Remember how I mentioned needing to digitize old tapes brought from Russia? A solution was found. Maybe it will be useful to someone, so here’s the story.
First off, it turns out you can digitize tapes for free by just visiting the local Leesburg library. They have a bunch of equipment available for free use, from engravers to 3D printers; you only pay for consumables. There are no consumables needed for tape transfer, so it’s completely free.
However, it turned out that this doesn’t work with tapes from Russia. Because in Europe it’s PAL/SECAM, and the equipment in the USA is NTSC. So, they just aren’t compatible.
Friends let me know that they have a PAL/SECAM standard VHS player and video capture equipment with HDMI. Hurray! That solved half the problem—I managed to digitize all the “big” tapes. But there were still MINIDV tapes. Technically, MINIDV is a digital format, and ostensibly PAL/SECAM/NTSC shouldn’t matter, but it turns out MINIDV cameras are still region-dependent and can only play tapes recorded in their native format.
Finding a PAL/SECAM camera in the USA was not easy, and shipping one from Europe was too pricey. So, I just went to Istanbul.
Of course, I didn’t go there just for the camera. But I did buy one. Istanbul’s market setup is very convenient. The whole city is like a market. If you need electronics, there are at least two places that sell only electronics, and there are places that sell only photo-video equipment, both new and used, and they also offer repairs. In one such place, there are three floors, each large, in another—six, but each smaller.
The lowest price for a MINIDV camera was 3,500 lira, which is roughly 100 dollars. Nobody is willing to drop even 10%. I found about 10 cameras in different places. Eventually, I managed to get a slightly flawed one (minor issue) for 2,000 lira—about 57 dollars. Samsung Duocam VP-D6550i PAL. It’s a model from 2004 (21 years ago!) with a cassette and SD cards. And it seems like all these cameras are new. I don’t know how that works—maybe the Turks have learned to restore old cameras to perfect condition, but more likely, the Chinese just never stopped making them.
As I write this post, the third tape is being copied. But it wasn’t all smooth sailing. The power supply, although it says 100-220V, does not work on 110 volts—it does not output the necessary 7.2V. I had to buy an additional camera battery charger for 10 dollars, which is universal at all markets.
For video capture, a combination of AVERMEDIA LiveGamer GC311 (thanks, Misha!) and a simple RCA to HDMI Converter is used. The AVERMEDIA software is very good—it works “like clockwork.”
The camera is quite remarkable for 2004. It has a separate lens for photos and—separately—a telescopic lens for video. There’s even a built-in flash. In short, the task is accomplished.
Hi, I'm Rauf Aliev. 