Transferring Betamax video to digital

Life Technology
1

My mother has a load of Betamax tapes from my childhood that she would like to digitise. Professional services in the UK cost an arm and a leg, and I’m convinced I could do it myself with the right thingymajig to connect the Betamax VCR’s analogue output to my Mac, and the right software. Googling has left me more confused than before though, so I wonder if anyone here has any insight on how to make this work?

Thanks!

2

[quote=“Taffy”]My mother has a load of Betamax tapes from my childhood that she would like to digitise. Professional services in the UK cost an arm and a leg, and I’m convinced I could do it myself with the right thingymajig to connect the Betamax VCR’s analogue output to my Mac, and the right software. Googling has left me more confused than before though, so I wonder if anyone here has any insight on how to make this work?

Thanks![/quote]

Suppose those service are expensive cause it costs mainly time to do the editing.

  1. Go to Nova/3C buy one of those AverMedia TV Cards (I use the HC81 R in my Notebook which is a Express card).
    avermedia.com/avertv/Product … spx?Id=289
    On shopping.pchome.com.tw it sells for 1990 TWD.
    Also buy a S-VIDEO cable.
    You can also use it afterwards to watch DVB-T or cable TV (it supports CATV/TV/FM/NTSC/PAL)…
    See the website for what you can input.

  2. It has S-VIDEO input connect it to your tape recorder/player or whatever can read your old tapes.
    Press Rewind/then Play. Before hit the Record button in AverTV.

Check this list. All values are approximate NTSC resolutions. For PAL systems, replace “480” with “576”.
* 350×240 (250 lines at low-definition): Video CD
* 350×480 (250 lines): Umatic, Betamax, VHS, Video8
* 420×480 (300 lines): Super Betamax, Betacam (professional)
* 460×480 (330 lines): Analog Broadcast
* 590×480 (420 lines): LaserDisc, Super VHS, Hi8
* 700×480 (500 lines): Enhanced Definition Betamax
Digital formats:
* 720×480 (500 lines): DVD, miniDV, Digital8
* 720×480 (380 lines): Widescreen DVD
* 1280×720 (680 lines): Blu-ray, D-VHS
* 1440×1080 (760 lines): miniDV (high-def variant)
* 1920×1080 (1020 lines): Blu-ray, D-VHS

AverTV (an app that comes with the card) is quite decent and you can select several bitrates, resolutions, codecs for recording.

  1. Upload all videos to Youtube and share them with us :slight_smile:
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Thanks engerim, that’s very helpful.