Tangential but cool: in 1998 there were commercial, 50GB data VHS tapes.<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D-VHS" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D-VHS</a><p>about a decade after that someone asked me for help reading a crate of these tapes that had been flooded then stored in a shed for several years. Couldn't help them at all but it was an amusing diversion figuring out what the hell they had.
Really nice! In case anyone was wondering, this is for capturing and decoding the raw VHS RF signal from special test points on your VHS recorder. Some hardware hacking is required: <a href="https://github.com/oyvindln/vhs-decode/wiki/Hardware-Installation-Guide" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/oyvindln/vhs-decode/wiki/Hardware-Install...</a><p>By the way, great Japanese docudrama about the making of VHS with Toshiyuki Nishida and Ken Watanabe: <a href="https://rarefilmm.com/2020/05/hi-wa-mata-noboru-2002/" rel="nofollow">https://rarefilmm.com/2020/05/hi-wa-mata-noboru-2002/</a>
I find this stuff really interesting. It reminds me of another project where someone developed an optical scanner to capture the shapes of vinyl record tracks (without making physical contact, of course). The idea was then to "play-back" the record by simulating a needle responding to the tracks in an ideal way and then simulate the needle's transducer and finally the turntable pre-amplifier.<p>I see this project still uses an actual VHS head. I wonder if, in the future, folks will try to capture magnetic tape signal by using something like a hard drive head scanning over the top of the tape but not touching it? This could potentially retrieve signal badly damaged, unplayable tapes-- lay out a segment of tape on flat surface, scan it, repeat, until entire tape has been scanned.
Slightly off-topic, but bit related:<p>I'm about to start a project for digitalizing a bunch of recordings from a 1990s Sony Handycam for a film project run by a friend of mine. The quality doesn't have to be perfect, but I want to ensure I don't risk degrading the "tapes" themselves. Anyone know of any hardware that is up for the task? Doesn't have to be professional quality, but of course I want good results.<p>Just about to start the project so haven't had time yet to look into what hardware I need yet, maybe people here have good ideas, you usually do :)
What is it about OSS project webpages and burying any layman's explanation or context.<p>It's like they've been knee-deep in it so long, surrounded by fellow geeks they just assume everyone should know what they're talking about.
This uses high speed ADCs to capture the signal. Anyone know the bandwidth of VHS? If it's narrow enough, using a much cheaper SDR could be an option.<p>The usage of a DC blocking capacitor implies it's not baseband.
In terms of physical construction, I believe early 90s VCRs were the best. Late enough to have most of the reliability issues worked out, and before cost-saving became a priority. That said, perhaps the last designs (late 2000s?) are also alright because they were simplified to reduce assembly cost, but may be more fragile too.
I don't understand why this is better than simply doing composite or s-video to 480p HDMI with a cheap little box and capturing that?<p>It seems like this is an order of magnitude more complex and expensive.<p>Is the quality really that much better?