Hardware MPEG2 Capture.

[amirkhan]

Hi,

I'm in need of some advice please. I have the opertunity to purchase one of two hardware based encoders.

The first is the Pentamedia based NavisPRo card dont know what chipset this is based on buy can read about it here (http://www.bernclare.com/navispro.htm) The other is a Linux based solution (which i hope works, or hiopefully I can use it under windows) and the url is http://www.linuxtv.org/mpeg2/kfir.xml

Please advice if you have experience of ANY of the above!

Amir

p.s. I want to capture for DVD production using 352x576 and 720x576 (or 704x576 as the kfir board doesnt seem to support 720)

[amirkhan]

Has ANYONE got an opinion even?! ;-)

[mkanar]

Well, according to the text at http://www.linuxtv.org/mpeg2/kfir.xml, there must exist a Windows drivers for this card.

Honestly, most of us don't know anything about either card. Personally, I have tried the low-end solutions like the Dazzle DVC-2 realtime mpeg-2 encoder. It'll do a pretty nice job if the input video if from a high-quality DVD playing on your DVD player, but of course nothing even close to the best available non-realtime software encoder solutions. The Dazzle DVC II's C-Cube chip or whatever it is (it has been a long while since I sold the card now) has a lot of potential, but Dazzle has admitted that they simply don't have enough resources to better develope the software drivers. What the Dazzle experience DID demonstrate to me is that even a hardware-mpeg2 encoder depends significantly on the software drivers. This is similar to the latest graphics chipsets from NVidia which would be far less powerful if it were not for NVidia's incredible driver development team.

Good luck!

[amirkhan]

Thankyou for posting a response. I've done some research and hear the Dazzale DVR does indeed have problems. I understand its the same chipset os the Sigma DVR but for what ever reason the card does not work as well.

I've had a look at some capture examples on the Benclare site and they do look exceptional. Point taken about the input btw; I also noticed the NAvis has glowing reviews on www.vcdhelp.com so I hope its ok. I'm going to go for the Navis as at least I know its ok with Windows (I'm more than happy with Linux actually but dont want to risk an experimental board).

Thankyou for taking the time to respond!

Amir