VHS to VHS copy trouble

[Scottie]

Hello everyone,

My first attempts at transferring from VHS to VHS have been met with ill fated omens. Every time I have tried to make the copy, something has gone wrong. Either the image doesn't appear on my tv tests as the signal moves from one player to the next, or the recording falls into disarray once a signal is produced. I have tried using coaxial, RCA, and combination of of the two in order to create the best image, but nothing is working. I have tried sending the signal from box A to box B and vice versa, all with no success. Even my attempts at sending the signal to a VCR/TV combo set from a regular VCR does not work. I need help.

Here is where the biggest problem lies: once I get a good signal where I can send the video from box A to box B and it appears on TV C crystal  clear, when I press the record button on box B, the image collapses. It fades, gets jumbled, regresses into black and white, loses sound quality, and altogether falls to pieces. Now, as I am watching this happen, I can press the STOP record button on box B and watch everything immediately return to normal. But then I press record again, and the same thing happens. I want to know what is going on. Why does the record button have this sort of an effect on the image quality being recorded? When this is happening, I am using RCA out from box A to RCA in on box B, which is then sent via coaxial from box B to TV C. The original tape is in box A, while the blank is in box B. At this point my VCR knowledge is exhausted. I am completely baffled by this and am about to go crazy. I believe my heads are clean, and both VCRs are relatively new (the oldest being only 3 years old).

HELP!!!

-Scottie H.

[Menard]

Somewhere you are getting feedback. Try recording straight from one VCR to the other without a monitor and then test the recorded tape. The tape you are trying to record may have copyguard as well. Have you tried a different tape?

[Scottie]

I have been told VHS tapes are nearly impossible to copyguard, and I have checked over the tape to determine if any important things have been covered with any materials. Is copyguarding done in the electromagnetic recording process? Plus, I have tried another tape, and it fails as well.

Feedback you say..... I have been trying to do the copying under a large mass of wires and electronics from an HD-TV, box, speakers, amps, etc.... May that be the cause?

[Mr_Vindictive]

I've tried this with DVDs before but never with VHS.  Before I bought a DVD+-R drive for my PC (greatest invention EVER), I tried copying from a DVD player to VCR.  It's damn near impossible.  I constantly ran into the same thing as you mention with your VCR to VCR, Scottie.  

The picture would fade to black and then back again and the sound would fade in and out.  I finally narrowed it down to some type of copy protection on the disc.  I know they do the same thing for VHS as well.

[Menard]

Feedback can easily be caused by other components and wires. It is best to separate the wires from the others. Although they may appear fine when playing, leaving all the wires together, recording is a different matter and is more susceptible to interference.

Copyguard started with VHS tapes. NTSC standards, which are used in the states for broadcast puposes, separates the signal into lines of resolution based on a double-scan. Rather than getting into a breakdown of the lines of resolution, lets just say that the majority of the lines are used to for the picture while there are a limited number of black lines used for sychronization (if your horizontal is off, you can see these as the black bars going down your screen). Since the synchronization lines do not normally show on the screen, it is here where the copyguard signal is placed (I believe on line 20, but don't quote me). As the television does not normally show the line, the most effect you will get is a small jittering at the bottom or top of the screen. However, a VCR does record the line and it will cause interference across the other lines of resolution.

[odinn7]

The best way to test this and see if you are trying to copy tapes with copyguard on them would be to try and copy a tape that you yourself have made. This could be something that you taped from the tv or shot in a video camera. Try to copy that and if it works, then it's not interference but most likely a form of copyguard.

[Menard]

Good suggestion.