VHS -> PC ...nothing works!

[templar112]

Hi All,

I have spend hours now trying to capture some video from a VHS tape. I have tried VirtualDUB, WinDV, VirtualVCR and a program that comes with Pinnacle Studio 14 (AMCAP).

My capture hardware is something I borrowed off a friend. It's a compro USB VideoMate C200.

WinDV doesn't work at all because I think it's only meant for Firewire, but it detects the hardware correctly. It says "Error: Can't find DV output pin".

AMCAP detects the device and I can watch the preview while the VHS tape is playing. However capture to file doesn't work. Strange thing is that during capture it says "Filter cannot report capture information". The captured video just plays as a lot of green lines and a diagonal line from top left to bottom right. I can sort of see something playing in the background but the left half is on the right half of the screen and the right half is showing up on the left side of the screen!

Finally, VirtualDUB allows me to see the video prewiew. However, after capturing the resulting video is mostly black with a few random green lines.

The problem here may be I'm using Windows 7 with DirectX 11 and it's 64bit...

Any ideas?

[Ghitulescu]

Did you install the drivers for the device?

[ExperimentalAnimations]

good luck with figuring it out. I cant seem to get a straight answer on here on how to actually do a vhs to pc transfer, and it seems no one else really knows either. The faq's on here are outdated and of little help too. There should be some sort of cheap interface on the market that allows for simple transferring without lossy compression, ill post it if i find anything.

[templar112]

Brilliant!

The drivers I had installed were correct, however:

My friend dug up the software that actually came with the Compro C200 USB Capture stick. It's ULEAD VideoStudio 11 SE. Works with no issues after setting the correct video capture input.

[Ryu77]

good luck with figuring it out. I cant seem to get a straight answer on here on how to actually do a vhs to pc transfer, and it seems no one else really knows either. The faq's on here are outdated and of little help too. There should be some sort of cheap interface on the market that allows for simple transferring without lossy compression, ill post it if i find anything.

Saying things like no one else really knows isn't really giving much credit to the community here.

First of all, the statement "There should be some sort of cheap interface on the market that allows for simple transferring without lossy compression" doesn't really make sense, unless you really want to capture in raw RGB or even HuffyUV (you will need large amounts of HDD space). Then what do you intend to do with this large, uncompressed video file? Otherwise, if you intend to have the finished project on DVD (or other format like DivX or h264), your only option IS lossy compression.

I have converted many VHS tapes to DVD and could quite easily have chosen any other destination format. What steps exactly are you having trouble with?

My friend dug up the software that actually came with the Compro C200 USB Capture stick. It's ULEAD VideoStudio 11 SE. Works with no issues after setting the correct video capture input.

As templar112 has discovered, it usually comes down to which software is the most compatible with the hardware and drivers that work the device. Sometimes checking your direct show filters/codecs may help also.