? on old svideo cable (which one)

[Jeff Dean]

I have to dub a hi8 tape from a Sony evo-9720 using the SVIDEO out.
And I need a SVideo to rca component cable. Problem is that when I start looking online at monoprice and I see Svideo 5 pin din, 7 pin din, svideo 8 pin din, etc..
I never realized they even made different svideo cable - I guess it's been a while since I needed one.

What # svideo pin (or more importantly what Svideo to rca compenent cable) do I need for this. It's the old style svideo connection. Below is a pic of the svideo out on the back of the deck. Thanks for any help.

[Chris Hurd]

Hi Jeff,

I think this is one case where Monoprice won't have what you need.

Try this instead: Male S-Video to Male BNC cable

[Jeff Dean]

Thanks for the suggestion. It's closer but I need 3 rca component cables on the one end rather than BNC.

[Jeff Dean]

Now I'm wondering if I'm confusing how to get the best hi8 signal out of the deck.

SVIDEO to ?? (is component possible with svideo hi8)

The input on my editing system either has to be RCA single, component, composite, or firewire/usb.

Chris - with the link you provided, the cable would seem to work if I added a BNC to rca adapter on the end (which I already have). But is only 1 rca cable for video the best quality I can get out of SVIDEO?
No composite or component?

[Jeff Dean]

Thanks Chris for that website suggestion. I looked around on it and found a SVIDEO to 2 RCA (female to 2 male) a "Y/C" separator...it sends the color and brightness information on separate wires.


That looks like it will work!

[Rick L. Allen]

Originally Posted by Jeff Dean

The input on my editing system either has to be RCA single, component, composite, or firewire/usb.

You only have 2 kinds of video output. So based on the picture you posted the easiest choice is the BNC composite out to composite in of your record deck.

The much more expensive option is to get an S-Video to component transcoder.

[Ervin Farkas]

There's no point in going S-Video to component, you will gain nothing. If you don't have an S-Video capture device, get an old D8 camcorder and capture via firewire. Or use the composite connector, the BNC on your deck.

S-Video has one wire for luma and one for chroma, unlike component which has three individual colors. In composite luma and chroma are all on the same line.

I doubt you will gain anything going even S-Video... composite is just fine.

[Jon Fairhurst]

S-Video is definitely better than composite. In composite, you can get cross color and cross color artifacts that can look similar to moire. (The classic thing is waves of color on Johnny Carson's herringbone jacket.) S-Video keeps luma and chroma separate so they don't get mixed up.

Unfortunately, you can't use a cable to go from S-Video to Component. You would need an active box that demodulates the chroma.

Given that, I'd recommend using Composite. If you get waves of color on luma patterns and you want better quality, then consider finding an S-Video solution. If you don't see that artifact, then Composite is good enough.

[Gordon Hoffman]

Yes s-video is definitely better. If you can feed it into a dv deck or camera and use firewire to capture with your editing system would work. I've still got an EVO-9700 deck.

Gordon

[Jay West]

To expand on what Gordon said, I have done a lot of Hi-8 tranfers over the years. If you can, you definitely want to avoid both the BNC and the composite outputs from your deck.

The only "cable" I can recall is by Adesso. My recollection is that it cost about $40, and could take S-Video from a deck or camera to the computer via USB. My recollection is also that it had terrible reviews. I do not recall where I saw the thing discussed but it might be sold by Radio Shack or Best Buy. Maybe B&H carried it.

Evan suggested using a one of the old Sony Digital8 handycams. This can be a good suggestions. I kept/inherited a couple of them and they will play Hi8 out through firewire. About ten years ago, I used this method to ingest about 25 hours of Hi-8 tapes, You just need to find a D8 camcorder and beg, borrow or buy it. Maybe you have one or know somebody who has one sitting on a back shelf in a closet somewhere?

Better than that, however, would be using it or just about any miniDV camcorder (with an S-Video connector) as a pass-through device.. Use the EVO deck (with which you will get the best playback) and run the S-Video out to the mini-dv camcorder, then run firewire from the camcorder to the computer. You won't have tme code and will have to manually stop play and record, but that would not be a problem most NLEs that I am familiar with. If you don't already have an SD cam sitting around, maybe you know somebody who does? You don't care if the tape mechanism works (you aren't playing tapes in it), so you could use just about any old camcorder that will allow simiultaneous analog in and firewire out. My recollection was that almost every Sony and Canon miniDV camcorder with S-Vido connectors would do this. (Other brands will probably do so, as well; I'm just not familiar with them.) If you have or can borrow a miniDV camcorder, this will be a free fix. If you have to buy one, almost any miniDV cam will do since you don't care if the tape mechanism works or not because you use it as a converter.

Finally, you could look at analog-dgital video converters. I gather you have one now but that it does not have an S-Video input. I believe that Pinnacle's "Dazzle" unit can accept S-Video. It feeds to the computer via a USB 2.0 cable. That would give me pause except for my experience with another Pinnacle USB device, the Liquid Break out Box (BOB) that came with Avid Liquid 7.0. It worked pretty well as long as I had no other USB devices on that USB channel. IIRC, B&H was selling the Dazzle for $50 or so.

Roxio has a package similar to the Dazzle for about the same price but my recollection is that it gets very mixed reviews and it might not have S-Video inputs. (Is that, maybe, what you have been using?)

If you plan on doing much of the Hi-8 tansfers, you might look at replacing your current input connection to the computer with one of Grass Valley's ADVC line of analog-digital converters. These are much more solid units and software and feed to the computer via firewire, IIRC, B&H carries them and the least expensive one is about $200. That might be out of your budget, though.

[Adam Gold]

Some great ideas above. If you decide to go the old Digital8 camcorder route, just be aware that not all D8 cams will play back Hi8 (or any analog format). Check the specs carefully to be sure.

Never assume anything with Sony. If it doesn't specifically say it will do something, it won't.

[Jay West]

I never saw a Sony D8 that would not play Hi8. That does not mean there could not have been some. Always RTFM

But, again, since you've got the EVO deck, use it for playback and only use a D8 or miniDV cam for passthrough digitzation. If memory serves (and it does not always do so anymore), the EVO decks allowed you to adjust tracking and make corrections in case your Hi8 tape was recorded in LP mode or had some other peculiarity in the recording.

[Jeff Dean]

Originally Posted by Jay West

If you plan on doing much of the Hi-8 tansfers, you might look at replacing your current input connection to the computer with one of Grass Valley's ADVC line of analog-digital converters. These are much more solid units and software and feed to the computer via firewire, IIRC, B&H carries them and the least expensive one is about $200. That might be out of your budget, though.

Thanks everyone. The Information has been helpful.

Looks like I'm going with the Canopus ADVC 110