Home audio & video forum: how do you hook up a VCR to a DVD recorder w/o a cable box?

They did note the home made tapes but the tracking and more means that it won't always work. It's that simple and why I have to keep more than one player around.
Bob

My response to R. Proffitt:

"While we could dive into this down to the heads and circuits will the simple answer do? If so the answer is that some players are better than others. That's the short answer. And the long answer will do nothing to fix a player that doesn't play tapes."

This could be possible...as some brands of electronics are better than others...but this is not teh likes of Daewoo or Sansui or any other low rent brand...Philips is a well known brand. It has played various commercial tapes just fine, JUST like my Toshiba did...but again, for the life of me, I can't understand why a Toshiba VCR will play these tapes and my Philips won't...as in my mind, Philips is a better brand of electronics than Toshiba is. So reagrdless of your short or long answer, I'm not sure either would help but I do thank you.


"This sounds like the old MACROVISION copy protection. It's the pain of trying to copy old commercial tapes and we will not discuss any box or cable to fix that (forum rules!)

But it's a known issue and it's there to thwart copy from the tape to other things.

In other words it's working properly."

I specifically noted in my opening sentence in my post that these were tapes THAT I TAPED MYSELF. I am quite familiar with the Macrovision format...which would indeed cause an issue and rightfully so...if they were on COMMERCIAL tapes that I was trying to copy...unless those nasty people in Big Media snuck into my apartment and macrovisoned all of my videos while I was at work or sleeping hahaha

trust me...I could go to mnay websites and find a fix for that pesty macrovision problem...so I most certainly don't neec any one informing me of any forum rules for something I wasn't even asking about! hahaha

so in other words...no, my dvd recorder/VCR is NOT working properly...but I do thank you for your lack of help and assuming you know what you're talking about when you don't have the slighest idea.

As to those names, I've had good and bad experiences with that. As to Macrovision there was a few recorders the applied Macrovision as they made tapes. Nasty units that didn't fair well in retail but worth noting.


Sorry to have upset you. I want to be honest and not dive into areas that won't help except to explain how things work.

Bottom line? It's not working proper so you return it as defective because any trips to their repair shop is 99% of the time a waste of your time.

You did write the tapes did play in some other player which is your best clue this player is not well.

Bob

in response to 3coursedinner:

the only hook up I have involves the main cable wire that is coming from outside and into my apartment, by which I then put into the "IN" port where it says "ANTENNA" on the back of the Philips combo unit.

As far as the ages of the Toshiba VCR and the Philips combo unit, the Toshiba is proably close to 8 years old if not more but still works like a charm...and in my honest opinion, probably one of the last stand alone VCR's made before they became only a part of combo units. The Philips combo unit itself is only about 2 years old and has mostly seen the DVD side of it used way more than the VHS side, though I have used it in the past on ocassion.

Not sure if you and I could communicate via email...and I could take pics of the back of both the Toshiba and the Philips units, but I have the current hook up situation as this:

I have the white and yellow composite cables plugged into the "OUT" ports in the back of the Philips combo unit and plugging those in the IN ports on the back of my television. Having the connection set up this way, I am able to view VHS or DVD, record VHS or DVD, or watch TV. I have several other composite cables that I have tried plugging in in every conceivable way between the Toshiba, the Philips and the TV that I can think of with the assistance of eHow to no success.

Ideally, I would just love to have a picture on my TV of the VHS that I want to copy onto DVD playing from my Toshiba, have that tape to DVD from my Philips. I'm not concerned about watching or losing any cable signal while this is going on.


Thanks for the helpful hints 3coursedinner...I will read over what you wrote and see if I can ultilize them. I SOOOOO want to avoid purchasing another DVD recorder, let alone a stand alone one, if I don't have to, though I think in the end I might have to. My father purchased the Philips for me 2 years ago for almost $200 and I really want to give it a go on this before I totally give up and purchase a stand alone DVD recorder.

I tried adjusting the tracking as well to no success. I had to adjust the tracking in some way on the Toshiba, but it played beautifully after I did so...however, when it came to the Philips, adjusting the tracking did nothing but make the situation worse, not better. I have NEVER encountered such a tracking problem on any VHS I have ever used that could not be resolved. I have used the GO Video VHS duplicating decks in the 90's and never had a problem...I've used various stand alone VCR's in the past 20 years..and every tracking issue that could be resolved...was...but the VHS side of the Philips seems to be the most stubborn VHS related thing I have ever come across!!! I've read complaints on this Philips model...but it was always on the DVD side, NEVER the VHS one. Ugh!!!

l me know if I'm correct. You have no other connections other than the coax coming into the house or apt or whatever. Also, does the TV have audio/video (rca jacks)?
Do you have any RCA cables laying around or a short length of coax? If not, you're not going to be able to do what you want. You'll have to spend a bit of money on a length of coax or rca cables to try any alternatives I've mentioned.

Hi Dan-

Wow, that's super strange IME. If anything, it's the DVD recording side which will be much, much pickier as far as media brand is concerned. We all know what a "lovely" consistent product the DVD recording medium is (LOL), let alone when you involved a PC burner.

My experience with blank, VHS tape anyway has always been, insert blank, record content, and play it back later wherever, whenever. I can't think of a single instance where I couldn't play back what I had taped elsewhere, or received such a recording on VHS from a friend. Even some of the 'el cheapo' bulk tapes always seemed to work. The most common issue people have are recordings on one player using the SLP setting, which leads to poor quality results and incompatibility with other players sometimes. SP & EP generally work the best IME. I believe most commercial content is recorded in SP mode for that reason too.

-Pedro

Yes, I agree that tapes will play on other machines, but from my experience, things changes with age on the decks. Maybe the VHS heads came out of adjustment. For a couple of years, shorty after VHS Hi-FI format was established, I used VHS tapes to record and save music (kind of like a mastering format). These tapes were mostly recorded on a Mitsubishi deck. Two years later, I tried playing them on a Sony and JVC deck, and all tapes had a terrible time keeping accurate tracking. Minor tracking changes may not be something you notice all that much in video, but audio was so picky it was unusable. And yes, I agree about the DVD recording decks being horrible products. I've never found one that really worked as I wanted. This is why when I had VHS tapes that I wanted on DVD, I used a Canopus Analog-to-Digital converter and ingested the tapes into my Mac and created DVDs. The Canopus paid for itself after trying two DVD recorders that didn't work.

Anyways, back to recording, I'm stumped as to the problems with Video-Out recording into Video-In.