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Originally Posted by zenith2134
I ordered an MCM 'Digital Video Stabilizer' for about 20$ just to see what it could do for my copy-protected VHS tapes. Keep in mind, I'm not digitizing or copying these tapes, I simply want to air them over my amateur NTSC channel without my old TVs brightening/darkening in unison with the AGC fluctuations caused by the Macrovision encoding.
Running the stabilizer off of a (freshly-installed by me) 9V battery since the one supplied looked like total garbage, the unit does a fine job of removing the copyguard on all tapes tried thus far. The VBI, as visible with my 1979 System 3 vertical hold control in between frames, maintains the sync pulses as normal, versus the light-and dark- strobing boxes which it contained without the unit. For instance, on my VHS copy of "Quiz Show" there was a distinct difference and the cheap MCM box worked 100%. Also on "Meet the Parents"--same situation. Not bad for the money.
However. This unit, since it isn't a proper TBC (which would cost real money), does nothing on tapes with stretch from previous VCR abuse, such as former rentals. The flagwaving is still present on badly damaged cassettes, even on a modern TV set. This is to be expected, since my VCRs do not contain any form of a skewing control.
Overall, for the money this box is definitely recommended if the copyguarding of your video library is throwing off the AGC in one or more of your TVs.
The attached pic shows the unit in my upstairs video closet, along with my Toshiba VHS deck and Philips DVD unit. It is feeding a Blonder Tongue AM-60-860 agile modulator with a freqency-specific dipole I built thanks to a helpful video on youtube. The Leader NTSC pattern gen. is there for good measure; I broadcast bars in between showings. Excuse my cellphone camera..it's dark in that room since it is also where I store my vinyl records and books.
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I have videocassettes that are at least 25 years old, which still play like new on my Panasonic PV-4022 VCR and flat-panel TV. These cassettes contain programs I taped from network broadcast TV in the '80s and '90s, long before DTV, the "500-channel universe" and everything else we take for granted today. I also have a few (very few) professionally recorded VHS videocassettes, but I don't know if they show any kind of distortion as I haven't played them yet. I would imagine they would play normally on an NTSC TV, but the Macrovision signals may cause distortion on modern flat screens. I'll have to dig out those tapes and try them, just for the ducks of it. Who knows, they may play just fine on a modern TV, even though the VCR is well over ten years old.