I don't have a Mac so I'm not sure what to say here, but I suggest if you don't get responses here to try over at Audiokarma.org. Very nice people and lots of Mac owners. Membership is free and you can post your question and get some advice. Or, maybe a Mac forum?

Thank you! I appreciate the information. I will check that out.

FYI... I have since narrowed down my options to these two convertors (still deciding), which I found on Amazon: Elgato Video Capture Device 10020840, or the Blackmagic Design H.264 Format Video Recorder (for Mac Only). The first one has tons of reviews. The second one seems to be newer on the market and may have slightly more advanced features (not sure). The first one also is much less, and the second one is about double the price.

I know this thread is a bit old...but anyhow...

Years ago I used a Miro DC10+ and a government surplus EVO-9850 that I got for a cheap price. That was the best Hi8 VTR ever made. Got very good results. The resolution figure on the DC10+ sounds low these days, but the truth is Hi8's true resolution wasn't that "Hi". There was a UK documentary shot on Hi8 in the 90s whose look on DVD amazed me, but then I remember PAL and SECAM always looked better. Especially SECAM, the first time I was in Paris in 1993 I couldn't believe it, it looked like high-def or what someone back then would have thought high-def would have looked like. They are higher resolution, lower framerate and better color. So, the DVD probably looked good because they used a top of the line Snell and Wilcox Alchemist Phase Correlation FFT to convert it to NTSC. Not because Hi8 was a good format.

So, the point of all that techno-babble that you didn't need is that the capture device _these_ days DOES NOT matter. Unless it's a real piece of junk, it will have sufficient bandwidth to capture the NTSC Hi8 signal. So get the cheaper one if its specs are full D1 which they probably are. The concern is, if your CCD-TRV98 is still working, that's an absolute miracle. So, don't spend much on the capture device, but be prepared to have someone recap (replace surface mount caps) on your Sony when it stops working. Because with the workload of transferring video to computer, it will.

This post was edited by davidrt28 on Wed, Dec 17, 14 at 1:33

Well I had never heard of the Elgato. it is surprisingly cheap: I'm amazed anybody even makes a 640X480 capture device anymore. What's a few more pixels to get D1? But like I said, that's enough for Hi8 BUT it's data rate is really low, lower than the late 1990s Miro even if you correct for the better codec! When I use MeGUI, even pegging 4 cores by using best motion search algorithms, I am sure i could not get an acceptable picture with 1.4 mbps. I'm sure I've never used less than 3 standard def. Youtube recommends 2.5 for 480p aka standard def...for capture, it's even crazier to go lower.

You could always buy the blackmagic and sell it on ebay when done. Might be better if you care about image quality, if not, just go for the Elgato.

Here is a link that might be useful: http://forum.videohelp.com/threads/366890-Capturing-Hi8-tapes-latest-advice

Oh BTW,
don't rule out getting a Hauppauge TV device that captures analog. If you happen to have clear QAM or Antenna, you can watch HD TV on your computer. I'm not sure of its official specs, but my HVR-1955 captures Hi8 about as well as the DC10+ does. They are probably phasing out analog capture, though.

This post was edited by davidrt28 on Wed, Dec 17, 14 at 1:54