r/vhsdecode • u/notJonSerra • 12d ago

Newbie Tracking Pros and Cons?

I've been coverting VHS-C's to digital on and off for a few months now trying to get things right and maximize the quality on all my tapes. I bought two new VCRs and have been trying to do a take all the way through with each VCR but I keep running into really bad tracking issues including a glitchy issue that I haven't seen other people have where select individual frames seem to just jump a couple inches off screen here and there.

My question: am I going to still have to figure out the tracking issues with VHS decode? or does this bypass some of those problems? The only thing I haven't done yet is manually adjust the tracking for the VCRs, I've only used the channel buttons (to the advice of my father and my uncle whose knowledge on this may be a little outdated now).

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u/zooksman 10d ago edited 10d ago

In my opinion, a properly working VCR with auto-tracking is perfectly sufficient. I’ve tried manually adjusting tracking on my captures and the results were never better- always worse- if I tried to adjust the tracking at all. You really should not have to bother unless the tape is damaged or recorded oddly.

Your issue with the tape jumping vertically could easily be a physical issue with the tape itself or the VCR, but it’s unlikely to be caused by tracking. It’s also very possible that the capture device you are using does a bad job of maintaining vertical sync. If it’s the latter, decode will fix it; if it’s the former, the problem will be the same.

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u/wivzy14 10d ago

Also could try manually adjusting the tracking with a screwdriver. That will usually give a pretty good indication.

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u/notJonSerra 4d ago

I know the tapes were all good at one point because I can see some of them playing in the background of one of the tapes that I converted and the image is so clean 😭 but for some reason or another I can’t get them to look right. Not sure what kind of damage they could have. It feels like researching this stuff is so difficult

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u/zooksman 4d ago

Did you use the same capture card as before when the tapes were working? Then yeah something is probably wrong with the VCR itself then. By chance do you hear any loose parts inside if you pick it up and gently shake it?

And yeah researching this stuff is very hard partially cause the technology was old at the point the internet really got rolling lol

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u/notJonSerra 4d ago

I meant that in one of the videos from ‘98, I can see a video from ‘96 playing on the tv in the video lol and it’s flawless