View Full Version : Capturing some old mini DV tapes


Brian Luce
March 29th, 2010, 03:21 AM
I have some old mini dv tapes I want to commit to DVD. They play well in camera, but once captured in 9c the audio is broken and unintelligible. Video portion is fine. It's a newish Dell i7 running Vista home edition. In the timeline and burnt to DVD it's broken, in camera it sounds fine.

Fixes?

Jeff Harper
March 29th, 2010, 01:45 PM
While likely of no use, you could try capturing with Windows Movie Maker...just to see what happens.

Allan Black
March 29th, 2010, 04:38 PM
Brian are you capturing those AVI files using firewire? .. or it might be the codec?
Cheers.

Brian Luce
March 29th, 2010, 04:49 PM
Brian are you capturing those AVI files using firewire? .. or it might be the codec?
Cheers.

Yes, by firewire. I'm worried it might just be the age of the tapes. I captured a newer tape (though it was HDV not mini DV) and the audio was fine. That wouldn't bode well for the idea of tape as archive medium. Hopefully it's me, not the tape.

Allan Black
March 29th, 2010, 04:58 PM
If it plays on your camera the tape is Ok .. but I guess it's not the camera used to shoot the tape? It's not LP speed is it?

Sometimes the signal tracking is not the same old cameras to new cameras. Check your capture settings and try another camera?
Cheers.

Graham Bernard
March 29th, 2010, 11:44 PM
If the tape was recorded LP, then Allan is right on the money. Both of the symptoms you report and the switch to another camera, not the original, makes for 2 pieces of evidence that point towards the LP-issue direction.

Grazie

Brian Luce
March 30th, 2010, 01:20 AM
I've tried it in the original cam and a newer one. Same symptom. However I tried capturing with windows movie maker or whatever it's called and it worked, so must be a Vegas issue.

So looks like Vegas 9c can smoke RED ONE footage but can't handle mini DV and chokes on JPEGS. These are strange times.

Allan Black
March 30th, 2010, 01:28 AM
Sure are .. got plans to get it onto DVD?

Cheers.

Graham Bernard
March 30th, 2010, 01:41 AM
Brian, I would have gone down the bookies and laid odds on that one - really! Well, that's worth trying to remember. Liked your "comment" about RED.

Grazie

Brian Luce
March 30th, 2010, 03:55 AM
the amazing thing is what a great job Windows Movie does, it puts in little dissolves and makes one nice big file that's easy to slice and dice.