NTSC Capture With a PAL Capture Card

[ses]

Regards from Sweden Everyone,
This is somewhat hard to describe, I hope you who read this will understand me. I purchased a Sony VCR while in the US to convert my VHS tapes to digital video. What happens is that the left side of the image will sometimes turn into a sort of "negitive" version of the picture. The right half remains in normal color. It will ´"blink" in this fashion. It won't be a mirror image of the right half, rather it is the left half of the image that will, for just a second, blink to a negitive version of the rest of the picture.
It usually happens at the start of a home recorded VHS tape, commercially purchased VHS tapes are fine.
I tried with deinterlacing but that made no difference. Regardless of which recording program I use, the effect is the same. When I rewind a tape with preview funtion on, the left half of the picture is green.
Has anyone else experienced this? If I run the VHS machine through my TV set, the picture is fine. If I play the VHS tapes in my European VHS which can play PAL60, there is also no problem with the picture. Any ideas?

[ses]

Since a picture is worth a thousand words and since I just figured out how to send up an image, here's how it looks. This is an NTSC VHS televison documentary that I recorded long ago. I get no droped frames, no problem with sync, but this is what I get now and then.
http://www.shs.home.se/images/test.jpg

[leonid_makarovsky]

Is your VCR NTSC? Are your VHS cassettes NTSC or PAL? What is your capture device?

--Leonid

[ses]

Yes, it is a Sony NTSC VCR and the tapes are also NTSC, they were home recrdings of TV broadcasts in the US. The odd thing is that I don't encounter this problem with commercial NTSC films bought in the US, only the home recorded ones and not all of them either.
The capture card is an MSI FX5200 nVidia based Personal Cinema. Regardless of which recording program I use, the effect is the same

[leonid_makarovsky]

Can you watch it on TV ok? Did you chose NTSC in your capture card driver settings?

--Leonid

[ses]

Yes, I can. Oddly enough, my cheap Gold Start TV set can read an NTSC signal in it's AV inputs and the picture is just fine there with no split screens.
The card is a PAL card bought here in Europe, but it is supposed to handle NTSC, there are three NTSC settings in the card which is an MSI nVidia based FX 5200 Personal Cinema All in One Card. They are NTSC M; NTSC 433 and NTSC MU. In all three, I get the same problem. I would like to try it with another capture card, but don't have the possibility of doing that right now.
As I mentioned before, a commercially recorded film works fine through the computer, it's the home recordings that show the problem. Most of the time, this shows up right at the start of a recorded program, but not always.

[ppera2]

This looks for me as software problem. Usually capture cards aren't specific PAL or NTSC, but can handle both.

I remember that in 'good-old' Win98 times I could easily change video system in capture programs. Now, in XP time, it's not so simple. It's connected in some way with regional settings or location.
Can you describe what software you use, do programs allow video-system change?
Maybe card has limited drivers?

[video]

seems like copyright/content protection at the first look. original VCR was immune against this, but it brings down your capture card. have you tried capturing with some advanced devices such as canopus ADVC 50?

anyway it's definitely not a PAl card cannot handle NTSC problem, because in that case You'll see balck and white video only and nothing else

[ses]

Sorry to take so ling to get back, kids, family, job, you know...
Well, as far as OS is concerned, it is a Swedish W2000 professional. I use the iuVCR recording program, but regardless of what program I use, I get the same thing. iuVCR can easily change from PAL to NTSC.
I could believe that about the drivers, but the funnny thing is, with my card, I have found that each new driver makes things worse, it has always worked the best with the original drivers and my Service Pack 2 W2000. I tried using the latest drivers, the latest Service Pack for 2000 and the video looked like I was looking through a fishbowl. Now, I 'm back to all original and am getting otherwise fantastic video from my MSI Personal Cinema card apart from this problem.
I need to borrow another card/computer and see what happens there with my NTSC VCR.