Preferred formats

[Stooky Bill]

When it comes to ripping sources, I understand that modern formats like DVD and Blu-ray are always preferred. However, there are old movies that were never released on those formats. I’m looking into buying a specific movie released in 1995 (over a year before DVD’s introduction), and it was released on three formats: VHS, Laserdisc and Video CD. Which one sounds the best? Technical specifications point to Laserdisc, due to having near-DVD quality provided it’s in good condition, but it’s analog. Video CD would by far be the easiest to rip: it’s already completely digital and I’d just have to throw it into my disc drive, but the quality of VCD is generally crap (unlike the analog formats, the picture is stable, free of discoloration and static, but the resolution is tiny). I’m really not even considering VHS, because it basically combines the worst features of the other two formats, being prone to analog deterioration and having relatively low picture quality even in pristine condition.

Where to go with this?

 

[Casshern2]

VCD I thought was maybe max 1500kbps bitrates. Laserdisc would be more than that, at least.

 

[SamKook]

Personally I'd go with the highest quality one without question. It's not hard to make something digital as long as you can manage to plug it into a hardware capture card(might be harder these days since most are probably hdmi only now though but there's always a way).

Can't really speak about the formats themselves since I've only ever worked with VHS between the 3 with a super cheap capture card that couldn't keep the audio in sync(pay more than 5$ for one is my recommendation) and I also never had a reason to research the technical specs for all of those but sounds like you did.