Do you recommend S Video or RCA Cables for VHS to DVD Dubbing?
Below is the technical explanation, but I’m speaking from first hand experience. RCA cables (more correctly known as composite cables, though everyone calls them RCA) deliver a significantly inferior picture. I can see color bands right in the center of my screen using RCA cables, whereas colors look much better and signal seems less susceptible to noise with S-Video cables. Make sure you use good S-Video cables, though, because I sometimes see a “herringbone” noise pattern on inferior cables. Don’t bother with gold-plated connectors, they really don’t improve the picture or the signal. But bottom line, if the VCR you plan to buy has an S-Video output, you should definitely use that rather than RCA for connecting to your DVD recorder or computer for dubbing. You’ll still need RCA cables for the audio, though.
Below is the technical explanation, but I’m speaking from first hand experience. RCA cables (more correctly known as composite cables, though everyone calls them RCA) deliver a significantly inferior picture. I can see color bands right in the center of my screen using RCA cables, whereas colors look much better and signal seems less susceptible to noise with S-Video cables. Make sure you use good S-Video cables, though, because I sometimes see a “herringbone” noise pattern on inferior cables. Don’t bother with gold-plated connectors, they really don’t improve the picture or the signal. But bottom line, if the VCR you plan to buy has an S-Video output, you should definitely use that rather than RCA for connecting to your DVD recorder or computer for dubbing. You’ll still need RCA cables for the audio, though. Here’s the tech explanation: Separate video, abbreviated S-Video and also known as Y/C (or erroneously, S-VHS and “super video”) is an analog video signal that carries the video d
