Mini DV to PC Win 10

steve1500

Have a load of Mini DV's & a perfectly working JVC GR-D366EK camcorder.

Trouble is when I connect to the laptop get the error message not recognised etc. I cannot find any drivers.

Does anyone have any suggestions? Sending off for a company to do would be stupid money
TIA  

Jenni_D

https://usermanual.wiki/JVC/GRD366EK.1307348183/view ... see page 44

Any help?

[Deleted User]

Just transferred all my 20 year old MiniDV tapes from a JVC GR-DVL9500 to a PC recently, had a nightmare with it and gave up trying to connect the camera to a PC and did it another way.

First of all - what connection are you using to link the camcorder - is it USB or Firewire (iLink/DV out) connection? The USB connection can only transfer still images - not video, so even if you do find a driver it won't capture your videos.

The best way to connect the camera to a PC is with the DV out port which is Firewire - this will give you the full original digital recording at the max quality possible. Unfortunately this connection used to be on older laptops / computer 20 years but is no longer used. If you have a desktop PC, you can still buy a Firewire expansion card and connect it up that way for example but the software needed and the setup is a bit complex because it is all dated now and you won't find such an adapter for a laptop.

The other way is using a video capture card and connecting to the analogue AV out port using composite video - however this will not be the best original quality as the camera will convert the video to analogue and then your PC will convert back to digital.

So the workaround I used was buying an old Sony HDR-HXD770 digital DVD recorder from ebay for about £50 - this has the firewire digital video port that works perfectly with the JVC camera. I captured the tapes on to the built in hard disk and then burned them to DVD keeping the quality as high as possible.

I then ripped the DVD's on my PC into .mkv files using MakeMKV free software and edited them using Boilsoft Video splitter before finally uploading to my Plex server for the family to view - all done without transcoding the original format to preserve the quality.

Although a bit faffy to do, it ended up being the best solution in terms of preserving the original digital quality and didn't tie up my PC for hours on end whilst copying 40 hours of MiniDV tapes.

steve1500

Firewire to USB. 

Already read the manual thanks, just says you need the software

[Deleted User]

steve1500 said:

Firewire to USB. 

Already read the manual thanks, just says you need the software

Right, so Firewire directly to USB isn't possible - they are incompatible formats. I know you may have purchased such an adaptor or cable but my research led to the conclusion that it just won't work directly.

This was the only way I found it could be done - looked really expensive and will need Thunderbolt 3.0 to work. I do have those ports on my laptop but when I priced up all the bits it was cheaper to do it via the DVD recorder.

This video explains why Firewire to USB won't work and gives a full workaround and all the software needed to do the job.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GASIuX1mqwE

OnlyTheBestWillDo

steve1500 said:

Have a load of Mini DV's & a perfectly working JVC GR-D366EK camcorder.

Trouble is when I connect to the laptop get the error message not recognised etc. I cannot find any drivers.

Does anyone have any suggestions? Sending off for a company to do would be stupid money
TIA  

A twelve year old thread: https://web.archive.org/web/20171229012548/http://www.forums.bestbuy.com/t5/Cameras-Camcorders/Need-help-burning-minidv-to-dvd/m-p/22766

"Most video editing programs that support DV video can capture over Firewire from a MiniDV camcorder.  Windows Movie Maker includes this capability I think.  Many camcorders don't come with any MiniDV capture software, I know my old GR-DVL530U didn't.

 

You typically won't see a device detected by Windows itself when you plug in the camcorder, that's just how the Firewire camcorder interface works.

 

Once you've got capture/editing software (such as possibly WMM), you will need to start capturing with the software and then hit play on the camcorder.  The capture software might be able to start playback automatically.  You will need to rewind the tape first, of course."

As suggested, even if you find a Driver, it may even be for XP. Firewire to Firewire seems the best option for you if you have a PC at home. USB Streaming isn't your best option.

If you want to persevere; DriverScape has Drivers from 2006: https://www.driverscape.com/download/jvc-dv-camcorder
and you can likely source USB streaming Drivers from similar models. 
Notwithstanding, I advise FireWire to FireWire to be the most straightforward and highest quality way forward. 

steve1500

Trouble is, new laptops don't come with firewires. 

I thought the Firewire to USB would do the trick but as I have now discovered that is not the case 

[Deleted User]

steve1500 said:

Trouble is, new laptops don't come with firewires. 

I thought the Firewire to USB would do the trick but as I have now discovered that is not the case 

If you are around Manchester area you are welcome to pick up my Sony HDR-HXD770 to use to capture the tapes to DVD and then at least you get a hard backup of them as soon as possible - 2 of my MiniDV tapes snapped due to age and I end up doing open heart surgery to splice them back together so I could use them.

Fairly easy once they are on DVD to manipulate, just spent a few evenings ripping the DVD's then splitting the hour long tapes into relevant short video.

I have absolutely no use for the Sony now, it was bought just for this purpose and saved me £300 compared to using professional services to do the transfer. It will be going back on sale on eBay or stored in the loft as antique maybe so no qualms about letting you use it for as long as you need. I picked that specific model because it has HDMI rather than SCART so I could easily preview the videos on my TV when capturing them.

Make sure you have enough storage space - about 200GB for 40 tapes in my case.

Either way, good luck with it, I've really enjoyed watching my 20 year old memories again, surprisingly good quality for the era as well.