Optimal JVC VCR settings for capturing

[Arachnotron]

Hi all,

I recently purchased a new VCR, a JVC HR-S7950EU. It has several interesting options to improve the picture quality.

Since I noticed several people on this list also own JVC VCR's, I was wondering if anyone would care to comment on which options to switch on for capturing, since the manual is sadly lacking in details. I mainly want to capture NTSC Anime tapes (PAL-60) and camcorder recordings (PAL) for later transfer to DVD.

So far, I have left most options off, since I think it is better to capture as raw as possible and do any filtering with avisynth afterwards.

The options are:

TBC/NR
TBC seems a good thing, so I leave it on. Digital 3-DNR Noise reduction is linked with it. If this is the same as the Digital 3R option below, it can be switched off later, but from the manual it is not clear if this is true.

BEST (Biconditional Equalised Signal tracking)
Anything which improves tracking is fine by me. On it is.

Picture Control (Auto, Edit, Soft, Sharp)
Sounds like filtering to me. When you switch off BEST, Picture control switches to NORM. The manual suggest the edit setting for montage work, which implies to me switching off filtering. I set it to Edit.

Digital 3R.
does 'edgecorrection on the luminance signal for sharper details' (translated from dutch). The manual suggest switching this off if you are doing any editing. Since this sounds like a filter, off it is.

Video Stabiliser
Reduces vertical vibrations in the picture. Cannot be combined with TBC. Since TBC seems the better option, this one stays off.

Any comments?

[Kika]

Yeah, it's the same VCR i use since 10 Months now. ;)

Which settings are best? That's not easy to find out.
If i'm capturing from my older VHS-Tapes, i'm using the TBC. If i'm capturing from my own SVHS-ET-Tapes, TBC is always off.
Video Stabilizer is usefull on commercial VHS-Tapes.
BEST sometimes gives you too hard edges.
On Picture Control, i prefer Edit or Soft, otherwise sometimes the edges are too hard.
Digital 3R: that's usefull on older Tapes to get a little more Sharpness.

But to be honest: I always do some tests to find the best Settings for each Movie before i start the Capture .

[Arachnotron]

Hi Kika, thanks for the reply.

>If i'm capturing from my older VHS-Tapes, i'm using the TBC. If i'm
>capturing from my own SVHS-ET-Tapes, TBC is always off.
>Video Stabilizer is usefull on commercial VHS-Tapes.

Why is TBC better for old tapes, but video stabiliser for commercial ones?

>But to be honest: I always do some tests to find the best Settings
>for each Movie before i start the Capture

I agree that simply testing would be the best. But that takes a lot of captures with all possible combinations.

I dont think any build in filter can be better than a good avisynth filter after capturing. Also, trying out different avisynth filters is easier than doing several captures.

So the best thing for me would be to use any option that improves the capturing process, stabilises the image and reduces framedrops, but switch off anything that you can do (better) afterwards with avisynth /virtualdub filters.

The only problem is, JVC uses all these nice terms in their folders and on their website, but they don't explain any of them. :angry:

(What is new in this product? The word "NEW" on the box, that is what is new)

[Kika]

Why is TBC better for old tapes, but video stabiliser for commercial ones?

That's because the TBC is "bundled" with the DNR. On older Tapes, i get a better Picture with less Noise.
The commercial Tapes do mostly provide a good Picture quality, so there's no DNR needet. But to kick off the Macrovision-Protection from some Tapes, the Stabilizer is very usefull.