How to Copy Family/Home Video Tapes (VHS, Betamax, Hi8, mini DV) to Digital - ElGato Video Capture

I know this is a few years old but there seems to be a resurgence in old camcorders, do not use the Elgato or DigitalNow converters. They don't deliver both fields of an interlaced video so you only really half your footage and you won't be able to interlace. Look for the I-O Data converter, it's usually like $10 cheaper than the Elgato and it delivers both fields of an interlaced video.

Verry good explanation!

pr0n hub brought me here, darn titles

I understand that hooking a camcorder with firewire will digitize the video footage automatically. it digitizes everything without much involvement of a person. is this true?

Did you know that you can adjust brightness while you are recording or watch in full screen while your recording? You left a lot of information out of your video

This thing is just as bad as the "cheap" capture devices. Ive tried it. Quality looks like crap compared to a Firewire capture device.

By any chance do you know if we can use a video capture that isn't elgato but still be using the elgato program???

Hello! My Elgato does not have PREFERENCES. How do I get this?

The Scart adapter was used for the European TVs in order to use composite outputs.

junk, it never work on me damn it.

SIMPLE INSTRUCTION: Very good video tutorial ,to show how simple it can be to capture your old camcorder tapes and capture to a PC?

Why can't I capture my own family video I took myself ,? Every time I try it tells me you can't record this video is copyright

This elgato RCA is trash with SECAM

Hi , Once I record to the Hard Drive can I transfer to a memory stick ? Thank you

I have a current generation iPad mini in my vehicle for using Apple Maps and Google maps. I need a way to connect the analog video output from my backup camera to plug into the lightning cable. There will be no analog video signal unless I go in reverse, which turns on the camera. So the iPad mini should just automatically switch to that source when I am in reverse.

will this work with elgato hd aswell?

once you have captured , how do you upscale it to HD.

I recoreded a few 5 min. Clip and my audio does not sync. How can I prevent this?

Vhs movies more free whiching in your house now days y get rid of them

Vhs movies more free whiching in your house now days everything proven people like myself are buying them offline now days no more getting out of the house now days plus people like myself are fixing broken vhs tapes with Scotch tape it starts playing again with out no problem's y get rid of vhs tapes

Very helpful video, keep it up!

Approx. how many GB for say 1 hr of vhs tape? Watching your video looks like 60 min 1 gig. Trying to determine the size of flash drive I will need for maybe 30 tapes, and maybe 120 minutes each. Have old family tapes that I will just let record to the end (not keep an eye on) and then just trim the end of blank space. Thank you kindly for any info.

there is no audio on my Elgato. How to fix it?

Hi. Thank You very much for this very good and instructive video. All is clear and well explained. Thank U for sharing this with us.

Excellent overview. Nicely done.

Really interesting video very informative. Thank you for educating me.

Hi there ,
Legato video was helpful however can you trim segments of the video ie crop or is trim only available at the beginning and end of the video?.
Thank you.

Oh god... People please don't follow this advice. El Gato cards earned the nickname "El crappo" among video community. They're better than generic 8$ USB card but they're the bottom of the barrel of usable cards. Please do not use this card for legacy analog capture. Hauppage USB live 2, gv usb2, and many other USB cards are better for the same price. A lot of examples are available at videohelp and digital faq that show how bad El Gato is (they make excellent products generally, just not for analog capture). If you're in doubt of what to buy, open a thread in video help and ask ur questions! Do not follow random advice and waste your money.

Everything is proven am buying vhs movies VCR belts VCR players cleaning tapes offline from my phone now days everything proven people don't want people having nothing now days specially that

Clear concise explanation. Will use VHS physical holder for most recent digital tapes. However have old larger tapes from an older long lost camcorder and I guess will have to try and buy an equivalent old s/h camcorder to play back these tapes and convert.

I’ve never tried egato one but I’ve used the cheaper one and ITS GARBAGE the quality is bad and the audio is delayed

What’s the camcorder used in this video?

Plz reply me ?

Sir hw to i8 file converted normal video like Mp4 avi...

Stéph Lemieux
August 5, 1996

Nice video.
I wonder if you can make a video about converting tapes from the JVC through Elgato video capture. I’m having an issue with hooking the camera to my Win laptop. Can’t seem to get the proper cables.
Thanks for any help.

Ɛ̂

thanks - very useful

I’ve used Elgato Video Capture for years and truly loved it. Unfortunately it no longer works with the new Silicon M1 or M2 Macs. Hopefully they can work out the compatibility problems. In the mean time, what would be the next best option for Mac users? Thanks.

I have over 200 VHS tapes dating back to 1986 (I went to DVD recording in 2008); and assuming my tapes are not badly degraded, the sooner I get an acceptable refurbished VHS player or recorder, I plan to turn all of my tapes into digital files. Do I risk losing too much video quality from the original if I convert all of my VHS material to DivX? I don't particularly have any use for a 10GB AVI event if it can be compressed to 2GB or smaller without losing too much visual quality.

Does connecting via S-video or RCA give better video quality?

Thanks for great video! Please specify, when digitizing VHS, the mp4 file ends up with a PAL 576 lines vertical resolution or only with a poorer NTSC 480 quality? 30 or 25?

hopefully this works for me even though my screen goes pitch black in playback mode.

Thanks in 202@ lol. Yes I bought my Video capture from Best buy, lucky they still sell it lol. Funny how fast things change . All hi8 to be put to digital files.

Thank you! My Mom passed away and I’m keen to transfer videos…does the software work with window 10? Thanks again

OBS is free

i had one of these, not this brand but a brand from best buy that i used about 10 yrs ago to transfer the same MiniDV videos to my hard drive, done lost it, can't find it but thats ok.
i was in my closet looking for something and found my Sony DCR-TRV11 MiniDV camcorder and found about 15 tapes ... Battery was dead obviously but it still works and plays back those 22 yr old tapes ...