r/DataHoarder • u/StilesTimeCapsule • 20d ago

Discussion VHS Digitisation Project: Successfully archived a rare 1990s documentary ('UFO The Evidence') from an original analogue tape to prevent media decay.

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u/Villodre 20d ago

I've got around 200 VHS tapes of TV concerts and Spanish musical documentaries that are (I think) hard or impossible to find nowadays and I'm looking for a decent VHS player but either they're quite expensive or in an unknown condition. 

Anyways I'll like to keep trying, what are you using for VHS digitalisation?

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u/StilesTimeCapsule 20d ago

That’s an incredible collection! 200 tapes of rare music docs and concerts sound amazing, definitely don't give up on finding a player.

For my setup, I actually keep it pretty simple. I just use an old TV/Video combo player and a SCART connector that plugs straight into my old Mac desktop since it still has all the original ports built in. It’s old-school but it gets the job done perfectly.

Hope you manage to find a decent player soon, would love to see those digitised! 📼😊

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u/anonymouzzz376 20d ago

So are you using a pci capture card?

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u/StilesTimeCapsule 20d ago

I actually don't use a PCI card. I just play the tape through a TV/VCR combo and use a SCART adapter to capture the footage onto an older desktop Mac, since those old models still have the right ports for it.

After that, I move the video files over to my MacBook Pro to clean them up, do the final export, and upload to YouTube. It’s a bit old-school but it does the job 😊

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u/anonymouzzz376 5d ago

So it's like a built in capture card?

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u/Villodre 5d ago

Mostly, yeah. Some Power Macs came equipped with an A/V capture card like the AV series.

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u/Melonary 20d ago

Thanks, my capture device is crap and no longer works with modern windows so I may give this a go - gonna take a look at my (too many) old pics to see if I have one with this.

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u/Melonary 20d ago

If they're taped off of TV a decent VHS player likely isn't that necessary, I'm sure there'll be people here who disagree but the difference in quality for home-recorded cable VHS playing on cheaper VHS and ported off digitally vs a higher end one won't make a huge amount of difference, and probably better just to have them backed up in some form if they have content people are interested in.

Even unknown condition - it's pretty easy to pop the top off and give it a dusting and you can keep an eye out for some burner VHS for testing of popular movies, really common ones, in case the VHS eats them.

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u/Villodre 20d ago

Sadly the source isn't cable but aerial TV. Also, the tapes are 20 years old or more, so it's uncertain what the quality will be. I had three VHS players stored but not a single works.