S-VHS to capture card

[Aphix]

Ok I have an old S-VHS camera I wanted to play with just to see how well it still works and wanted to know about the editing process going through a computer. What software works, what kinda of capture card to use, and anything else i should know.

[Robert Hughes]

You may be able to find a couple year old Pinnacle or Matrox card out there with SVHS inputs. Check eBay. Try to find one that has drivers for the operating system you are currently using otherwise it won't work.

[Aphix]

Does the card just need to have s-video input or does it have to be specific cards?

[Robert Hughes]

If you're having trouble finding a card with SVHS connector, just use a video capture card with analog inputs and forgo the SVHS connection. For your work it probably won't make much difference; you're not going to get pristine video from SVHS anyway, so don't worry about the difference.

[Aphix]

Ok and will Adobe Premiere work with it?

[Mike Lary]

I have a Canopus ADVC-100 that is basically one of their video cards in a metal box. You can switch between analog and digital IN, and it supports S-video, RCA and DV, in both directions. There's also a separate Audio In. I've had very good results going from VHS to DV. I've heard that analog to digital can result in quality loss depending on the card you're using because the codec is optimized for digital compression, but the Canopus codec worked very well for me. I was able to drive the box with Premier (a version or two back) on a Mac. It cost around $300 a year ago - I don't know if that model is still being made, but Canopus has a good reputation from what I've heard from other end users, so a similar model card might yield good results as well.