Let's make a change...

[The Bad Guy 0]

Hopefully someone will take notice of this, because this is going to be a long rant on something that I consider very important to the future of the tape trading community at this site and various others.

 

Plain and simple, the tape trading community currently sucks. As I'm sure some of you may have noticed, most tapes being traded around are several copy generations old and were copied onto low grade six hour VHS tapes at the EP setting. Needless to say, nearly everytime a copy like this is sent out, it again is copied and traded, again and again until the end of time. VHS tape when copied, especially in a setting like EP, causes the quality to lessen an incredible amount every single time. Even the originals wear down significantly over a short amount of time.

 

At the current rate of things, in just a few years, most of the circulating tapes will be of far less quality than they are now. As such, here is what needs to be done:

 

1. Low generation (preferably master copies) tapes need to be located.

2. These tapes need to be transferred to DVD-R.

3. The DVD-Rs need to be copied (Digital copies are lossless) and distributed.

 

On the surface, this may sound difficult and it probably will be, though I believe it is necessary to the survival of trading of professional wrestling. I wish to point out, that this is not impossible. Here is a story that you may wish to hear:

 

Just a few years ago the Nirvana bootleg community (traders of audio and video shows) consisted mostly of high generation tapes, mp3s, and vcds. Currently, thanks to a mass organizing it is possible to locate the best circulating audio on cd-r and the best circulating video on dvd-r in an easy fashion. The way of trading that is used by that community is the same one that I would advise here. It's called B+P or Blanks and Postage and here is how it works:

 

1. Person A has a show that Person B wants.

 

2. Person B contacts Person A and asks to make a B+P trade which Person A agrees to.

 

3. Person B sends an padded mailer with a DVD-R inside it, as well as a stamped mailer for Person A to send it back in.

 

4. Person A, at no expense to himself, makes a copy of the disc and puts it back in the already stamped and addressed mailer that was included.

 

5. Person A and Person B now both have the same show without any quality loss and at minimal expense.

 

At the current moment I do not have a DVD-R/W drive or a video capture card, however, I am sure that someone here most certainly does and can help with this project. I would be willing to contribute low-generation or master copies of various shows under the condition that my tape would be returned to me and I would also receive a DVD-R of the show.

 

- Andrew "The Bad Guy" Harris

[godthedog 0]

yeah, the big problem would be actually getting a dvd burner. they're kind of expensive.

[JJMc 0]

I have a standalone DVD recorder, and I've been putting a bunch of my Colieum masters onto DVD+R, lately. I couldn't be involved in any kind of ring at this time, though. I'm only home on the weekends and I'm just too busy overall. -Jim

[Guest theoldxpac]

Trouble is, a single blank dvd costs more than a pack of blank cds or videos.

 

Then youd have to pay out for whatever you need to record them.

[Guest realsandman420]

-those stand alone dvd burners suck!!!!!! i will never do a dvd trade with someone that uses one. get a internal burner.

 

-i get blank dvd's off of ebay...100 blanks for $90.00 shipped!!!!!

 

-you would also need a good computer and video capture card. for $800.00 i got a killer computer with a mega video card....and burner. you just need to know where to shop.

 

-i would love to put my whole collection on dvd, but who has that kind of time.....lol

 

-more people should be putting their masters onto dvd!!!!!

 

i've done a few, but when you have 3000 tapes, where do you start??????

[Guest OldSkoolNWA]

realsandman420

 

what was wrong with the DVD's you got ? If someone knows what they are doing, the quality is as good as the source. I never go over the 2.5 hour setting, and I have never had a complaint. IMO using you cpu and an internal DVD burner takes waaaay too much time - a burner that hooks diectly to your VCR is the way to go (of course that's just my opinion)

 

 

http://home.comcast.net/~oldskoolnwa/index.html

[Guest realsandman420]

i had gotten some dvd's from that stand alone burners....and i couldn't rip or copy them. you can do more with them if done on the cpu. i just don't have the time to make menus or chapter stops.

 

but the dvd's i have done has come out really good.

[JJMc 0]

realsandman420

 

what was wrong with the DVD's you got ? If someone knows what they are doing, the quality is as good as the source. I never go over the 2.5 hour setting, and I have never had a complaint. IMO using you cpu and an internal DVD burner takes waaaay too much time - a burner that hooks diectly to your VCR is the way to go (of course that's just my opinion)

 

 

http://home.comcast.net/~oldskoolnwa/index.html

I guess it all depends. If you're just converting from VHS, then a standalone is ok IMO. I don't want to go near an internal burner...just seems like too much work. Plus my capture card is terrible. -JM

[Guest OldSkoolNWA]

I know its a pain when I want to capture and convert a video to VCD/SVCD - so I cant imagine it would be any easier, or take any less time (about 2 hours for every hour of video) to cap and convert to DVD - plus you have dropped frames and uneven audio to worry about, NO THANKS, I will stick with my DVD recorder.

 

 

http://home.comcast.net/~oldskoolnwa/index.html

[Guest BobBarnett]

I love my Panasonic E80H-and the 2:40 videos in flex mode look great-if the source tapes look great.

I'm getting a second recorder next week.

[Matt Young 0]

Hey look, you actually posted. Wow. Great topic, cuz. This must have been right before you got your burner. As you know, I plan on getting a new computer with a DVD burner ASAP, and I agree with pretty much everything you said here. DVD burners and recordable media are getting down to a reasonable price these days, and although DVD-Rs may not be as cheap as tapes (yet), the huge jump in quality makes them well worth it in my opinion. Also, DVDs take up much less space than tapes, and as you and I both know from our decent sized tape collections, those things accumulate quite rapidly. Plus, people who have the know-how can add in extras and stuff like that if they wish, thereby creating limitless possibilities for trading. I think it sounds great.

 

Oh yeah... hey Bob.