Outsmarting Sony (or, Stupid U-Matic Tricks!)

[captain18]

So, part of the reconfiguration of my edit suite/man cave has been to recable everything to use S-Video instead of composite video for the highest quality video I can get from my collection of professional and prosumer gear. This was pretty easy on the S-VHS front since that's where S-Video was developed to begin with, and my Betacam deck does S-

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Re: Great U-Matic Tricks

[captain18]

The best way to actually convert Y/C 688 to S-Video is to stalk eBay. Options include:

Y/C Plus has the YCP-688 which is a bi-directional transcoder.

Digital Processing Systems (Leitch) has two products that might do what you want as well, the DPS-210 (a transcoder) and the DPS-295 (a TBC and transcoder).

Panasonic has the UTP-2, a re-badged DPS-210 transcoder.

Prime Image has the Excel 6.5, also a TBC/Transcoder combo.

The upside to the converter is you don't need to open your VO-9850 at all. And if you get one with a built-in TBC you've killed two birds with one stone. The downside is you're taking the 3.58mHz Chroma signal, converting it to 6.88kHz, then converting it back to 3.58mHz so you have the potential for signal degradation. There's also the waiting for one of the units to actually show up and be affordable.

If you want to try the homebrew route, here's a start:

For all models, you can intercept the luminance from the dub connector. Pin 1 is Y Signal and Pin 2 is Y Ground. Unless you have a damaged dub cable lying around, you'll want to get a male locking DIN-7 connector. Try Markertek and search for "SVHS-7M".

Intercepting the chroma is going to vary per series. For the BVU-8xx series, look for TP-603 on the CD board for the C signal. For the VO-9600, according to a user on the U-Matic PAL Site you can try Pin 6 of CN113 on the VO-17 board. This would be a place to start with your 9850, I'd imagine.

The drawback to doing it this way is the horizontal timing on the Chroma will be a little off from the Luma. I run my S-Video output through a DPS-235 frame synchronizer and adjust it there so it arrives sharp and pretty at my router.

Keep in mind of course this is provided with no warranty, any modifications you make to your gear is done at your own risk. Good luck!

[passwordisfail]

[Hoping I won't get marked as spam this time.]

The JVC KM-F250 Frame Synchronizer could be another good option. The Y/C dub input and output can both be switched between S-VHS/U-Matic, and there's even component outputs. As a bonus, it claims to feature U-Matic dropout compensation.

[captain18]

This looks promising, yeah. The only thing is, it uses the locking 7-pin DIN, so in order to take advantage of S-Video output to modern gear you'd need to build an adapter.

[ext_2928138]

what is the correct name of the tbc? JVC KM-F250EG, E or other letter?
there is an Umatic Dub Converter for PAL standard?

thanks

michele