The VHS-C cassette will usually slide into place straight down without issues. That being said ( always a catch) some tapes may need a gentle nudge or wiggle to make them slip into place. This would save the money of sourcing for almost-obsolete equipment and setting them only to store them away after the conversion. I have a post that shows 17 different capture devices that can be used to transfer your home videos. That being said, if you have an editor already it may recognize the capture card (once plugged in) and let you capture directly to the editor. After a few seconds, the motor sounds stop, and it’s ready to be loaded and used just like a regular VHS cassette.

With this adapter, you can slot your VHS-C tape into it and pop it into a VHS player to capture video to your computer. A look at the underside shows the normal arrangement – namely, the supply reel has a hub identical to regular VHS, whereas the take-up reel is driven by a geared wheel. It just so happens I still have my Sharp VR-C2CA VHS-C adapter which I used to digitize my early VHS-C memories. This is a deluxe battery-operated (single AA) motorized unit. When no cassette is loaded, a red triangular tab protrudes from the side to prevent insertion into a VCR. Step 1 is to slide the bottom switch to allow the front door to open. The cassette is slid into the opening, which also releases the flap of the VHS-C cassette.and Hi8 audio are recorded differently than VHS. 8mm/Hi8 audio is recorded in AFM HiFi mode, while the audio on a miniDV tape is recorded at either a 12-bit or 16-bit digital format. This audio recording is done via the same heads that do the video recording.

The capture button is in the lower left area below the preview window. Before you do begin to capture anything, it will be worth your time to change the settings for the footage. Video resolution can be scaled up to 1920×1080 and the video Bit Rate increased to 25mbps (that’s a large file in layman’s terms)Inside, the flap appears to be patterned to prevent scratching the tape. There’s a leader tape on this too. The software is on CD which these days might appear outdated (certainly in computer generations). My Laptop Doesn’t Have a DVD Slot Ninety Nine percent of the time I never have trouble but I have encountered tapes that appear to catch on edges of the adapter for some odd reason. Along the gear-side, a plastic dimple is used to release the flap latch mechanism, so it can be opened normally. Note that the lid doesn’t cover the tape completely, with the tape exposed to the air on both sides. Once it’s in place, we can close the front door, which actuates the motorized system to pull the tape out of the cassette into the VHS standard position. The VHS-C casstte lid covers the gaping “hole” in the adapter when no cassette is loaded.

I took the adapter out of the vhs player, it felt unusually warm (heatwave this summer Aug/2020) - slightly difficult to get the tape out . Then the lid did not close - so presumably the plastic material had deformed. Note the bottom of the adopter is steel whereas the VHS tape cassettes are plastic (no metal bottom).Due to how VHS VCRs record and read audio, they are not equipped to read the AFM ( Audio Frequency Modulation - similar to audio for FM radio) audio recorded on an 8mm or Hi8 tape. If you have no interest in editing the footage or uploading it to the internet then the other ArcSoft ShowBiz options will be of no interest. The second option is through computer video capture as explained above. After capturing video and storing it as a digital file on your computer, you may proceed to burn it is as a DVD.