What kind of requirements for 704x480 30fps capture?

[MrTibs]

Presently I have a P1.4, 128 RAM, 7200 Maxtor, Matrox 400 TV capture card, Win98SE. I'm getting dropped frames. What do I need to capture w/o dropped frames. (BTW, cpu utilization is only at 50% when in full capture.)

[tuco]

what codec are you using for capture? mjpeg? huffy? I can do 704x480 mjpeg on my Athlon 650, maxtor 7200 rpm drive.

[kempodragon]

If I'm reading your specs right, you've only got one hard drive. Add a second hard drive, (not a partition), and use this one strictly for capturing. Using the system drive for capturing adds a great deal of overhead to the capturing process. A dedicated capture drive will dramatically improve the frame drop problem.

[MrTibs]

I neglected to mention my second drive. I am not using it because even though is has an RPM of 7200, its throughtput is actually lower than my main drive. I have tested various configurations but frankly it is still faster to capture to the C drive. When I do capture to the D drive, I get more frame drops... go figure.

Thanks for your suggestion though. I apprecicate the time.

[jggimi]

@MrTibs:

Is your D drive sharing the same bus as your C drive, or is it sharing a bus with a slower device such as a CD-ROM? If the latter, switch it's connection to the same bus as the C drive. (If I recall correctly, on a two device IDE/EIDE bus, the data transfer occurs at the speed of the slower device.)

[MrTibs]

You are correct. I moved my D drive to the second IDE connector on the MB but it didn't eliminate the problem. Windows has DMA checked.

I just purchased a PCI soundcard to replace the onboard. I'll give that a try tonight. (I noticed that AVI_IO doesn't drop frames when not capturing audio but Virtualdub won't even capture unless there is a sound card present so things are looking bad for the onboard sound card.)

[vhelp]

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I just purchased a PCI soundcard to replace the onboard. I'll give that a try tonight. (I noticed that AVI_IO doesn't drop frames when not capturing audio but Virtualdub won't even capture unless there is a sound card present so things are looking bad for the onboard sound card.)

Nah, i think you are missing a few things here :)
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I've ben here and done it all before. In both avi_io and vdub, I can
capture w/out audio and no frame drops. But, I did find that my main pc still drops frame due to an unknown issue that is causing me
some brain-ackes. But, that's ok, cause I have my ADVC-100, and it's the
sure cure for the blues. Still..

How are you setting up vdub's fps rate ??
It's not posted anywere on earth, but Don't set the fps in vdub's
settings. You have to set it (I call the accurate mode) in the main
window. Look down to your bottom right and when you click the fps
rate showing, select the 29.97 (as this will LOCK in your fps)
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There are also two locations for shutting off the audio. Which
one did you use ??
Perhaps the one you did you did not work for your setup.

On my main pc, I am using a Turtle Beach "Santa Cruz" card. It does a
much better job at releasing Sys Resources, while SBlive does not.
Just something to think of.

-vhelp

[MrTibs]

Thanks Vhelp.

You are everwhere.

You were right, the sound card didn't help at all.

I'll try your suggestions but I got to tell you, my AverMeadia card doesn't have this problem. When capturing with AverMedia card the CPU hovers around 5-15% not at 50% like with the Maxtor. Too bad the AverMedia's tuner is so bad.