Recording a DVD onto VHS

[Escapay]

As an experiment, I set up my DVD/VCR with another VCR, so as to record a DVD movie to VHS (in SP, for best quality).

It worked.

But I wouldn't recommend it for 2 reason:

1. It's illegal.
2. The picture would go from very bright to very dark to very bright again. I think DVDs were made like that to keep people from making VHS copies. The audio would fluctuate with the picture as well. When it's bright, it's loud, when it's dark, it's near-whisper.

Then again, WHY would someone want a VHS of a DVD?

Escapay

[Sekaino Jasmine]

Then again, WHY would someone want a VHS of a DVD?

Escapay

That's what I was wondering!

Maybe I'll try that "experiment" sometime...it sounds educational.

[Disneykid]

The same thing happened to me when I tried it. I was trying to tape one of my DVD's to bring to school because we didn't have a DVD player in school then, and the picture kept getting darker, then lighter, then darker again. I thought it was just my VCR, but apparantly not.

[Poppins#1]

Hey you silly-billies. Ever heard of Macrovision encoding? It's a copy protection process that causes the gain control to screw up on your VCR. That's why the picture pulses light to dark.

[Rebel]

1. It's illegal.

Maybe. For your own personal use, it could be legal.

2. The picture would go from very bright to very dark to very bright again. I think DVDs were made like that to keep people from making VHS copies. The audio would fluctuate with the picture as well. When it's bright, it's loud, when it's dark, it's near-whisper.

It is called Macrovision. Not all DVDs use it, but I believe that the vast majority do. Of course there are always ways to circumvent it. For example, I used to have a VCR that ignored Macrovision. However that VCR has since died amd so now I own a DVD player that has the option of disabling Macrovision. Even if your VCR and DVD player both support Macrovision, there are ways to get around it.

Then again, WHY would someone want a VHS of a DVD?

Back when I only had one DVD player, it was sometimes useful to make a VHS copy a movie that I had on DVD so that the children could watch a movie on the VCR in one room while the adults watched a DVD in the other room.

It was also somewhat safer to have the children handle the cheap VHS copy rather than the DVD original; I have had a few CDs and DVDs damaged when children have stepped on them, thrown them against wall, or chewed on them.

Last but not least, there are some movies (talking about non-Disney movies here) that require a little bit of censorship before the youngest children can watch them.

[Disney Guru]

I have tried it before. But it isn't the best thing to do.

[AwallaceUNC]

I put the DVD in the player (which is connected to my TV in the A/V Input jacks), and then connect my Sony Digital DV camera to the A/V Output jacks on the TV, and record from the image on the TV to the Digital Camera... it bypasses the copyright inhibitor thing. Then I connect the Sony camera's A/V Output to the A/V Input on my VCR, and stick in a blank tape and record from the camera to the tape, and it works perfectly well. I don't use it for anything but my own personal use, though... and rarely, at that.

-Aaron

[ThiagoPE]

Hey you silly-billies. Ever heard of Macrovision encoding? It's a copy protection process that causes the gain control to screw up on your VCR. That's why the picture pulses light to dark.

My VCR doesn´t show these "pulses", it only show flashing lines in the NTSC mode, these lines disapper when I put the NTSC vhs signal in a PAL-M tv.

[Just Myself]

Well, who makes the DVD? The majority of Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema DVD do not use macrovision. I have a few personal copies of Warner and New Line films on VHS to watch in my room.

[wizzer]

i think it's funny that everyone is cool with this but i can tell you how to make perfect copies to dvd-r (to watch in the other room or to let the kids handle) and it would probably start some big argument. why record dvd to vcr when you can disable the macrovision and burn duplicate quality to dvd-r and ditch your vcr for good.