Summer holidays are here, time to clean up the house and get rid of all the accumulated rubbish one (or, more precisely, one's family) collects over a year or two. Rummaging through lots of old home Videos (that's not the rubbish, by the way, to me anyway) I decided it was time to save all this stuff on new media before the VHS tapes disintegrate.
Surprisingly easy these days and, happily to report, all my VHS tapes going back to 1987 were still OK - I'm sure they left a bit of dust and residue behind but it all looked Ok when played back on DVD. The end result is a new library of home DVDs (and a backup copy) and the original VHS tapes which I've now packed away with the Master DVDs and stored in a constant temperature environment.
What did I need to do the job ? Not a computer, that's for sure! I experimented in the past with Video Capture boards and Studio software but it takes waaaay too long to render bulk amounts of tapes. At the start of this exercise I briefly flirted again with this stuff but still, no thanks.
Moved on to a combo VHS/DVD recorder - a Panasonic ES35V to be precise - as the name suggests it has both functions in the same box - incredibly, this machine could not do the job for me. I say incredibly because I'm thinking its probably one of main reasons anyone would buy this type of machine - but you can't edit the tapes as you copy them! What a load of hooey. Now, I'm not suggesting anything wrong with Panasonic here, folks. I've been using Panasonic VCRs from when they first came out (was it in 1979?) and they've always worked extremely reliably - anyway, the lack of the edit feature was a major downer but probably "mea culpa" for not researching this up front - don't assume...
Bit the bullet and bought a dedicated DVD recorder - this time a Panasonic DMR-EH55 attached to an existing SJ400 Panasonic VCR - could have used the ES35V but my wife already stole that for her use elsewhere in the house. The EH55 has 160GB which is ample storage space (bit more than 640K anyway).
After cabling machines together (easy) play video in VCR, hit record on DVD and edit away. I finished up loading all the tapes on the DVD recorder (they're all still on it), carved them up a bit further and hi-speed copied them onto 8x or 16x DVDs. You just need to get everything in the sequence you want and copy as close to (but under) 2 hours worth of viewing. 2 hours is the limit if you want roughly the same quality on a standard (non Dual layer) DVD.
Quality is good and because of the hi-speed transfer I was able to make a backup copy very quickly as well.
Just do it before it's too late. The Black Stump Guides page has few more good sites for tips on Digital editing. See also the DVD section.
Surprisingly easy these days and, happily to report, all my VHS tapes going back to 1987 were still OK - I'm sure they left a bit of dust and residue behind but it all looked Ok when played back on DVD. The end result is a new library of home DVDs (and a backup copy) and the original VHS tapes which I've now packed away with the Master DVDs and stored in a constant temperature environment.
What did I need to do the job ? Not a computer, that's for sure! I experimented in the past with Video Capture boards and Studio software but it takes waaaay too long to render bulk amounts of tapes. At the start of this exercise I briefly flirted again with this stuff but still, no thanks.
Moved on to a combo VHS/DVD recorder - a Panasonic ES35V to be precise - as the name suggests it has both functions in the same box - incredibly, this machine could not do the job for me. I say incredibly because I'm thinking its probably one of main reasons anyone would buy this type of machine - but you can't edit the tapes as you copy them! What a load of hooey. Now, I'm not suggesting anything wrong with Panasonic here, folks. I've been using Panasonic VCRs from when they first came out (was it in 1979?) and they've always worked extremely reliably - anyway, the lack of the edit feature was a major downer but probably "mea culpa" for not researching this up front - don't assume...
Bit the bullet and bought a dedicated DVD recorder - this time a Panasonic DMR-EH55 attached to an existing SJ400 Panasonic VCR - could have used the ES35V but my wife already stole that for her use elsewhere in the house. The EH55 has 160GB which is ample storage space (bit more than 640K anyway).
After cabling machines together (easy) play video in VCR, hit record on DVD and edit away. I finished up loading all the tapes on the DVD recorder (they're all still on it), carved them up a bit further and hi-speed copied them onto 8x or 16x DVDs. You just need to get everything in the sequence you want and copy as close to (but under) 2 hours worth of viewing. 2 hours is the limit if you want roughly the same quality on a standard (non Dual layer) DVD.
Quality is good and because of the hi-speed transfer I was able to make a backup copy very quickly as well.
Just do it before it's too late. The Black Stump Guides page has few more good sites for tips on Digital editing. See also the DVD section.
Happy copying!
