🚀 go-pugleaf

barbie gee <booger@nosespam.com> wrote:

> It's a Sony DCR TRV8/TRV10.
> It has firewire, but whose computer has firewire?

> Anybody got a memory stick reader laying around?

Almost all Macs have firewire, but since you windows people still think
you need a parallel port, no surprise.

The memory stick on those are just for still pictures.

You need to use the DV port to export video out, which is 1394 (firewire
400).

My question is, how many tapes they have to dump?

The problem with most USB adapters (video to usb) is that they'll compress
on-the-fly or use a small resized window of video. The only correct way is
to use the DV into a mac, using QT Pro, it'll read in the raw data stream
(which is about 13GB an hour) then save it as that or export it out as
something else.

From there, it'll make a as-good-as the original quality on DVD or spit out
avi or mp4 versions.

I have a couple of those cameras similar, made by JVC. If they don't have a
shitload of tapes to convert, I can probably lend a hand. 

If they insist on doing it themselves, find like a used MacBook Pro, I've
tried about all of those stand-alone converters and the best of them sucked.

One thing otherwise, there were (not sure now) many vhs-to-dvd recorders
made within the last 10 years that had DV inputs, the same as the one on the
cameras (like a mini firewire port) and can take the raw data stream in also
and do dvd-on-the-fly.

But I'm telling you, I converted 1200 vhs tapes, about 100 8mm ones and a few
dozen of those DV-tape ones, you have to use the firewire out to do it right,
especially if they want those for permament storage and are planning on not
using the camera anymore.

-bruce
bje@ripco.com