seen a few stores around that do this and thought that this could be even better than backing up to VHS. however, do the machines they use to transfer the tapes bypass the macrovision or is this option out of the question?

palebluedot

What is VHS?

What you need is a RF Modulator, you can get one from Rat-Shack and that will bypass the macrovision.

You could make VCDs of them yourself if you have a computer with a video card that has a video in. Otherwise I am sure a DVD authoring house that converts VHS to DVD will have the equipment to bypass macrovision.

ngp

In any case, if you can spend more money, get one of the Govideo duel VHS decks, many of them bypass the protection.

sleepykid

i know it seems totally ludacris to spend 40 bucks per tape, but after watching them it was worth it. i train in the martial arts (JKD/Kali to be more specific) but right now i'm at school so i cant go to class. these tapes are a series that Guro Dan Inosanto (he's my SiGung, or instructor's instructor for those unfamiliar) produced and sells through his school. basically its like having all the material that i need to practice right here on these tapes that i can watch anytime and substitutes for the classes that i miss.

kahuna

Not any of the models from the past 3 years. You need to find a older model. Probably the ones that are stacked on each other instead of the side by side models.

Kahuna

lpvo

Well, I have a kind of similar problem ... I have several home movie of my son and want to tranfer them to CD or making a VCD out of it so I can save it for a long time.

I bought a Digital Video Creator from Dazle and transfer my son 5 birthday video to the computer ... it's only about 15 minutes ... to my horror it is a whooping 3 gig files ! It's in .AVI format and I did choose NTSC with frame rate about 30.

To my understand, the average VCD can contain about 60 minute of movie ... Is there any software out there can I get to convert them since a CR-R only hold about 650 Meg.

Also, do I need a special software to make a VCD (ie. so it can be played in my DVD player beside my computer)

I appreciate any inputs DVD Talker ... :-)

buzzdalf

Ipvo:

Go check out vcdhelp.com

That place has a lot of information on doing just what you describe.

For everyone else, if you'd like a lower cost option to get VHS-VCD you can get the IOMagic PC PVR from CompUSA for $39. It has inputs for antenna, rca-video, and s-video. It has a built in tv tuner if you want to capture live TV also.

I bought one last week and love it. There are a couple very extensive threads going on at dbsforums.com in the PVR forum talking about it and walking people through using it to archive their VHS tapes onto VCD.
Do a search in the PVR forum for iomagic and a search for "39" to find them both.

sleepykid

everyone keeps mentioning vcdhelp.com but when i went there half of there site is down while they look for a new server or something.

icondude

They are back.

lpvo

Thanks buzzdalf ! I just got the IOMagic PC PVR from CompUSA will try it later tonight !

However, they don't have the audio input !

X

It goes into your soundcard and the software handles it just fine.

sleepykid

i'm sorry, i'm a little confused. i just bought the I/O Magic card also (thanks for the recommendation X) and was wondering what you meant by the above statement. do you mean that when you hook up the coaxial cable and watch tv that the sound is handled by the sound card (i guess that is obvious)? ok, but what about if i want to hook up my vcr with composite cables or even with s-video, how do i hook up the sound cable?

am i making sense? i hope so, thanks for the reply.

buzzdalf

The card comes with a jumper cable you use when you are using the co-ax input. You jumper from the PC PVR to your sound card's line-in.

When you are using the s-video input, you hook your audio out from the VCR into the line in on your sound card.

So the PC PVR doesn't actually do the sound, but the software knows to get the sound from the line in on your sound card (I believe this is configurable to any input you want actually).

lpvo

I was able to convert on of my kid video to 30 min -> 500 Meg ( I choose MEG1-average quality) ... now only if I can find a good and easy to use VCD burning software !!!

I did go to VCDhelp and try various one to no avail:

VCR 2.0 Tool Kit ... claim to be used by professional before it was widely available but I cannot figure out head or tail with it ... :-(

VCD Easy 1.0.3 whenever I open it crash (... cause an unknown error, cannot find a CD Writer) ... I went back to the web site and they just discover the error due to ASPI or ASIP problem ... I download the file to fix it and run it ... It said that I do not have any Adaptec component in my computer so they can not fix it ... but when I run the diagnostic tool they have it say the my version of ASPI is outdated ... ???

Finally, I went to download a trial version of Nero and it want me to deinstal my Easy CD Creator (which came with my CD burner) ...

icondude

I record into my computer at NTSC VCD specs (29.97 fps @ 352x240) and create huge .AVi files that I stop at commercial breaks (when I'm doing TV shows). I then use TMPEGnc and set it up for an overnight batch file. By the time I get home from work the next day I have mpg files which I can burn onto a CD-R with Nero. I'm using Nero 5 and I also have Easy CD Creator 4 on my computer, and they both live happily togather. If Nero wants you to delete Easy Cd creator then go ahead and do it then reinstall Easy CD creator (although I'm not sure how I did it). What version of Easy CD creator are you using? If it's before version 4 then you really shouldn't be using it.

lpvo

I just check my computer it is Easy CD Creator 4 ... I look at my read me file and it say 4.02 and there is nothing about 'create' VCD ...

icondude

Perhaps I should have been more clear. I have both Easy CD creator 4 and Nero 5 on my home computer (I'm not sure what exact versions). I use Nero exclusively for VCD's and Easy CD creator for everything else (audio and data CD's). There is a version if Easy CD creator that you can use for making VCD's, but I do not recommend using Easy CD creator for making VCD's.

Beeeil

I know the thread has evolved into something else, but to answer the original question about VHS-to-VHS copy, you need 2 VCRs and a video stabilizer in between. Video stabilizers clean up MacroVision and you can pick them up for about $20. I have 2 and they work great.

You can get the video stabilizers from many places, here are some examples from eBay.

Beeeil