Exciting new capture card discovery

TheThrillness

Edit history:

TheThrillness: 2014-02-15 06:29:17 am

TheThrillness: 2012-06-21 05:52:40 am

2012-06-21 05:51:23 am

thethrillness.blogspot.com

Please visit my new website dedicated to hardware and software reviews: http://www.thethrillness.com

Thanks to member Tranquilite from here a great and exciting discovery was made in regards to capture cards. I know members like nate have been itching for a good 480p capture solution so this solves nearly all problems.

It's been popular belief that Micomsoft's SC-500N1 card is the best capture card out there. It can capture component, HDMI, DVI and VGA. The main selling point however is 240p RGB capture (requires Sync Strike or equivalent). It however is very expensive at £238.40... 375 dollars (Solaris Japan).

This is where Tranquilite comes in and found a clone of the card for a fraction of this cost: http://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-Express-Video-Capture-1080p/dp/tech-data/B007U5MGBE

It has recently been confirmed it can do exactly what the Micomsoft can. It's capture is pretty much perfect.

Another member here is blizzz who has the Micomsoft card and confirmed the StarTech drivers work with the Micomsoft. He has been sending screenshots over the past few weeks of the quality.

RGB PAL SNES: http://img14.imageshack.us/img14/5244/amarec20120604202402.png
Wii 480p Component: http://img443.imageshack.us/img443/3899/wiicomponentzeldai.png

The only downside to this card is no Composite or S-Video input but not bad.

Thread title:

Please visit my new website dedicated to hardware and software reviews: http://www.thethrillness.com

Thanks to member Tranquilite from here a great and exciting discovery was made in regards to capture cards. I know members like nate have been itching for a good 480p capture solution so this solves nearly all problems.

It's been popular belief that Micomsoft's SC-500N1 card is the best capture card out there. It can capture component, HDMI, DVI and VGA. The main selling point however is 240p RGB capture (requires Sync Strike or equivalent). It however is very expensive at £238.40... 375 dollars (Solaris Japan).

This is where Tranquilite comes in and found a clone of the card for a fraction of this cost: http://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-Express-Video-Capture-1080p/dp/tech-data/B007U5MGBE

It has recently been confirmed it can do exactly what the Micomsoft can. It's capture is pretty much perfect.

Another member here is blizzz who has the Micomsoft card and confirmed the StarTech drivers work with the Micomsoft. He has been sending screenshots over the past few weeks of the quality.

RGB PAL SNES: http://img14.imageshack.us/img14/5244/amarec20120604202402.png
Wii 480p Component: http://img443.imageshack.us/img443/3899/wiicomponentzeldai.png

The only downside to this card is no Composite or S-Video input but not bad.

Indec

2012-06-21 08:21:32 am

I actually just ordered one of these StarTech cards and have a bit to add to this. I don't have it in my possession yet, but I did mail StarTech asking about composite and S-Video support through the 7-pin mini-DIN socket on it and they told me "indeed it should work". According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-Video#7-pin_mini-DIN, the 7-pin input will actually fit a standard 4-pin S-Video cable. Composite I assume will just have to be connected to the proper pin, so it'd be a matter of of finding a compatible cable to get it to work. Assuming it does work properly, my concern would be how to get both audio and the composite/S-Video signals to it at the same time since I haven't been able to find a good cable solution for it yet. Worst case, there's always the option of running the audio to a soundcard's line-in.

Once I have the card I'll of course be doing tests and will let you know the results if you want, assuming nobody else gets to it before I do.

blizzz

Edit history:

blizzz: 2012-06-21 08:51:27 am

blizzz: 2012-06-21 08:49:34 am

2012-06-21 08:47:10 am

Quote from Indec:

I actually just ordered one of these StarTech cards and have a bit to add to this. I don't have it in my possession yet, but I did mail StarTech asking about composite and S-Video support through the 7-pin mini-DIN socket on it and they told me "indeed it should work". According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-Video#7-pin_mini-DIN, the 7-pin input will actually fit a standard 4-pin S-Video cable.

Connecting a S-Video cable to the 7-pin input on the SC-500N1 doesn't work. I didn't do extensive tests though, so you might have other results. Having S-Video and composite on the card would be awesome, but Micomsoft never advertised it and the StarTech card should be an exact clone (it has the same Hardware ID). StarTech also states that the card supports 1080p, which the Micomsoft doesn't. Only 1080p24, so no consoles etc that output 30 or 60 Hz.

Also note that I'm unable to get proper screenshots from my PAL SNES which shows in too much brightness and other artifacts in the SNES screenshot AnubisGI linked (most likely cable related). For a NTSC SNES / SFC you will need a cable that uses pure sync which is only sold by one person in the USA who doesn't ship to my country and hasn't responded yet to my request :/ Does anyone from US/UK want to donate one to me? Grin

Screenshot with a normal RGB cable look like this. The noise is caused by extracting the sync info from composite video (by the SyncStrike) instead of pure sync.

And here's a short video of Yoshi's Island with the same cable and software noise filtering.

Edit: I bought a Monster S-Video cable some days ago on eBay and will test the quality difference between S-Video and RGB once I've got enough time and the right RGB cable.

[quote="Indec"]I actually just ordered one of these StarTech cards and have a bit to add to this.  I don't have it in my possession yet, but I did mail StarTech asking about composite and S-Video support through the 7-pin mini-DIN socket on it and they told me "indeed it should work". According to [url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-Video#7-pin_mini-DIN[/url], the 7-pin input will actually fit a standard 4-pin S-Video cable.[/quote]

Connecting a S-Video cable to the 7-pin input on the SC-500N1 doesn't work. I didn't do extensive tests though, so you might have other results. Having S-Video and composite on the card would be awesome, but Micomsoft never advertised it and the StarTech card should be an exact clone (it has the same Hardware ID). StarTech also states that the card supports 1080p, which the Micomsoft doesn't. Only 1080p24, so no consoles etc that output 30 or 60 Hz.

Also note that I'm unable to get proper screenshots from my PAL SNES which shows in too much brightness and other artifacts in the SNES screenshot  AnubisGI linked (most likely cable related). For a NTSC SNES / SFC you will need a cable that uses pure sync which is only sold by one person in the USA who doesn't ship to my country and hasn't responded yet to my request :/ Does anyone from US/UK want to donate one to me? ;D

Screenshot with a normal RGB cable look like this. The noise is caused by extracting the sync info from composite video (by the SyncStrike)  instead of pure sync.
[img]http://img818.imageshack.us/img818/3096/kikirgb.png[/img]

And here's a short video of [url=https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3459629/videos/yoshi.mp4]Yoshi's Island[/url] with the same cable and software noise filtering.

Edit: I bought a Monster S-Video cable some days ago on eBay and will test the quality difference between S-Video and RGB once I've got enough time and the right RGB cable.

TheThrillness

2012-06-21 08:56:34 am

thethrillness.blogspot.com

Indec, that would be cool yeah but as blizzz said he tested and it failed. Wouldn't hurt to try directly from StarTech card though. Smiley

blizzz did say Micomsoft had no selection for composite or s-video but the startech driver does. There has to be some reason for StarTech to list this in the driver (blizzz also stated the StarTech has one more IC on it which may be the enablement of composite/s-video.... who knows).

All I know is I want one.

blizzz

Edit history:

blizzz: 2012-06-21 09:01:12 am

2012-06-21 09:00:27 am

Quote from AnubisGI:

Indec, that would be cool yeah but as blizzz said he tested and it failed. Wouldn't hurt to try directly from StarTech card though. Smiley

blizzz did say Micomsoft had no selection for composite or s-video but the startech driver does. There has to be some reason for StarTech to list this in the driver (blizzz also stated the StarTech has one more IC on it which may be the enablement of composite/s-video.... who knows).

All I know is I want one.

I'll try the StarTech capture program later, maybe that will help with S-Video, but I don't have high hopes. The stock picture of the StarTech card does indeed have one more IC than the picture of the Micomsoft card, but those are just stock images and the real PCBs might look different. I'll check which PCB version my card has...

Indec

2012-06-21 09:45:33 am

Hmm. That's a little discouraging the SC-500N1 doesn't seem to work with S-Video, but I also can't really say I'm surprised it didn't work with just plugging a cable straight into it. Looking around at various pinouts for the 7-pin seems to give really varying results. It seems like what each pin is for just comes down to whatever the manufacturer felt like doing at the time, so there isn't really much of a standard.

As far as testing it goes, any software that lets you actually select the composite or S-Video channel should work. I'm not familiar with the software the SC-500N1 or StarTech card comes with, but anything like VirtualDub or AmaRecTV should at least give you the option to pick the right channel if the new drivers added support for them.

As far as that NTSC SCART cable goes, are you talking about retro_console_accessories on eBay? I'd honestly be surprised if she didn't try to work something out with you. From what I've heard on another forum she's always swamped with mails, but good about helping people out once she gets to them.

Hmm.  That's a little discouraging the SC-500N1 doesn't seem to work with S-Video, but I also can't really say I'm surprised it didn't work with just plugging a cable straight into it.  Looking around at various pinouts for the 7-pin seems to give really varying results.  It seems like what each pin is for just comes down to whatever the manufacturer felt like doing at the time, so there isn't really much of a standard.

As far as testing it goes, any software that lets you actually select the composite or S-Video channel should work.  I'm not familiar with the software the SC-500N1 or StarTech card comes with, but anything like VirtualDub or AmaRecTV should at least give you the option to pick the right channel if the new drivers added support for them.

As far as that NTSC SCART cable goes, are you talking about retro_console_accessories on eBay? I'd honestly be surprised if she didn't try to work something out with you.  From what I've heard on another forum she's always swamped with mails, but good about helping people out once she gets to them.

blizzz

2012-06-21 10:09:10 am

Sometimes you only get a black screen in AmaRec when you change inputs. Opening Video Keeper solves that, but the Micomsoft Video Keeper doesn't let you select S-Video. The StarTech program might. Maybe there's some info about it in the StarTech manual.

Yes, I'm tralking about the retro_console_accessories cables. Maybe I just have to wait a few more days for a reply...

blizzz

2012-06-21 11:13:22 am

Well, that's interesting. The StarTech capture application doesn't list composite and S-Video as input.

Indec

2012-06-24 06:12:27 am

I got the card yesterday and messed around with it some, but unfortunately I didn't have a whole lot of time. I actually won't be able to do anything else with it for at least a couple of days because I'm not at home with my desktop, but I thought I'd at least share what I've checked so far.

First things first, the chipset is the same as the SC-500N1. 240p support is fantastic as expected. One thing I tested that I haven't seen mentioned anywhere else is that the cheap CVS287 RGB SCART->YUV component converter works well with it. Something odd I noticed when trying out composite video is it seems to take input from the same pins as component. So with a component video feed plugged in and software set to the composite capture pin, connecting to green gives you sync+luma, and red and blue fill in the color just like with component. A little worrying, and I haven't gotten composite working at this point, but I do have several things in mind to try out before considering it a lost cause. S-Video I haven't tested at all yet.

As far as lag goes, I saw your (blizzz's) post over on the shmup forums about that person's blog post on lag tests. What they reported feels about right from my judgement. Using graphedit and going straight from capture source->rendering was extremely responsive; MAYBE one frame of lag. Using something like AmaRecTV or Virtualdub with minimal processing felt like ~2-3 frames worth of lag to me. Aero is one of the first things I disable on a Win7 installation so I can't really comment about any difference with that.

Anyway, I'll poke at it some more once I'm back and have time. Probably do some screencaps and that sort of thing if you want.

I got the card yesterday and messed around with it some, but unfortunately I didn't have a whole lot of time.  I actually won't be able to do anything else with it for at least a couple of days because I'm not at home with my desktop, but I thought I'd at least share what I've checked so far.

First things first, the chipset is the same as the SC-500N1.  240p support is fantastic as expected.  One thing I tested that I haven't seen mentioned anywhere else is that the cheap CVS287 RGB SCART->YUV component converter works well with it.  Something odd I noticed when trying out composite video is it seems to take input from the same pins as component.  So with a component video feed plugged in and software set to the composite capture pin, connecting to green gives you sync+luma, and red and blue fill in the color just like with component.  A little worrying, and I haven't gotten composite working at this point, but I do have several things in mind to try out before considering it a lost cause.  S-Video I haven't tested at all yet.

As far as lag goes, I saw your (blizzz's) post over on the shmup forums about that person's blog post on lag tests.  What they reported feels about right from my judgement.  Using graphedit and going straight from capture source->rendering was extremely responsive; MAYBE one frame of lag.  Using something like AmaRecTV or Virtualdub with minimal processing felt like ~2-3 frames worth of lag to me.  Aero is one of the first things I disable on a Win7 installation so I can't really comment about any difference with that.

Anyway, I'll poke at it some more once I'm back and have time.  Probably do some screencaps and that sort of thing if you want.

TheThrillness

2012-06-24 08:30:45 am

thethrillness.blogspot.com

I actually think there is no need for filling this card with composite/S-Video sources now.

This is what we need: http://www.amazon.co.uk/StarTech-S-Video-Composite-Video-Capture/dp/B000O5RIWO

A rebranded GrabBee. It's more expensive than a Dazzle. I ordered it last night. Can send it back and full refund through Amazon after I test the capture quality. I have high hopes for it.

blizzz

2012-06-24 09:01:58 am

Quote from AnubisGI:

I actually think there is no need for filling this card with composite/S-Video sources now.

This is what we need: http://www.amazon.co.uk/StarTech-S-Video-Composite-Video-Capture/dp/B000O5RIWO

A rebranded GrabBee. It's more expensive than a Dazzle. I ordered it last night. Can send it back and full refund through Amazon after I test the capture quality. I have high hopes for it.

Did you find any review of it, or do you think that it must be good because the SC-500N1 clone is also sold by StarTech?

There's a Japanese USB capture device that has stunning S-Video quality: http://amalabo.blog35.fc2.com/blog-entry-195.html but I don't know where to buy that thing. There's also a device from Yuan (the original makers of the SC-500) which has a 3D noise filter.
I just tried SFC to Aver H727 with the Monster S-Video cable and the quality is not as good as on the screenshot in that blog. http://img213.imageshack.us/img213/5346/amarec20120624165716.png There's also noise in the picture which doesn't happen with my PAL SNES and the same cable. Maybe I need a better PSU for my SFC?

[quote="AnubisGI"]I actually think there is no need for filling this card with composite/S-Video sources now.

This is what we need: http://www.amazon.co.uk/StarTech-S-Video-Composite-Video-Capture/dp/B000O5RIWO

A rebranded GrabBee. It's more expensive than a Dazzle. I ordered it last night. Can send it back and full refund through Amazon after I test the capture quality. I have high hopes for it.[/quote]

Did you find any review of it, or do you think that it must be good because the SC-500N1 clone is also sold by StarTech?

There's a Japanese USB capture device that has stunning S-Video quality: http://amalabo.blog35.fc2.com/blog-entry-195.html but I don't know where to buy that thing. There's also a device from Yuan (the original makers of the SC-500) which has a 3D noise filter.
I just tried SFC to Aver H727 with the Monster S-Video cable and the quality is not as good as on the screenshot in that blog. http://img213.imageshack.us/img213/5346/amarec20120624165716.png There's also noise in the picture which doesn't happen with my PAL SNES and the same cable. Maybe I need a better PSU for my SFC?

oasiz

2012-06-24 09:30:54 am

Iha paska

Wow wow wow...
I've been drooling over micomsoft stuff for over a year now but this would be like the thing if it did.
I am hopeful that PAL stuff will work well, but they never mention those in the documents :/

Is the syncstriker enough as the cga2vga scaler is useless when it comes to scaling PAL stuff properly.
I just want to be able to capture RGB scart at PAL/NTSC rates, stuff like amiga500, MSX, SNES and so on..
Preferably in their native resolution as the scalers tend to stretch the image poorly and I don't want that.

What was the device-chain that was used with the RGB PAL SNES screencap ?

Currently I am using a BMI pro but that is only really good for 720p60 stuff.

blizzz

2012-06-24 09:34:22 am

Quote from oasiz:

What was the device-chain that was used with the RGB PAL SNES screencap ?

SNES -> RGB Cable -> Sync Strike -> SC-500N1. It records at 720x240 / 720x288 both NTSC and PAL. 288p component has wrong colours though...
But PAL won't look as good as NTSC because the image is streched to 288 lines on most games. The PAL SNES I used is modded to 60Hz.

oasiz

Edit history:

oasiz: 2012-06-24 09:40:43 am

oasiz: 2012-06-24 09:39:35 am

2012-06-24 09:39:13 am

Iha paska

That's alright. Is the wrong color thingy consistent or does it distort in areas?
PAL/NTSC lowres progressive is what I really need as scalers really screw it up. cga2vga is very noisy and loses sync randomly, and my other scaler doesn't support lowres.
Can you perhaps PM some distortion/other cap examples if you have any?
I'd really love to get a working solution for game and demoscene stuff without importing a 300e scaler from japan. Smiley

Oh, and do you input the d-sub from striker in to the card? Never really carried 15KHz RGB stuff trough that so I have no idea.

blizzz

Edit history:

blizzz: 2012-06-24 09:54:48 am

blizzz: 2012-06-24 09:54:13 am

2012-06-24 09:43:18 am

Quote from oasiz:

Oh, and do you input the d-sub from striker in to the card? Never really carried 15KHz RGB stuff trough that so I have no idea.

Oh yes, I forgot that cable. It's a normal HD15 cable connected to the included VGA to DVI adapter.

Here's a 288p screenshot (PAL Wii, RGB).

288p component (PAL Wii).

oasiz

Edit history:

oasiz: 2012-06-24 10:07:03 am

2012-06-24 10:06:39 am

Iha paska

I get pretty much the exact same result as RGB when I swap blue and red channels.
So technically it's still working.. Thanks for those, I guess I know what my next purchase will be.

Aftermath

2012-06-24 02:53:48 pm

Quits halfway

Is the 1080p capture on this 30fps or 60fps? I'm kind of on the lookout for a 1080p60 capture card.

TheThrillness

Edit history:

TheThrillness: 2012-06-24 03:05:17 pm

2012-06-24 03:03:47 pm

thethrillness.blogspot.com

Quote from blizzz:

Did you find any review of it, or do you think that it must be good because the SC-500N1 clone is also sold by StarTech?

Clone thing yeah.

Also about the USB 3d noise filter, is this the PD652 3D you are talking about?

http://www.yuan.com.tw/en/products/multimedia/multimedia_products1_2_models.htm#sdcapture

I can't find nothing either. This yuan site is very peculiar.

Aftermath, I think 24 or 30. Know card I know can do 1080p60.

blizzz

2012-06-24 03:26:15 pm

Quote from Aftermath:

Is the 1080p capture on this 30fps or 60fps? I'm kind of on the lookout for a 1080p60 capture card.

The card can only do 1080p24, no console recording.

Quote from AnubisGI:

Quote from blizzz:

Did you find any review of it, or do you think that it must be good because the SC-500N1 clone is also sold by StarTech?

Clone thing yeah.

Also about the USB 3d noise filter, is this the PD652 3D you are talking about?

http://www.yuan.com.tw/en/products/multimedia/multimedia_products1_2_models.htm#sdcapture

I can't find nothing either. This yuan site is very peculiar.

Aftermath, I think 24 or 30. Know card I know can do 1080p60.

But you know that the manufacturer is not Yuan for the USB device, right?

The Yuan SC-510N1 can do 1080p60, but there's no new info about that card. Other than that, the cheapest device that can do 1080p60 is the Blackmagic UltraStudio 3D for ~1000$ as far as I know.

TheThrillness

2012-06-24 03:46:46 pm

thethrillness.blogspot.com

Yes but what I meant is they are obviously sourcing from reputable sources of quality. We can fairly assume if a company sources this Yuan card for HD that the SD source of manufacturing will also be of a good quality. Who knows though.

We can only gain from testing it and make sure.

TheThrillness

Edit history:

TheThrillness: 2012-06-25 11:30:13 am

2012-06-25 11:26:17 am

thethrillness.blogspot.com

Quote from blizzz:

http://amalabo.blog35.fc2.com/blog-entry-195.html but I don't know where to buy that thing.

http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%82%A2%E3%82%A4%E3%83%BB%E3%82%AA%E3%83%BC%E3%83%BB%E3%83%87%E3%83%BC%E3%82%BF-GV-USB2-I-O-DATA-USB%E6%8E%A5%E7%B6%9A%E3%83%93%E3%83%87%E3%82%AA%E3%82%AD%E3%83%A3%E3%83%97%E3%83%81%E3%83%A3%E3%83%BC/dp/B00428BF1Y

?

So GV-USB2 vs PD652 3D for best capturing of SD I guess?

blizzz

2012-06-25 12:11:41 pm

Quote from AnubisGI:

So GV-USB2 vs PD652 3D for best capturing of SD I guess?

You'd have to import and test the cards yourself with the same console and cable. From the cards I know of the SC-500N1 has the best SD quality.

TheThrillness

2012-06-25 03:55:06 pm

thethrillness.blogspot.com

I meant for composite and s-video support.

Andrew_Mills

2012-06-26 03:00:50 pm

AlphaStrategyGui des.com

Nice find and only £118 in the UK at Amazon.

However, AnubisGI, how does it compare to the Aver card that you got working (and I couldn't). Better all round? Does it work fine in AmaRec? What's the driver support like and does it work with W7 64-bit?

blizzz

2012-06-26 03:08:47 pm

Quote from Andrew_Mills:

Nice find and only £118 in the UK at Amazon.

However, AnubisGI, how does it compare to the Aver card that you got working (and I couldn't). Better all round? Does it work fine in AmaRec? What's the driver support like and does it work with W7 64-bit?

AmaRecTV is made to work with the SC-500N1, the developer uses it himself. Component is a lot sharper, RGB is awesome with the right consoles and cables (+ Sync Strike) and HDMI is good too. It doesn't allow you to record HDCP protected stuff like PS3 though (which only works with the H727 because of a bug in the software). Drivers work perfectly with Win7 64bit (but so did the H727 driver for me). The only downside is that it has no composite / S-Video in.