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View Full Version : Best device for capturing high quality 1080p H264 and multichannel audio over HDMI?

morphinapg
2nd July 2016, 02:57
Right now I'm using an HD PVR 2, which actually allows for both of the things I want, but the video bitrate is limited to 14mbps, which can be pretty low for 1080p sources. I can't find any other device that captures in H264 as well as allows for multichannel audio. The closest I found was the Blackmagic Design Intensity, which actually captures up to 8 channel LPCM audio, but unfortunately it captures video uncompressed, which is much too large for me to deal with on my computer considering I'm dealing with dozens of hours of video game footage for editing. Optimally I'd want an H264 encoder that can do ~25mbps for 1080p. As for audio, it would be awesome if I could capture multichannel LPCM, but Dolby AC3 or DTS support would be enough for what I want. Basically, if I could somehow increase the bitrate on my HDPVR2 I'd be pretty happy. Does anybody know of any devices that would be able to do the things I like?
ChiDragon
2nd July 2016, 04:45
With a fast enough CPU, you could compress using x264vfw in realtime with a Blackmagic card.
morphinapg
2nd July 2016, 06:32
Did some tests in Bandicam with x264vfw, with crf 16, ultrafast preset and low latency options, capturing my screen watching some high paced 1080p gaming videos. Got bitrates between 20 and 45mbps, but everything played back pretty smoothly. Is there any way to have x264 give me a log telling me whether there were any dropped frames?

Also, if I got the Blackmagic card, how would I accomplish vfw encoding? Does the included software have an option for that? If not what would I use, and would it also support the multichannel audio?
ChiDragon
3rd July 2016, 07:02
Is there any way to have x264 give me a log telling me whether there were any dropped frames?
I think only the capture app can tell you that.

Also, if I got the Blackmagic card, how would I accomplish vfw encoding? Does the included software have an option for that? If not what would I use, and would it also support the multichannel audio?
Well normally I would say VirtualDub or AmaRecTV, but now that you mention it, I'm not sure that either one of them can actually capture multichannel audio. I don't have my Intensity Pro 4K plugged in anymore to check.