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Our organisation has ordered several 1000s new iPad minis for frontline staff. One of the things the management want is the ability to import analog video (ie, from a VHS) directly to the iPad (please don't ask why).

I've seen devices like this for sale: www.elgato.com/en/video/video-capture

But this device connects via USB 2, and an iPad doesn't have USB. Probably the iPad would lack the needed drivers to connect to it even if a USB converter was used.

Are there any devices which would connect directly to an iPad and allow for the import of analog video?

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None that I'm aware of. Why couldn't the iPads be updated over the air to all download the same pre-converted video? It would take much longer and be extremely redundant to perform this task in the way you describe, over and over again for each iPad, even if a device that could do this existed.

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  • Its not the same video each time. The frontline staff go to remote sites (no wifi) and need to connect to DVRs and pull video. Management has decided to buy ipads (not a good decision) and I've been asked to find a solution to connect an analog video source to an ipad.
    – Sugrue
    Mar 20, 2015 at 10:28
  • If there was something out there that was almost a solution, then we might be able to adapt it. Cost is not a problem.
    – Sugrue
    Mar 20, 2015 at 10:30
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I don't think you can record directly to the iPad, but you could do it in a 2-stage process:

  1. Record from the analog video source to an SD card. There are various screen grabbers and mobile video recorders that can record to SD cards or similar devices.

Something like this perhaps, though I'm not sure about the video codec being iPad compatible. I think it also needs external power (no battery). I've not looked extensively, and don't know exactly what your analog output is either (RCA? S-Video?)...

If you can get a converter from your analog source to HDMI (which will probably need power too), there are definitely some good options, often marketed as video game screen capture devices. I've used this one (or something very similar) and it's worked quite well, with no computer required, it records straight to SD card.

  1. Import the video files from the SD card to the iPad. For this you just need the Apple lightning-to-SD adaptor. There's also a version for the old 30-pin adaptors if you're on older iPads.
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