File size for full resolution AVI capture

[markrb]

I have been thinking for some time of capturing my laserdiscs and converting them to SVCD's. I think my hardware and storage space are now up to snuff to give this a whirl once I find a good AVI capture card.

My question is actually kind of simple and I am surprised I couldn't find mention of it in the FAQ or in a search. Am I the only one with this question?

I just wanted to know how big I should make my partition so I can do a 2 hour full resolution NTSC 720 x 480 AVI capture at 29.976 fps? I have over 320GB's of space and I can dedicate at least 100 Gb's of my RAID if I need that much.

Still have much to learn, but I really want to start trying this if I can get a decent capture card cheap enough.

Thanks,
Mark

[kempodragon]

Short answer: Create the biggest partition you possibly can

Long answer: VirtualDub lists the bitrate of 720x480, 29.97 fps, YUY2 color space as 20403 KB/s for uncompressed avi. Using Huffyuv will result in about 2.5-3.0 compression ratio for the video. To give you an idea of how long you can record, my capture drive is a 120 Gig (111 Gig formatted in ntfs) in one partition. I tested it in full resolution, uncompressed in YUY2 colorspace, 29.97 fps and audio in 44100 Khz, 16 bit stereo, pcm format. VirtualDub reported the record time as just over 1 hr, 35 min. Using Huffyuv, I got a record length of approx. 4 1/2 hrs. In other words, for your capture requirements, BIGGER IS DEFINITELY BETTER!!. Make sure your partition is dedicated strictly to capture, i.e. no system files. Also, keep it regulary defragged. Hope this helps.

[bb]

You could of course save a lot of space and processing time using MJPEG instead without noticeably sacrificing quality. I use PicVideo's MJPEG codec at quality level 19.

bb

[markrb]

kempodragon Thanks exactly what I was looking for.
Any captures will be purely a temporary file as I am going to be converting it to SVCD as soon as it's done. Then the converted files will be whisked off to a different drive. It will be a dedicated drive with no system files.
I won't need anything to record more then about two hours and I probably will use Huffy, but I am still very early in the research stage.

bb can I still convert the mjpeg files with DVD2SVCD? What format does it end up saving in?

Thanks again,
Mark

[bb]

Originally posted by markrb
bb can I still convert the mjpeg files with DVD2SVCD? What format does it end up saving in?

Yes, you can, using the AVI2SVCD mode. Using MJPEG you'll get a classic AVI container having a vids and an auds stream in it, just like any other standard AVI file (nothing special like DV type-1). The file can be opened directly in TMPGEnc or CCE, if you wish, or through AviSynth frameserving, provided that you have the MJPEG codec installed, of course.

You can work with the MJPEG AVI just as with a Huffyuv AVI, nothing special. It's more sensitive to noise, though. If you are going to use VirtualDub for capturing, you should try VirtualDub's internal denoising (in the capture menu, not the filters) with low settings. MJPEG stores each frame as a JPEG picture, so each frame is a keyframe, no delta frames. This is ideal for editing (again, just like Huffyuv).

Using MJPEG instead of Huffyuv lets you capture without frame drops even on slow machines, where Huffyuv produces drops (depends more on the HDD speed than on CPU, I guess).

I use PicVideo's MJPEG codec for all my TV caps, and I get good results. If your source is even less noisy than the output of my crappy WinTV card, then you should definitely try the MJPEG way.

BTW: A DV codec like Canopus etc. is another option some people might prefer for some reason. Needs more CPU power, but gives 5:1 compression (better than Huffyuvs 2:1 - 2.5:1). Produces artifacts as well as it uses DCT similar to MJPEG.

bb

[markrb]

So my system of an
AMD XP 2200+
512MB PC2700
2 X Maxtor 7200 RPM 80GB drive RAID Stripe One partition at 100GB
Windows XP Pro SP1

This should be OK for either Mjpeg or Huffy right?

My end result is for as good a capture as I can get. My source will be my Laserdisc player. Using the S-Video if possible.

Can I get as good of a capture with the Mjpeg card? Is it cheaper?
Cost will become an issue.

Thanks,
Mark

[bb]

Originally posted by markrb
So my system of an
AMD XP 2200+
512MB PC2700
2 X Maxtor 7200 RPM 80GB drive RAID Stripe One partition at 100GB
Windows XP Pro SP1

This should be OK for either Mjpeg or Huffy right?
Right.
My end result is for as good a capture as I can get. My source will be my Laserdisc player. Using the S-Video if possible.
Huffyuv will result in best quality as it's lossless. The question is if you want to save some time and space, and if you will notice a difference, especially with SVCD as target format.
Can I get as good of a capture with the Mjpeg card? Is it cheaper?
Cost will become an issue.
I was talking about a software MJPEG codec ($25 I think). I'm not sure whether it's the same for MJPEG as for MPEG-2 regarding the quality, but for MPEG-2 I know that the best hardware solutions are much worse than the best software encoders. If you are interested in a hardware solution, you might want to try the Canopus DV box. I heard that one's pretty good (don't know if can create MJPEG, too, but in that case I'd use DV). Some people connect the source to their DV camcorder's analogue in (if it has one). That's a cheap option, provided that you already own a camcorder.

bb

[markrb]

Ok so I guess I am a bit confused. I will need some kind of hardware to input the video. I was thinking that the input cards are specific to Mjpeg, Mpeg-1/2 or the Indeo solution. I thought they were married.
So can a Brooktree card encode as Mjpeg as long as you have the codec?
Is the Huffy Codec free is you use Vdub to capture?

Thanks,
Mark

[dar1us]

##Note to all##

with codecs like PicVideo MJPEG and HuffYUV, neither of them take up much processing power but CAN write a lot of info to the hard-disk very quickly so processor speed isn't really an issue because my Athlon XP 2000+ uses <10% cpu power when encoding on the fly 720x576 from a composite source


dar1us

[dar1us]

@markrb

Huffyuv is totally free (or have i nicked it:)

and your capturing device (if it works in VDub) can encode in what ever format you want. the only thing that makes a difference is the pixel format (ie. YUY2 or RGB)

... as I heard


dar1us

[bb]

Originally posted by markrb
So can a Brooktree card encode as Mjpeg as long as you have the codec?
Is the Huffy Codec free is you use Vdub to capture?
You can use a Brooktree based card like the Hauppauge WinTV, but that's not necessary if you want to capture from a laserdisc. It's more interesting if you want to capture analogue TV...

For your purpose all you need is a graphics card with a video in connector, ATI Radeon preferred. Use VirtualDub to capture. Check out what cables you need to connect your laserdisc to a video in (cinch).

If you don't want to spend money on a codec, then use Huffyuv: it's free (available at: guess where ;) ).

bb

[markrb]

@bb that is the problem though. I already have a video card I like and don't want to replace it right now. I would rather just get a seperate card. There has to be something like what is on these other cards in something seperate out there. It sounds like it should be cheap too.

Mark

[dar1us]

@markrb

I think you can get simple devices that plug-in via... dread the thought, USB that have only a Composite and S-Video source on them, they wont be much and you can probably pick them up at Dixons or I guess if u are in the US 'radio shack'. All you need is a simple device to get composite/s-video into your pc.


dar1us

[bb]

Hi Mark,

how's it going with your laserdisc capture?

bb