Weird Real VCR to Marvel BOB Problems, Please read.

[Brian Ellis]

Phire

1. My guess is that your friend's VCR on which he recorded it has had a knock, misaligning the heads slightly, just sufficient to get tracking errors on your machine.

2. If your VCR (nothing on the computer) does not have sufficient tracking adjustment to stop the problem, then you will not get round the problem with your set-up.

3. If you had a friend record it, e.g. from tape to tape, then Macrovision protection probably does not enter into it. It would require more than two VCRs to get round that without knowledge.

4. You can roughly check the tracking of your own machine: disable auto-tracking and put the manual tracking control about half-way along. If your machine is OK, it should play most modern commercially produced tapes from reliable sources without further adjustment (you may find the odd one that does not). If they don't, then it is your machine that is playing up.

5. Be aware that TV sets are more tolerant of poor tracking than computer capture.

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Brian (the terrible)



[This message has been edited by Brian Ellis (edited 17 March 2000).]

[Phire]

Unfourtunatly there is 1 tape in which the tracking utility almost doesn't help at all, although another tape I have which does get distortions puts the tracking utility to good use.. Except instead of having the bending on all the time at the top, it flickers from time to time.. With greenish discoloration too. Now my question is if another VCR would make a difference in this matter.. Or am I stuck like this?

[Brian Ellis]

Phire

If the tape is recorded with badly aligned heads, you're stuck with it. If its your VCR that has its tracking out-of-tolerance, then you need to get it seen to or replaced. I would have thought that all the foregoing posts would have made that obvious.


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Brian (the terrible)

[Tinnes]

Ok so if it is the tracking then why does it do it on some but not others. It doesn't make sense. Here is a screen shot I took when it was REALLY BAD.

[Phire]

"If the tape is recorded with badly aligned heads, you're stuck with it."

Assuming Tinnes is using a retail tape of the Matrix, this would rule that out right? I would assume retail tapes wouldn't be recorded badly.

Also a note about the tracking on my VCR.. I actually can't find a tracking option on it so I guess its working automatically. As I said before no distortions ever appear like this on the TV.

Tinnes is there another VCR you have in the house that you can test the tape with? Unfourtunatly I don't have another one in the house. And could you also manually fiddle around with the tracking on your VCR if its possible to see if it makes a difference?

[Phire]

I went around sites reading about Macrovision and the protection schemes it uses seem to somewhat fit the problems I have.. So maybe this is a Macrovision problem? but PC-VCR doesnt report it as Macrovision.. So now my question is if i got the crack for Macrovision would it be able to supress the video signal distortions its able to do? Or is the macrovision crack just so it allows u to record? Cause i read it can do video distortions, would the vcr have to be modified to disable those sort of things?

[smitty]

Your problem is NOT macrovision , it is a problem with either the recording vcr or the playback vcr.Try substituting as per previous posts and let us know the results.
smitty

[Tinnes]

1. Ok I was using a retail version of the Matrix.

2. Unfortunally I don't have another VCR to test it with.

3. I fiddled with the tracking on my VCR but it did nothing.

4. I already have the Macrovision crack installed and so that will not help. It could be like you said though and the crack does not disable the video distortions only the ability to record.

Anyway I hope we do find away round this. =)

[Phire]

I went out today and bought a 200$ VCR, Made no difference at all. Tried manual tracking on it, made no difference at all. Could it be macrovision? I don't know.. Obviously its not the tape becuase Tinnes' Matrix tape is retail, i doubt a retail tape would be recorded wrongly. I believe this is some sort of protection.

[Rick6612]

Hi Phire,

Take a look at http://www.videoguys.com/sima.htm. One of those Sima copy guard eliminator gizmos ought to solve your problem.

Rick

[smitty]

Did you guys try replacing the cables?(Video)
smitty

[Tinnes]

OK Rick I think that you miss typed something because the link above doesn't exist. I went to the root Video guys main page and I couldn't find anything to do with "Sima" or copy protection tools. Perhapps I didn't look hard enough.

Smitty I use composite cables I have not tried SCART from VCR to S-Video on Marvel because I couldn't find a cable like that. How about you Phire?

[Phire]

It's definitely not a cable problem since it doesnt happen on all tapes. I think i've narrowed it down to being macrovision protection. Tinnes, the link accidentally had a peroid at the end of it, so just remove the "." at the end of sima.html and it will direct you to the page. I think this will fix our problems, i've read the Macrovision FAQ and they seem to fit the description of our problems.

[Tinnes]

How stupid am I for not seeing that full stop!!!!

Ahh. They all cost money. So not really an option for me.

So we have narrowed it down to the anoying Macrovision. However the crack doesn't stop it. So what do we do? Just have to wait till someone releases another crack that does disable it?

[Phire]

The Macrovision crack can't stop these distortions I believe. There are several Macrovision protections and 1 of them happens to be one that stops recording of things completely and one that sends bad signals/pulses to the video so that it distorts it. The Macrovision crack gets rid of the recording block, I believe the only way to stop the distortion is with hardware, I don't know if its possible for software to do this. As for the pricing, yeah the best one is 150$ but the other one is 50$ which isnt TOO expensive.. It'll be a while before i get one though, if you get one before me please let me know how it turns out. I pray that this truely fixes the problem