thoughts on a decent USB 2.0 capture device?

[rt5]

I need a half-way decent USB 2.0 capture device, but not a pro one, so I can save a lot of old VHS tapes and save some of them to the hard drive. Finding what I'm looking for is more difficult than I expected it to be.

What I think a modern capture device SHOULD support is MPEG1 and MPEG2 (obviously), along with a few other newer formats like DiVX or something MPEG4-related, AND something good for editing like DV, MJPEG, or Huffyuv.

Now, what I find surprising is that there are new devices that support DivX and MPEG4, but these devices don't support an interframe or lossless format (DV, MJPEG, Huffyuv). It is obviously EASIER to compress something to DV than to even MPEG2, and chips to compress stuff to DV have been out for years.

In an ideal world, I might buy a capture device that had a TV and radio tuner and still worked hassle-free with perfectly engineered drivers. But I think I won't try to tempt fate and fly too close to the sun here. All I really need to do is save analog video to my computer.

Anyone have a device that meets all of these qualifications? I think the problem is that I'm straddling hobbyist (DivX) and pro (DV), which is a problem from a marketing point of view, not a technological one.

Here are a few devices I've looked at that do everything but an editing-friendly capture -- Dazzle Platinum (http://www.pinnaclesys.com/PublicSite/us/Products/Consumer+Products/Dazzle/Dazzle+Video+Archiving/Dazzle+Video+Creator+Platinum.htm), ADS Tech DVD Xpress DX2 (http://www.adstech.com/products/USBAV-709-EF/intro/USBAV-709_intro.asp?pid=USBAV-709-EF), CTX MD002 DVD Studio Xtra (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814144702)

The Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS Video Editor (http://www.soundblaster.com/products/product.asp?category=1&subcategory=204&product=11226) looks like it could produce some decent video and produces DV but only MPEG 1 and 2. It is also overkill, serving as a sound device (and amp!) and USB hub. That means overpriced + lots of new drivers (and it supposedly heats up like a stove).

In addition to the Dazzle Platinum, Pinnacle also has a couple of semi-pro devices that are available with their video product. Some (or all?) of these permit capture to DV as well as I think MPEG 1 and 2 although it's not clear that they do much of that encoding in hardware. There are some other devices out there that don't do hardware encoding either. Since I have a fast new laptop, maybe that would give me more flexibility? However, it doesn't seem like nearly as elegant a solution -- and I imagine a hardware-based device being more stable and consistent especially over a USB connection.

Finally, I did look at some of the TV tuner / DVR devices out there. Most of those either do MPEG2 only or have no hardware encoding at all. (It would be nice if devices let you choose between hardware-encoding and a straight stream for software encoding, but few seem to.) These also add TV and DVR software of varying quality and reliability, and that could complicate things. (Examples: Hauuppuage WinTV PVR2 (http://www.hauppauge.com/html/wintvpvrusb2_datasheet.htm), Leadtek products (http://www.leadtek.com/multimedia.html), Diamond Xtreme TV (http://www.diamondmm.com/allmce.php).)

There's a Turtle Beach device that is supposed to be good but consumes enormous amounts of hard drive space (uncompressed video?). This is a laptop so I'd like to avoid that route. (It also adds another step when encoding, which is necessary for those of us who don't have 50 TB of storage sitting around for uncompressed video.)

One other difference between the TV devices and most of the straight video capture devices is that most of the tuners require a power adapter whereas most of the video capture ones don't.

Pinnacle and ADS Tech get inconsistent reviews for most of their products, but the reviews I've seen for the Dazzle Platinum and the DVD Xpress DX2 have been good.

Still, after a pretty thorough search I didn't find a product that has what to me are the obvious features to include. Maybe someone else has found it, or has some insights on the products I mentioned or on whether I'm really looking for the right thing.

Thanks for your help. Maybe the title of this thread shouldn't have a question mark after it since I obviously added a few thoughts of my own... :) But I'm still open to suggestions.


p.s. I was planning to buy this thing a few days ago. I registered on here but had to wait 5 (!) days before posting. I have never had to wait 5 days before posting, and it left a bad impression. I think the 5 day rule is excessive and there is probably a better way. However, I will say that this site and forum have turned into a great resource for this sort of thing.

[nfm]

Welcome to the forum @rt5

I can see that you've done nice research, I too started to look for a capture card. Many will tell you that THEATER™ 550 PRO
is currently the best, and I would agree on that, you can check out anandtech's review. What I'm looking for is THEATER™ 650 PRO (http://www.ati.com/products/theater650pro/index.html). I heard that it was supposed to come up in July, but none of the online shops have them. I'm waiting for that card, if it doesn't come up in upcoming month then I'll buy THEATER™ 550 PRO card.

[rt5]

Heh. I guess we'll have to build our own hardware. Actually you're more into the innards than me. I don't know anything about the chips used although I assume there is some overlap with the stuff I mentioned. I'm not sure how many of them use single-chip solutions vs. an encoder plus a filter, etc. I think some of the newer products are supposed to produce decent video, especially for the price.

One company I didn't mention is Plextor. But their products seem to have the same flaw -- at least what I consider to be a flaw. They will encode to MPEG1/2/4, the INTERframe compression formats, but not something like DV, which is better for video editing mainly because the compression of Frames B, C, and D don't depend on the content or compression of Frame A. (This slows things down when editing, and reduces someone's ability to edit without loss of quality.)

I'm probably being too selective here, since I won't be selling the finished product to make a living or anything. I just like buying stuff that will suit all my needs.

I've seen lists of what DVD players use what chips. (Now that I think about it, I believe I saw them right here on this forum. :cool: ) Is there a list of what products use what encoders -- especially video capture devices -- ?

I'll probably have to compromise. It seems that life makes you do that sometimes. Not sure why.


p.s. This is off-topic but I got a new computer not too long ago and got Easy Media Creator 8 with it. It's not installed and I'm wondering whether this is a useful tool for burning and encoding or just a big bloated mess. Most of what it can do I can already do but maybe there's a good reason to use it? (It seems OK but geared for the lowest common denominator and it's a GB of space I could put to other use.)

[il Canoista]

One company I didn't mention is Plextor. But their products seem to have the same flaw -- at least what I consider to be a flaw. They will encode to MPEG1/2/4, the INTERframe compression formats, but not something like DV, which is better for video editing mainly because the compression of Frames B, C, and D don't depend on the content or compression of Frame A. (This slows things down when editing, and reduces someone's ability to edit without loss of quality.)

I think that this problem can be solved somehow with Plextor Convertx. If you use this software http://www.plextor.com/english/support/M402GoCapInt.htm
you can set the GOP structure to "Intraframes only", so each frame is indipendent.
Since the Intraframes are coded as jpeg images, you end up with a mjpeg capture, with bitrates up to 9,8 Mbit/s. Of course, this kind of encoding is not DVD-compliant...
I think that capture devices from other manufacturer have similar options too.

[urvieh]

I'm working with the Plex PVR TV402U. It does have some problems with a/v synch. of mpeg-2 recordings every now and then, but the quality as such is good. The other recording format options are mpeg-1, DivX 5 and MS mpeg-4, which looks a bit softer than the DivX alternative. I've also found mjpeg to select, but the stream does not seem to be flawless. I must admit I haven't dealt with this format very much.

If you decide to buy Plextools Professional XL along with the device, you will find advanced compression options, of which I don't know even the names :).

I hope they will release a detailed description in the future to provide with a better fine tuning of the chip. There is a trial version of the programme, which is being developed further and further and is looking promising.

BTW, the cable tuner of the PVR version of the ConvertX 402U is of excellent quality. It matches my TV set (Loewe).

[APC2006]

I don't have a DVD Xpress DX2 but an old DVD Xpress (USBAV701 Rev2) which I bought more than 2 years ago. I used it to capture TV programs on my old VHS tapes to make DVDs and/or to encode in XviD. I haven't used it for a while until recently, when I decided to save even older VHS tapes at my parents' house, with my laptop computer.

Anyway, this is how I use it.
1) Capture the videos with "highest quality" (15 Mbps). With mp2 audio, this will give you about 7GB of an mpeg2 video for an hour of a TV program.
2a) Demux the captured video with DGIndex, process with AviSynth, reencode with HCenc, edit with Cuttermaran, ....., burn on a DVD.
2b) Demux with TMPGEnc, edit with Cuttermaran, encode in XviD/DivX/MPEG2/etc.

The points are:
1) It's not lossless but I can get decent results, imho.
2) 7GB for 1 hr of video (even 14GB for a 2-hour-movie) is manageable on a laptop computer.
3) I rarely have A/V synch problems.
4) No dropped frames.

If you have lots of VHS tapes but don't mind (re)encoding on your laptop, I think, a decent H/W MPEG2 encoder is all you need.
I don't recommend a DV capture device if you live in the NTSC world.
Hope this will help.

[avih]

Depending on your hardware, and the type of editing you need, I think that a relatively modern cpu (say, 1.5G or better) will do well with software encoding in real time (while capturing) and the simplest capture hardware, especially if you need to edit and reencode it later (for which, you'll do well with mjpeg capture which takes little cpu resources). You can even capture directly to xvid/mpeg4, and just cut/join afterwards withOUT reencoding, as long as you cut at key frames. virtualdub will do it although it's not that good for NLE.

Quality wise, I think most of the capture hardware will provide good enough quality, especially if the original is not of broadcast quality. Tell me more about the hardware you have and procedure you aim at, and I might help you more.