I need a nice capture device...

2006-06-10 02:45:55 pm

Um, yeah, I already checked the faqs about capturing but I didn't really find an answer to the one question I have always been wondering. Is there a nice capture device (be it USB or a card or whatever) that I could use that has nice quality (not the best but good enough for people to at least read words) and doesn't cost more than $60. Is there one out there?

Thread title:

Enhasa

Edit history:

Enhasa: 2006-06-14 07:24:16 am

2006-06-14 07:20:56 am

everybody wanna tell you the meaning of music

I can't claim to know what's best for you, but I would try the low end of the Hauppauge WinTV line (Go, PCI, Radio, USB). Also, USB lag sucks, so unless you have a laptop or something, get PCI if you can (if it doesn't say USB, it's PCI).

The bundled software and drivers are decent by capture card software standards, which translates to: not very good. But that's irrelevant. Get DScaler to watch/play/record, and btwincap for a WDM capture driver (so you can use it in VirtualDub etc). This means that you shouldn't even bother installing drivers or even touching the CD that comes with the card.

If you go this route, I have DScaler settings I can share with you, that work well for me. You might have to turn the gamma (brightness) down on the card though apparently.

Oh, and don't worry about the difference in cards, unless we're talking about a $50 card vs a $500 one. Quality differences depend much more on the source and how you encode.

Final thing to add: unless you are very comfortable with computers and are interested in A/V type matters, it would probably save a lot of time and effort to record with a VCR or DVD recorder and send to Nate.

I can't claim to know what's best for you, but I would try the low end of the Hauppauge WinTV line (Go, PCI, Radio, USB). Also, USB lag sucks, so unless you have a laptop or something, get PCI if you can (if it doesn't say USB, it's PCI).

The bundled software and drivers are decent by capture card software standards, which translates to: not very good. But that's irrelevant. Get DScaler to watch/play/record, and btwincap for a WDM capture driver (so you can use it in VirtualDub etc). This means that you shouldn't even bother installing drivers or even touching the CD that comes with the card.

If you go this route, I have DScaler settings I can share with you, that work well for me. You might have to turn the gamma (brightness) down on the card though apparently.

Oh, and don't worry about the difference in cards, unless we're talking about a $50 card vs a $500 one. Quality differences depend much more on the source and how you encode.

Final thing to add: unless you are very comfortable with computers and are interested in A/V type matters, it would probably save a lot of time and effort to record with a VCR or DVD recorder and send to Nate.

nate

2006-06-14 11:06:50 am

Quote:

if it doesn't say USB, it's PCI

or pcix or agp.

Enhasa

2006-06-18 06:06:41 am

everybody wanna tell you the meaning of music

In general, yes. But not for the "low end of the Hauppauge WinTV line." Tongue