will Mini DV tapes created on Sony play on other brand camcorder

Ant555

Does anyone know if Mini DV tapes created in older Sony Camcorders will play fine in other brands of old camcorder? 

I dont know if MINI-DV is a standard or if manufacturers used the same tapes but had their own format.

Im thinking of transferring all my old tapes to digital format but my Sony DC35 camcorder doesnt work.  Ive spotted a few Panasonic and JVC camcorders on eBay listed far cheaper than any working Sony so im wondering if I grab one to do the transfers if they will work.

Any advice welcome.

Thanks

[Deleted User]

Yes, MiniDv format is generally interchangeable between camera brands.

There are some nuances around region (NTSC/PAL), 4:3 vs widescreen and progressive scan vs interlaced so just check those specs match your current camera.

How are you looking to digitise them?

I've did this as a lockdown project and used an old Sony RDR-HXD7700 to capture digitally using the DV port with no loss direct to the hard disk, then burned to DVD and then transferred to PC from the DVD into MKV files, all again with no loss of the original digital quality.

You will find it difficult to connect the camera directly to a PC unless you have a legacy Firewire port, so the above route is a good workaround even though there are many steps.

Ant555

Deleted_User said:

How are you looking to digitise them?

I have a Panasonic EZ27 DVD recorder that has a DV-in port to facilitate burning to DVD so I was planning on getting hold of a camera with DV out.  I would play tapes on camcorder and via DV cable to the Panasonic EZ27 copy to DVD then, once on DVD,  I can go from there.

Im hoping that process works.
Thanks for the reply

[Deleted User]

Great, yes and then MakeMKV free software app is a good way of ripping them from the DVD on to the PC.

Good luck with it, I had a lot of fun watching 20 year old videos of my kids as babies and growing up - the tapes were all in storage and like you my camera had died in the meantime so they were never going to be watched again.

I'm on with my next project, digitising 50 year old 8mm cinefilm now from my Dad's archives.

googler

You can get standalone Mini DV decks which will play back the tapes, there's no need to get a camera to do this. All you need is a playback device. 

Used Professional Sony decks seem to be going on eBay for around £150 at the moment, and there seems a healthy enough market that you could probably get one, do the transfers, then sell it again for not too much less than you paid.....

[Deleted User]

googler said:

You can get standalone Mini DV decks which will play back the tapes, there's no need to get a camera to do this. All you need is a playback device. 

Used Professional Sony decks seem to be going on eBay for around £150 at the moment, and there seems a healthy enough market that you could probably get one, do the transfers, then sell it again for not too much less than you paid.....

Have you got any links to said devices? 

I researched this for a long time during lock down and reached the same conclusion as the OP than the 2nd hand camera was not only much cheaper but more widely available.

MiniDV decks are very rare nowadays, cost £1000's and typically only available from the USA which is why I'd be really interested in seeing the Sony Professional one for £150 please?

The only ones I could find for less than £1000 don't have digital output so not worth the money at all.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/125120747629?hash=item1d21c7186d:g:cY8AAOSwIK9h8mdY

googler

Oops; spoke too soon, without enough morning coffee; the ones at £150 are in need of repair; the working ones seem to start at around £250, but are international sales with high postage ... 

Sorry, I'll try to be more awake next time, however - this Panasonic is the type of thing I think the OP needs, sold late last year for £76 ...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Panasonic-AG-DV2700-PAL-DV-Mini-DV-VCR-Digital-Video-Cassette-recording-deck-/185141953834?hash=item2b1b52052a:g:g8gAAOSwyLZhgbi4&LH_ItemCondition=3000&nma=true&si=F7%2B5yN4%2BmemuKJHBdPLwKTY1qXs%3D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

Ant555

Thanks - ive got my eye on a couple of cameras and ill see how things go - Ill get one and then once I have confirmed all my tapes are transferred and backed up then ill just try and sell everything.

Also, as luck would have it, i found my old HP TouchSmart IQ500 all-in-one computer in the loft and its got the little DV-i 1394 port on the side so I may not even have to go through the step of creating a DVD.
Just updating Windows on it now.

[Deleted User]

Ant555 said:

Thanks - ive got my eye on a couple of cameras and ill see how things go - Ill get one and then once I have confirmed all my tapes are transferred and backed up then ill just try and sell everything.

Also, as luck would have it, i found my old HP TouchSmart IQ500 all-in-one computer in the loft and its got the little DV-i 1394 port on the side so I may not even have to go through the step of creating a DVD.
Just updating Windows on it now.

Yes good shout but bear in mind the raw size will be about 15GB per 1 hour of miniDV when captured direct via 1394 which is crazy size in comparison to modern codecs considering it is 576i video. DVD from your recorder would be about 4GB per hour depending on the quality setting you use.

Make sure you have plenty of storage available and a plan to transcode them to something more sensible size wise for storing and sharing if you have a lot of tapes, .

With a h264 codec you could get them down to about 1GB /hr but don't bother doing it on the old HP, you'll need more processing power for that. It will only take 5-10 mins per hour of video on a reasonable CPU (i5 8th gen+) with Intel quick sync on a fast pass but if you have the time to run them in batches overnight with something like Handbrake then crank the encoding quality up as much as poss, maybe 2 pass to try to preserve as much of the original quality as possible.