CompuServe Messages

Jerry, know exactly what you mean about getting burnt on the formats. We used U-Matic for years and, on advice from a "friend", picked up on some Panasonic S-VHS decks to see what they were capable of. Did a bit of editing with them only to run into that "what's wrong with this??" problem. Of all things to happen, knocked one of the B&C connectors off the TBC while doing a dupe and noted on the freeze frame that the chroma was displaced by about four lines which was the "what's wrong" part of the signal. Got into the service manuals and discovered that they had designed an additional line of delay in the chroma path to use for noise cancellation which was not compensated for in the Y signal, resulting in a one line per field noncoincidence between the Y and C signals. That one will drive ya nuts just trying to figure out what is wrong with the picture until you figure out what is going on between the two paths <grin>. The error is cumulitave through the generations, of course. When I called their tech support number, all I could get out of them is that "the machines are operating as they were designed to", so that did it for that brand of equipment. Oh yes, did a bit of "redesigning" and got that extra line of chroma delay out of there with noticeable improvement in chroma stability and base line noise floor, but the additional noise is not objectionable and easily cleared in either a frame synchronizer or the TBC. I use those machines for sourcing when someone insists on providing S-VHS footage, but that's all <grin>. Oh yes, you are quite correct about the dropouts on both VHS and Hi-8, but I figured that Hi-8 is acceptable for acquisition. Personally, I'd rather a BetaCam for that any day. For the real work, I agree that U-Matic SP is the way to go unless you really need the "C" capabilities. The VHS machines are still acceptable for time shifting Perry Mason reruns though <grin>. Vince