All,

Long time lurker just love reading this stuff but the people here know far more than I so I can not contribute. At any rate I have the followig question..

Basically I have an old SVHS JVC BR-S611E professional recorder and have
discovered I need a cable with a 7 pin Y/C 443 Male connector (which I understand is equivalent to S-Video) to a
standard 4 pin s-video connector to take advantage of its full
quality for ancient VHS dubs. I have been quoted some outrageous prices - basically well in excess of AUD $100 and I was wondering if anyone here knows where I might source one for something more reasonable (say $15)

Note this is not a standard S-VIDEO plug but a 7 pin female plug (on the back of the deck) that looks something like this:

|
* *
* * *
* *
|

Note: The twist lock ears on the outer shell denoted by a |.
* denote pin holes

On a separate issue I note that the JVC deck plays back old tapes (recorded 1979-1984 on a Panasonic NV8400) with a great deal of fine nose in them. I am guessing the head gap is 19 microns on the JVC and something bigger on the NV8400. I still have the NV8400 is it worth using composite video from that deck (assuming it works) or should I go the Y/C route from the JVC - which is why I am chasing the cable.

Thanks in advance for any answers - and yes I do use a TBC!

IIRC, the 7-Pin cable was called a Dub Cable in U-Ville, I don't think it is analogous to S-Video. S-Video is simply separated Y and C, with the C being at the broadcast standard frequency (3.58, 4.33). The U-Matic Dub signal was the RF directly off the heads (C @ 688KHz, or YC688) which allowed bypassing the up-down conversion steps of dubbing with composite.

Something like this, perhaps?

4-Pin Male to 7-pin Male S-Video cable (http://www.markertek.com/Cables/Video-Cables/S-Video-S-VHS-Cables/TecNec-Cables-Connectors/SV4-7M-3.xhtml)

The JVC broadcast decks use that particular 7-pin connector...not sure why as the Panasonic deck can use the 4-pin connector.