btwincap drivers - only blue screen [Archive]

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darknessfear

10th March 2007, 14:09

Hello everyone,

this is my first post, i´ve already done some search on this subject, but haven't found answers that could solve my problem. My TV card is a Pinnacle PCTV PRO with BT878 chipset, and I want to capture from old VHS.

With virtualdub i only capture with 320*240 resolution, so i decided to install the "WDM Video Capture Driver" that are available from http://btwincap.sourceforge.net/

I followed every installation instructions, although the installer autodetects my card chipset.

The drivers installed are the conexant drivers,but in the end i only see a blue screen, can not even see TV with the new drivers.

Could it be because i don't choose the brand of the tv turner of my card, and leave the autodetect to do it? (I think its based on phillips turner, but dont know for sure and already tried some of them but didn't work..)

Does anyone know what can i do to see TV and capture with virtualdub or virtualvcr using that drivers??

Thanks in advance for your help.
best regards.

mgh

10th March 2007, 18:56

Your card should be autoselected and drivers should install correctly.Pl. check with device manager whether your new drivers are in fact installed. Once the btwincap drivers are installed your original software will not work. Try virtual vcr
http://www.videohelp.com/tools?tool=VirtualVCR

darknessfear

10th March 2007, 22:20

FishTank

11th March 2007, 05:20

i own a Pinnacle PCTV usb2 card and i use the drivers that
came with it. i dont have a problem capturing @720x576 in
vdub with those drivers.
the pinnacle software (PMC4.0) only supports resolutions up
to 352x576 though (they call it: long-play-dvd).

after you tried what mgh said, id probably clean it all out and
reinstall the drivers that came with the card.
i guess you have the pci version and not the external one, but
i doubt theres a big differents between them, but maybe im wrong.

good luck :)

GrofLuigi

11th March 2007, 14:05

Thank you for your quick reply! I´m not in my home town in this precise moment, i will arrive home tomorrow, and try the virtual vcr.

Nevertheless, i can assure you that the new drivers (conexant) are installed, because i choose them when i enter the capture mode in virtualdub, and with them only capture a blue screen. I also tried to find any channel in the "source" menu, using the virtualdub tv turner, but it doesn't change from that blue screen!( I have previsiously selected the "video turner in", because the card has composite and s video too)

The software from pinnacle fails to work with the btwincap drivers, wich is normal, because this means that i do not have the pinnacle drivers anymore, and it should also mean that the new BTwincap drivers were correctly installed...i really do not understand...the strangest thing is that i can capture from my webcam drivers using the virtualdub!!!!!

I would appreciate adicional help on this matter!
Thanks

Capturing from tuner in VirtualDub is difficult because of the tuner interface (it's not VirtualDub's fault). It doesn't remember the station and you have to type or auto tune it every time you start the program.

I can second mgh's recomendation on VirtualVCR, it works very well with my Pinnacle/btwincap.

About the driver: from what I remember of the time when I first tried to install btwincap, sometimes it cannot autodetect the tuner. The symptoms were similar to yours: capture from composite/SVideo works well, but inside any application that accesses the tuner, no change - always blue screen when changing/tuning channels. What I did was opened the computer and read the model from the card (mine was Temic FH XXXX) and entered it manually during the installation. Afterwards, when I got comfortable with the situation, I used BTWinCap's manual installation package - when you edit the INF files - it's also avaliable for download at the same place.

And I have never touched Pinnacle's driver ever since... :)

GL

darknessfear

11th March 2007, 15:21

thank you all for your replies, i will try as soon as arrive home, probably is better to open my pc and see what kind of tv tuner comes with the tv card and reinstall all the drivers, etc

i´ll keep in touch
regards

mgh

11th March 2007, 16:40

Virtualdub works only with vfw drivers. Btwincap drivers are WDM. Latest version of virtualdub is supposed to work with WDM drivers.
I used the WDM wrapper to make old virtualdub work both in 98 SE and XP with btwincap drivers
my copy of the wrapper
http://rapidshare.com/files/20515011/wrapper.zip.html
right click on .inf file to install.
Virtual VCR works well with WDM drivers. For capture my recommendation will be the PicVideo MJPEG codec at quality 19.To avoid dropped frames, do not compress audio and see the tutorial above in the sticky.
Best of luck

darknessfear

14th March 2007, 00:26

Hello there, well i give up, can´t do it, i´ve already pull out my tv card, and saw every chip and inscription, only know thai it´s based on phillips, because the logo is there on the chips. I've selected the phillips PAL from the installer but it did not work.

Allready installed the vfwwdm from the link above, but nothing happened

thank you guys but it seems that i can not do it..i+ve done everything, maybe its my webcam drivers..they seem to work, and when i choose them in virtualdub or VirtualVCR there are no problems, when i change it to conexant drivers..just a blue screen.

mgh

14th March 2007, 15:42

try philips pal secam tuner if you haven't already

darknessfear

14th March 2007, 22:34

no luck with pal secam! tks anyway

GrofLuigi

15th March 2007, 00:37

Is there a big tin box? That's the tuner on older models.

What does btwincap's autodetect say?

Have you tried dscaler (http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=7420&package_id=18879)? It has its own drivers and is independent of any installed drivers.

GL

darknessfear

15th March 2007, 15:20

Yes Grofluigi, there is a tin box on the card, with the logo of pinnacle system´s and nothing more. So i watched every chip on the card and kept their numbers, references and codes to manually introduce in the btwincap installer.

Once I launch the btwincap installer, the default options are :

1 - Autodetect tv card (and it autodetects my bt878 card chipset and also the maufacturer, rev. etc)

2 - Autodetect tv tuner (I tried with autodetec, with phillips PAL, Phillips PAL_SECAM, and others but none of them worked)

Never tried dscaler, i´ve read somewhere one year ago that once installed it could not be removed from the system, and it does something in the chipset of tv cards that could damage them...Is it safe? Is it possible to capture with dscaler?

GrofLuigi

15th March 2007, 17:29

Yes Grofluigi, there is a tin box on the card, with the logo of pinnacle system´s and nothing more.

Ugh... tough luck there. Don't know what to say...

Once I launch the btwincap installer, the default options are :

1 - Autodetect tv card (and it autodetects my bt878 card chipset and also the maufacturer, rev. etc)

2 - Autodetect tv tuner (I tried with autodetec, with phillips PAL, Phillips PAL_SECAM, and others but none of them worked)
I'm a bit rusty with the installer, but after it autodetects, doesn't it populate the box with its choice? I vaguely remember that I was able to change its choice afterwards (or maybe press back on the wizard). That might give you a general clue about the manufacturer of the tuner.

Another thing is, several years have passed since the last version of btwincap and it's possible that new tuners have appeared...

Never tried dscaler, i´ve read somewhere one year ago that once installed it could not be removed from the system, and it does something in the chipset of tv cards that could damage them...Is it safe? Is it possible to capture with dscaler?
It can be removed any time. About the bug: I've heard about it, and don't know if it is true or not. Allegedly, it happens if you have opened and closed DScaler, and afterwards open any app that accesses the installed drivers. In that case, DScaler driver allegedly writes some bytes to the card's EEProm, erasing the identifier of the card - and later you cannot install any drivers. But a lot of time has passed since this was reported and few newer versions of DScaler appeared, so one would think they would fix this. Maybe you could check Dscaler support forums (http://www.dscaler.org/phpBB/index.php) out.

In any case, it's safe to reboot between opening different applications (dscaler and something else). *edit* If you're unsure/afraid that you would fry your card, DON'T install DScaler. /edit

Dscaler captures video OK, but until recently had limited (or nonexistant) audio capture support. I don't know for sure, haven't tried it for capture recently. For capture from TV, I use VirtualVCR because it's easy to set up/change channels, and for composite/svideo capture - VirtualDub (http://virtualdub.org).

Tip: I use only these two programs for capture because they dynamically resample the audio (eliminating the frequency variations in most cheaper/midrange audio cards) and provide rock solid audio/video sync.

GL

darknessfear

16th March 2007, 15:14

GL, i am able to choose every card model and tv tuner available on the installer, but bellow on the installer window, it shows information about my card, wich means that at least the card autodetect is working just fine. regarding to the tv tuner, the situation is a bit different, because I can't see any information about it anywhere with the "autodetect tv tuner". So, wath i did was try with autodetect, and after that, tried with several tv tuners available on the installer, but none of them worked! Probably is any problem regarding to directshow, or some initial video/audio drivers. With the pinnacle drivers I can capture video, tv, with virtualdub, with virtualvcr, so i would be able to capture with the WDM drivers too. Perheaps is better to just format c: and start all over again :)

GrofLuigi

16th March 2007, 20:12

regarding to the tv tuner, the situation is a bit different, because I can't see any information about it anywhere with the "autodetect tv tuner". So, wath i did was try with autodetect, and after that, tried with several tv tuners available on the installer, but none of them worked! Probably is any problem regarding to directshow, or some initial video/audio drivers. With the pinnacle drivers I can capture video, tv, with virtualdub, with virtualvcr, so i would be able to capture with the WDM drivers too. Perheaps is better to just format c: and start all over again :)

It can't recognize your tuner... as I said, most probably it's newer model than the driver.

Again, some basic troubleshooting:

- What OS you're running? Any service packs? DirectX version?

- Between installs, you run it's deinstalation procedure (with reboot), right? ;)

- Does everything work with pinnacle drivers? Have you tried with them, in VirtualDub, setting custom resolution to i.e. 720x576 and turning both preview and overlay OFF?

- Did you make sure to have the latest VirtualDub version?

- Have you checked this (http://www.doom9.org/capture.htm) section? Tons of information there.

GL

darknessfear

16th March 2007, 20:36

hello again :)

- My OS is windows XP Professional, Service Pack 2, directx version 9.0d.

- Yes, when performing uninstall I allways reboot.

- My pinnacle "capture device does not support the selected video format" 720x576 resolution, turning preview and overlay off. Max capture to 320x240

- I use Virtualdub version 1.6.17

- yap, already checked that great tutorials on video capture!

GrofLuigi

17th March 2007, 22:40

My pinnacle "capture device does not support the selected video format" 720x576 resolution, turning preview and overlay off. Max capture to 320x240
Slowly running out of ideas here... But don't worry, it's SLOWLY. :)

In VirtualDub's capture mode, have you tried all devices? Maybe pinnacle drivers are WDM only now. In any case, I don't think you need the wrapper. DirectX 9 already has it. And VirtualDub now works with WDM too. If VirtualDub crashes, the next time you enter capture mode, hold SHIFT, otherwise it will crash every time.

For colorspace, select YUY2. It's the card's native color space, no point in selecting any other.

Try different codec. Test short piece uncompressed to rule out any codec trouble. If that works, for actual use you may try huffyuv, lagarith, some mjpeg codec if low on disk space...

Also, does VirtualVCR work? It's pure WDM app. There, try playing with Devices tab in Settings, particularly around Device Settings (Crossbar and others).

All this above is assuming that you have pinnacle drivers installed and working.

GL

darknessfear

17th March 2007, 23:44

:) yes, i´ve tried every devices

and already have those codecs.

VirtualVCR works with pinnacle drivers, but does not work with the btwincap drivers that we've been talking about all these days.

I have tried every options, crossbar, tv tuner, and others but none of them seems to give life to my capturesssss:)

tks a lot for your help!

GrofLuigi

18th March 2007, 03:06

VirtualVCR works with pinnacle drivers, but does not work with the btwincap drivers that we've been talking about all these days.
If everything works (7xx resolution and channel switching), why don't u use them? BTWincap is better, but obviously, if a solution cannot be found, something is better than nothing. :)

If you're so keen on avoiding pinnacle, here's another similar driver (http://www.iulabs.com/drv/index.shtml). Also, check out the program, if you haven't done so before. Very good, even though it's not free. But, anyways, no program will work correctly until you set up the drivers right.

And somewhat of a longshot. Are you sure you have BT878? You said there are plenty Philips chips on the board. Maybe there is SAA-some-number in there? I think Pinnacle also made PCTV cards with Philips chipsets.

You see, I'm still not out of ideas :) . Although it's hard to troubleshoot without actually sitting at the computer...

GL

darknessfear

18th March 2007, 14:46

Hi there! :)

So I can see you don´t like the meaning of the word surrender!! lol

Have already read about iulabs drivers, but as you said, they are not for free!

For now, I will work with pinnacle drivers and the VirtualVCR captures, using the huffyuv and MJPEG codecs. If i like the final result in DVD, i don ever bother anyone anymore about btwincap drivers! :)

About the chipset, yes I´m sure its BT878! The main chipset inscription is

CONEXANT
FUSION 878A
.......
......

Thanks for all your help!

darknessfear

18th March 2007, 21:53

GrofLuigi

18th March 2007, 23:58

I was beeing too optimistic. Already made a VHS capture to my pc, using VirtualVCR, and the PICVIDEO MJPEG Codec (quality 19). Now I have a *.avi file with 11 GB.

What do you sugest me to do now? Use the gordian Knot?
The avi file has a duration of 55 minutes , and 640*480 resolution. (I want to make a DVD with that viedo file, and think that should have captured in 720x576... isn't that right?)

The tutorial on analogue capture has lots of methods to encode video, but I´m a newbie on this one, really stucked here! :)

Congratulations. :) From this point on, there are many roads. For a newbie, GordianKnot or AutoGordianKnot are good choices, as well as many other. I think, if you'd like high quality results, you should invest some time in learning Avisynth and virtualdub procedures. The Capture Guide is very good reference.

For DVD you need an MPEG2 encoder. Free and very good are HCEnc and QEnc, and payware (and also very good) are CCE and Procoder, for example.

DVD authoring - simple and yet very very good are Muxman and DVDPlanner.

And yes, you should have captured in DVD compliant resolution, such as 704X576, 720X576 OR 352x576. The last one is perfectly valid for DVD and often enough for the VHS quality you can get, and it saves disk space too. Just don't get confused by the squashed looks of the video while you process it, on the finished DVD it will be OK.

And by the way, IuLabs driver is free.

Good luck!

GL

darknessfear

19th March 2007, 19:57

ok , i´ll leave that for the next weekend, it seems that video encoding demands many hours of work! Tks for all your help and tips!

FishTank

19th March 2007, 20:43

704X576, 720X576 OR 352x576

704x576 ? never seen that one lol

it really depends on where you live. NTSC or PAL country.

GrofLuigi

20th March 2007, 04:21

704x576 ? never seen that one lol

it really depends on where you live. NTSC or PAL country.

You can use 704x480 for NTSC if you want to. :)
Perfectly valid (http://www.dvddemystified.com/dvdfaq.html#3.4).

GL

FishTank

20th March 2007, 08:16

wasnt doubting you, just never seen it :)
thanks for the link!