Analog capture card recomendations

[*.mp4 guy]

I'm looking for feedback on what cards have the highest NTSC composite, and coaxial (cable) video quality. I'm not concerned about bundled aplications as long as the card can play nice with virtualdub/virtualVCR or something similar. Pci interface only, no usb crap. I'm particularly interested in what cards people on the forums have personal experience with.

[Chainmax]

PixelMagic PDI Deluxe (http://www.pixelmagicsystems.com/products/pdi/pdi_deluxe.htm). It has been talked about a bit here and it's what the X0 project uses.

If that's too expensive, then I'd suggest the Compro VideoMate Ultra as I've read a few quite good comments on it and gives much better results than BT8x8-based cards as can be seen in this comparison made by Richard Berg (http://richardberg.net/WeatherMapRoundup).
The X800, which I think is a sort-of the successor to the Ultra and whose 3D Y/C supports PAL as well as NTSC, seems very interesting but I never saw any review or comments about it.

Finally, I've seen quite a few people swear by the phillips SAA7133/7134 chipset.

[*.mp4 guy]

The PDI is indeed a very high quality card, but unfortunately it doesn't support coaxial, and I'm not willing to buy two cards (not enough space in my pc, so its not really an option). The compro does look promising, I actually already took a look at richard Berg's site; what I'm really interested in is how it performs compared to ati's newish theater 650 chip, wich unfortunately is not included in the comparison.

Does anyone know which card gives better quality, theater 650 based cards or the compro?

[Seraphic-]

I owned the ATI 650 card and used with s-video most of the time. Picture is clean due to the hardware noise reduction and edge enhancement. You can also adjust sharpness, saturation, etc. And so you know, it is locked to 720x480i. Never used the other card you talked about.

[chipzoller]

I have not used the compro, but use the 650 and can tell you it is outstanding and easily the best capture card I've ever used. It's better, in my opinion, than the philips chipsets I've worked with. With the noise reduction and 3D comb filter the effects are very very good. I never use the MPEG2 encoding feature as that requires the ATI software and just capture in lossless instead.

[Chainmax]

The PDI is indeed a very high quality card, but unfortunately it doesn't support coaxial

Huh, I didn't see that. My cable comes from coaxial as well, so this would be a problem. There has to be some Coaxial -->Component/RGB/RGBS/S-Video/Composite adapter, right?


As for Ati 650 Vs Compro Ultra: no idea, but it would be interesting to see some comparisons if they are available.

[*.mp4 guy]

Huh, I didn't see that. My cable comes from coaxial as well, so this would be a problem. There has to be some Coaxial -->Component/RGB/RGBS/S-Video/Composite adapter, right?

Well, a lot of the "magic" happens in the tuner (what esentialy converts coaxial rf video to composite video), and I Imagine most devices that convert rf to something else are more geared twards convinience then quality.

@chipzoller/Seraphic-

Can the hardware noise reduction and edge enhancement, etc. be disabled, do you have any control over what the card does to the video before you get it?

[chipzoller]

Can the hardware noise reduction and edge enhancement, etc. be disabled [on the ATI 650], do you have any control over what the card does to the video before you get it?
Yes, these settings (3D comb filter & noise reduction) are adjustable via a control panel applet. I'm not sure if edge enhancement is a co-function of the noise reduction or not, but these 2 basic features are fully controllable. Note that the 3D comb filter is not applicable to an S-Video source as chroma and luma are carried on separate channels.
It's a very fine card and I've been very happy with it since I purchased it.

[FlimsyFeet]

Well, a lot of the "magic" happens in the tuner (what esentialy converts coaxial rf video to composite video), and I Imagine most devices that convert rf to something else are more geared twards convinience then quality.You could always use an external tuner and feed the composite output into the capture card inupt. I would expect tuners in VCRs or DVD recorders to be better quality than a PC card (but I suppose it depends on the build quality of the device). And they will be obsolete in a few years anyway (at least in the UK they will be).

[minaust]

What software do you use to capture with your ATI 650?

[chipzoller]

I use VirtualVCR with HuffYUV.

[minaust]

I use VirtualVCR with HuffYUV.

Interesting... How did you set up VirtualVCR? I tried it and it never would capture audio.

[chipzoller]

I capture through my sound card and not through the capture card itself. Also make sure you have the option checked to resample the audio dynamically to avoid sync. errors between captured video/audio streams.

[minaust]

I capture through my sound card and not through the capture card itself. Also make sure you have the option checked to resample the audio dynamically to avoid sync. errors between captured video/audio streams.

Thanks, I'll give that a try. I used VVCR for a couple of years as my primary capture application with previous cards, the ones with an audio jumper cable between audio out on the TV card and line in on the sound card with no problems (after I solved my HD DMA problem - it was causing dropped frames).

If the 650 has an audio out jack I just may drop back and punt. I say "if" because I have an eyesight problem and can't really tell, but I don't think it does.

I checked - it doesn't. Drat.

[The_Gronk]

This is all very interesting stuff.
Could you guys please post some pics of captured frames so that we can see what sort of quality these cards produce?

I am after a decent card for capturing PAL VHS mostly and am interested to see how well these cards handle a noisy source etc.

Has anyone in the PAL world used these any of these cards for PAL VHS capture?

[Chainmax]

I capture through my sound card and not through the capture card itself. Also make sure you have the option checked to resample the audio dynamically to avoid sync. errors between captured video/audio streams.

Does the sound card itself (i.e: X-Fi vs onboard) make any difference in the quality of the capture sound?

[Blue_MiSfit]

Yes, but it all depends on what you need. A professional sound card like the M-Audio Delta 1010LT has much better ADCs than onboard, or even a gaming card like an X-Fi.

This, along with multiple in, multiple out, and low latency design is what differentiates these products from the mainstream, and is why they cost big money!!

~Misfit

[Chainmax]

I wasn't talking about high end gear, I was thinking more along the lines of X-Fi Vs Chaintech AV710 Vs M-Audio Audiophile 2496 vs Realtek ALC883

[meRobs]

PAL quality capture from VHS.
Until recently I had been using a FireBird XE capture card from DVico, which was superb - could not fault the quality, even when capturing cable TV transmissions. Unfortunately, it has begun to misbehave and I need a replacement.

There are Canopus products with its high-quality DV converter chip. There is the PCI card ACEDvio and the cheaper stand alone boxes ADVC110 (two-way) and ADVC55 (input only). Remember that problems arise when capturing from VHS and should be cleaned up with a Time Base Corrector. I gather there is a dearer Canopus product that also Time-Base corrects.

Hope this helps.
Robin

[Blue_MiSfit]

Chainmax,

Indeed. I think if given the choice between those options you wouldn't see much difference. If you have a good (not noisy) motherboard, then the onboard should be perfectly fine. If you wanted to go with a discrete card, the M-Audio would probably have the best ADCs out of those three. I know the AV710 has a fantastic 24/192 DAC (I know, because I have one for my HTPC), but I dont know about its ADCs. X-Fi, who knows?

~MiSfit

[ChrioN]

I don't quite understand which "ATI 650" is good.
The one I found has some golden components on the PCB, and has hardware MPG encoding.
We want lossless avi here right? Also, I don't see any composite inputs.

[chipzoller]

That's the one. You'll be bypassing the hardware MPEG-2 encoding all together to capture in lossless. Those cards use the proprietary "break-out" box that should come with the card and have hook-ups for composites and S-video.

[ChrioN]

Ok, I actually bought a ATI 650 NTSC card. I thought it would work with PAL material on the composite and svideo, but it seems that it doesn't. Can anyone confirm this?

In VirtualVCR I can change source to PAL, then I get color in the video. But when I do that, only half the screen is showing video, the lower part of the screen is green.
This is how it looks like:

http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f374/ChrioN/screen.jpg

[chipzoller]

Is the source a VHS tape? If so, it may be that it has macrovision protection, in which case you'll need a video stabilizer (eBay or build your own) to remove that signal.
I've captured PAL source material with no problems.

[burfadel]

It looks as if although PAL is the input, its still trying to display it as NTSC. Depending on the hardware/software the result of this can vary.

The dead give away that this has occurred in your case is in the bottom right hand corner of that image :) NTSC is 720x480 (as shown there), PAL is 720x576!

[ChrioN]

I got it working now, with Ulead VideoStudio 9! I want it to work with VirtualVCR.

[chipzoller]

It'll work just fine. It may require tweaking of the drivers in the control panel applet it installs, or messing with the input in VVCR.

[ChrioN]

chipzoller: I can't find any applets in the controlpanel

[chipzoller]

When you installed the drivers a control panel applet should have appeared called "ATI Control Center" or something of that nature. This was the case with the 550 and I think also with the 650. But regardless, it may likely be a setting in VirtualVCR and not a driver issue.

[Chainmax]

It's interesting to see that recommendations still revolve around 8-9bit SAA713x cards. Why do you think nothing has been released with higer bitdepth decoders like the TDA8768?

By the way, has anyone tried the AVerTV Studio 509? It has a Philips SAA7135HL video decoder chip.