Upconvert VHS to 1080i or 720p - Why?
The new JVC DR-MV7S DVD/VHS combo player will apparently let you upconvert your previous VHS collection to 1080i or 720p. My question is this: why? VHS is like, what, 360 lines of resolution? Who still watches VHS tapes anyway? I actually packed away my VCR a little while ago because I never used it. (Though I had to lug it out again to tape F1 races for my cousin.)
Ah well. I figure that JVC wanted to make an upconverting DVD player with a VCR built in for all those legacy tapes. Since they were using the same video circuits, they figured hey, why not upconvert the VHS tapes as well?
Still strange.
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November 30th, 2006 at 12:55 am
I have a lot of old western VHS tapes I watch over and over and do not want to invest in repurchasing these same flicks on DVD. I am thinking about purchasing an new HD television and would like to watch these on it. I did not follow your comment about the limitation of 380 lines limitation on VHS tapes does not make sense to up convert to 729p (with the advertised JVC DR-MV7S model of VCR/DVD player upconvertor). Can you please explain? Would there be “ANY” better increase in quality of the old VHS by doing this on a 1080p HD television? How much so. Marginal? Worth it? any help you may provide would be appreciated. I think you are saying the VHS is made with only 380 lines of resolution and so upgrading that can not increase the lines of resolution, therefore what does upconverting it do? How much if any difference will I see? By contrast can you tell me how many line of resolution are in a regular DVD? so upconverting it to 729p helps its picture quality by how much in comparision in this example and by way of illustration? Thank you kindly.
Tom
November 30th, 2006 at 11:34 am
A VHS tape will look better on a smaller screen, just because displaying it on a large screen will spread out the small amount of resolution available. Plus VHS doesn’t store the video in very good quality, so displaying VHS on a large screen will be a disappointment.
Anything displayed on most HDTV’s will be upscaled by the television to the television’s native resolution. The VHS deck doesn’t need to do this unless it can do a better job than the television. This is unlikely considering the low priority manufacturers put on VHS deck quality.
Upconverting just takes a signal and doubles or triples (or whatever) the existing scanlines to display it on the TV. You can’t manufacture information out of thin air, so the scaler is always stuck trying to make a 360 line image look good on a 720p or 1080p display. Some scalers are better at it than others.
If VHS is important to you, I suggest you take your deck to the store where you want to buy the TV, hook it up, and try it out. See which set performs best for you.
May 9th, 2007 at 6:15 pm
Go for it! You know how many cassettes you can buy right now at an unbelievable low price on Amazon? DVD’s will again have to wait to be part of my house! Love their conveniance, but at the prices VHS movies are right now…..go for it! Test the upconversion first though….Henning is right.