Questions for Pinnacle PCTV Pro owners

[Swan]

I'm considering buying a new capture card and after reading the review on tv-Cards.com (http://www.tv-cards.com/NewPCTVrange.htm)
I am thinking about a Pinnacle PCTV Pro.

I have downloaded the manual from Pinnacle, but there are I'm a few things that the manual doesn't shed any light on. I have posted on the Tv-cards forum, but it is very slow and empty, especially compared to this one.;)

I'm hoping that someone here owns a PcTV Pro and is willing to help me with these questions:

Is it possible to capture interlaced Mpeg-2 (720 x 576) or does the Vision software automatically deinterlace?

Does the Vision software report dropped frames?

Is it possible to capture with third-party software, in particular Ulead VideoStudio, Ulead MediaStudio, Ulead DVD Workshop, or Cyberlink's PowerVCR?

Is it possible to capture in full PAL resolution using third-party software, like VirtualDub or Ulead's software? I'm asking because with the original drivers of my Aver Tv Studio card, the resolution was locked to 352 x 288. It was only after I installed Btwincap drivers that was I able to use third-party apps and full resolution.

The review says the card has a "Connexant 878A with Temic 3X7 035 tuner". Does Btwincap drivers work with the card?

The reviewer writes: "Pinnacle do provide WDM drivers so that 3rd party applications can make use of the PCTV hardware but at the moment these don't work with stereo sound."
Has this changed with the PCTV 5.1 patch?
Also, I assume this only concerns audio coming from the tuner?

/Swan

[Bull]

Alot of questions, but I'm a nice guy...

First of all, Pinnacle is great, awesome....
I have pro, but regret that I bought it Rave is just as good (actually I think Pinnacle PCTV is just as good), why??? read along...

1. As far as I know you can't capute directly to mpg with this card, so what you do is that you capture to uncompessed avi and convert it to mpg after. I know that there is a new update for the card and i tryed it but whent back to the old version again, cause I didn't like it (and I will tell why). In the update the picture is deinterlaced for you, so you can capture at any rez and the picture is deinterlaced, and that is one reason that I didn't liked the update. I didn't check if you could capture to mpg with the new update, but I really doubt it, and you will get better quality if you capture to uncompessed AVI and convert it later (but of cause it requeres more HD space).

The deinterlation made it look like there was alot of noise in the picture and it wasn't that god (bad deinterlacing)(I don't really know if it's harder to rip with the deinterlaced picture and a high rez, cause if the computer have to deinterlace, then it would be harder cause the computer whould have to think more, but if the card does it then it wouldn't be any different, but I think it's the computer cause it an update for the computer, but maby some one can claryfi this for you/us)

But with the old version (4.02) I have no problem capturing in a high resolution (768*576 to huffyuv/uncompessed AVI (huffyuv is a codec I youse, but the AVI is still uncompressed, but this you will learn more about if you by the card)(not with the best settings but pretty damn close)) on my 1.2GHz computer. And with the old version the picture is non-interlaced but that don't really bother me, cause when you convert there is filters that can handel that (no matter if you convert to DivX or VCD or SVCD ect.), and they do a much better job than the update.

2. No I don't think it does, now here is the reasonI regret that I bought por, cause with pro there follows a video editing program (thats the only different between PRO and RAVE (don't really know the different between Pinnacle RAVE and Pinnalce PCTV)), but I ahve never used that, I prefere Adobe Premier but you can use Ulead VideoStudio to (both are for video editing). So the only things I use from the Pinnacle CD-rom is the monitor (Vision) thing and text-TV.
Now for capturing I use Virtual dub, but there is also AVI_IO, both programs tell you frame drops.

3. Yes, as I sayed I have capture with Virtual dub and AVI_IO, and also with a video editing program, so yes it is.

4. Yes, as I sayed earlyer Virtual dub can do it (proboaly others to). You just have to take OVERLAY off to cap higher than 352*288, you can have preview on but for better capturing, take that one of to.

5. I have no clue man, I just installed the shit and have been capturing ever since.

6. yes, the old version (4.02) can only cap with mono, but the update (5.1) can do stereo. Read the part that the dude has done to his audio, he has the same card: http://www.vcdhelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=89899

Hope this helps, tjek out www.vcdhelp.com
They have alot of review (also for Pinnacle PCTV Pro), thier forum has helped me alot, I myself consider doom9 more as help for DVD rippers.

Well it's up to you know, I'm happy with my card

[Swan]

Bull, thanks a lot for your reply.

As far as I know you can't capute directly to mpg with this card, so what you do is that you capture to uncompessed avi
That sounds weird. Are you sure?
Here's from the presentation of the card:
(http://www.pinnaclesys.com/ProductPage.asp?Product_ID=103&Langue_ID=2)
Note that Pinnacle says ¨
"Digital MPEG VCR for TV - and video recording from Camcorder , VCR or DVD-Player..."
"Real Time MPEG1-, MPEG2-, DV- software compression with presets for VideoCD, SuperVCD, DVD format".

And on page 63 in the manual, it is described how to capture to VCD, SVCD, etc, using the "PCTV Vision" software.

The main thing I want to do is capture 720 x 576, interlaced mpeg-2, using Ulead Videostudio or Ulead DVD Workshop. Since you say you can capture in VirtualDub at 768 x 576, with the original drivers, I guess I will buy it because that's all I needed to hear. :)

Thanks a bunch for all your other opinions about the card.
I'll take a look at vcdhelp.

/Swan

[Bull]

If you can cap directly to MPEG, you should could do it with the 5.xx update, but I only tryed the update for for 10min and then I uninstalled it and whent back to the 4.02 version.
I tryed to cap with the vision, when the 5.xx was in, but it just made an AVI that needed to be convertet, but maby it's just some settings I needed to fix to cap directly to MPEG...

But the good thing about capturing to AVI first is that when you convert it to MPEG, you can put some noise reduction on it (and some other filters) to make the video look better. But of cause capturing to uncompressed AVI takes more HD space, but the result looks better...

But if you already have a video editing program (Ulead Videostudio), then I wouldn't advise you to buy Pro, but RAVE or just the PCTV insted, I think that the update works for them to...

Cause as I sayed:
2. No I don't think it does, now here is the reasonI regret that I bought por, cause with pro there follows a video editing program (thats the only different between PRO and RAVE (don't really know the different between Pinnacle RAVE and Pinnalce PCTV)), but I ahve never used that, I prefere Adobe Premier but you can use Ulead VideoStudio to (both are for video editing). So the only things I use from the Pinnacle CD-rom is the monitor (Vision) thing and text-TV.

[Mac Sidewinder]

I have the Pinnacle PCTV - the only difference between this and the Pro version is a FM radio tuner. It also came with the 5.1v of the software and I have no problem capturing at high res. The software doesn't report dropped frames though. It will cap directly to mpeg and mpeg2 as well as dv and huff. But I'm with Bull in that you will get better results capping to huff then converting to mpeg with either tmpge or cce. I can also cap with Studio 7 software using the pinnacle drivers BUT they won't work with virtualdub.

So I use the btwincap drivers and cap with virtualdub - you simply use the preview function instead of the overlay mode. I can cap at full dv resolution with no dropped frames using huff.

The reason I use virtualdub instead of the vison software is because I was having problems getting cce to recognize the avi file format. Supposedly when capping using the dv codec in Pinnacle's software, it is saved as a type 2 dv file, but cce wouldn't take it. I tried converting the file format with numerous programs (including canopus file converter) but no luck. So I dumped it and went with the btwincap drivers and virtualdub.

Mac

[Swan]

Thanks, Mac Sidewinder (cool name, btw) ;)

I hope I didn't misunderstand you, but you say that you could *not* capture in VirtualDub with Pinnacle's drivers? And that's why you installed Btwincap drivers instead? What was the problem with Pinnacle's drivers and VirtualDub?

But I'm with Bull in that you will get better results capping to huff then converting to mpeg with either
I believe you. But since I capture so much, ever day, my disks would fill up in no-time if I didn't use compression when capturing. And I prefer MPEG-2. :)

I am mainly interested in using the card in conjunction with Ulead's products, either VideoStudio or DVD Workshop and Intervideo's PowerVCR (which I got because the software that came with my Aver TV Studio card was junk).
I hope it's possible to use the software I mentioned. :)

But I am delighted to hear that the card works with Btwincap drivers, that means I have a way out, if the Pinnacle drivers are poor.
I am running Windows 2000, what OS do you have, by the way?

I am very close to ordering it now. :)

/Swan

[Mac Sidewinder]

I'm using WinXP. I have a dedicated 40gb cap drive (am upgrading it to 120gb soon). I need one this big cause I cap in huffy.

Mac

[Swan]

Ok , thanks.
But Mac, what was the problem with Pinnacle's drivers and VirtualDub?
Why did you have to use Btwincap drivers?

/Swan

[therick]

I also have a Pinnacle PCTV...and at first I used the 4.01 drivers. Then I used the btwincap drivers. Both of these I used VDub with, and I could not get full frame to work without dropping frames or getting strange lines in my captures.

That was 5 months ago. Fast forward to today and I have the 5.01 drivers...which are WDM drivers, so no VDub...BUT I have found that with VirtualVCR AND iuVCR I can capture full screen beautiful video in YUY2 or RGB24...check it-

http://www.robbins.dns2go.com/good.jpg

My conclusions...the first two versions of the Pinnacle drivers were crap...5.01 + iuVCR or VirtualVCR is the way to go with this card...the results are better than anything else I have been able to get.

on a side note: when I used the btwincap drivers they messed up the color scheme for the card and it took me almost 30 minutes to get it where it looked normal. Did anyone else have this problem with the PCTV + btwincap drivers???

[Swan]

That was 5 months ago. Fast forward to today and I have the 5.01 drivers...which are WDM drivers, so no VDub.
Thanks for your input, therick.
Please tell me why "no Vdub"? Just what was the problem?
Why did you have to install Btwincap drivers?
Btwincap are also WDM drivers. The Btwincap site even says "WDM Video Capture Driver for WinMe, Win98SE ,Win2000 and WinXP for Capture Boards based on Brooktree´s Bt848 / Bt849 / Bt878 & Bt879 Chipsets." :)

/Swan

[therick]

VDub is a VFW application-so you can't use it w/ Pinnacle's 5.01 WDM drivers. The reason I installed the btwincap drivers is that I couldn't capture full D1 with Pinnacle's 4.01 drivers...and I wanted to. The reason that I am using Pinnacle's v5.01 drivers now is that in my experience, you should only use 3rd party drivers (and apps for that matter) if they let you do something the original drivers (or apps) won't...and the 5.01 WDM drivers from Pinnacle let me do all that I want, so I don't need the btwincap drivers anymore.

[^^-+I4004+-^^]

@Swan

does your existing capture card (you currently use) have
hardware mpeg2 encoder on it?if NOT,then your cpu is doing
all the job!

so if you have a card WITHOUT hardware mpeg2 encoder,there's
no difference to THIS (PCTV PRO) one!
(this differs to other models just by some sound features:nicam,
etc....as far as i could saw on the link you gave...)

SOFTWARE will do mpeg1/2 encoding on these cheap bt8x8 cards...

(as far as i know only DVB cards have mpeg2 hardware encoders...
i don't know of capture cards with mpeg2 chip on them...not sure though_perhaps there are some...mpeg2 chips i saw on DVB cards were "kfir"..)

btw. i saw you have avertv card:that uses the same bt8x8
chip as this one,doesn't it?
are you really expecting any improval picture quality wise?

bt cards only differ in tuner quality_with btwincap drivers &
using video-in you'll get the same picture quality...

[Swan]

Hello ^^-+I4004+-^^, we meet again. Nice icon you have! :-)

does your existing capture card (you currently use) have hardware mpeg2 encoder on it?if NOT,then your cpu is doing
I am aware of that. No, none of my three cards (yes, three, ha, ha) have hardware mpeg-2 encoding. None of them work as they should either, that's why I'm buying a Pinnacle one. :)

I have:
Matrox G450 eTV.
Problem: Not so good image quality, resolution limited to 704x576, vfw driver. Poor performance drivers.

AverTV Studio.
Problem:
Noisy image (possible because of too long composite line-in cables or grounding problem on card).
Original WDM drivers limits card a lot; can't capture in resolutions over 352x288 in software like VirtualDub, Ulead Videostudio, etc.
I am therefor using Btwincap drivers, which, coupled with my favorite capturing software Ulead VideoStudio and Ulead DVD Workshop, does not let me set any color space than RGB24. I get artifacts in the video in RGB24, I want to use YUY2. Also, with Btwincap drivers, the FM radio does not work, even though I created a custom profile with btspy.

Terratec Cinergy 400.
Problem:
Have had it for a month or so. Never got it to work. At all! Frame rate drops to half as soon as I try to capture in full PAL resolution (720 x 576). Card has not got a Bt-chip, so card is useless. Non-existing support. I am lending it to a friend and if he can get it to work, he can keep it. :)

My hopes with the Pinnacle is that I'll be able to capture in full PAL res. of 720 x 576, interlaced Mpeg-2, using Ulead VideoStudio/DVD Workshop and YUY2. Also use it with PowerVCR. I also hope for less noise/interference than with the Aver card. And if I could avoid using Btwincap drivers (they seem to make YUY2 unavailable in Ulead's software), I'd be a happy camper. :)
I don't care about the Tv-tuner, I'll only be using the composite and possibly S-video inputs.

btw. i saw you have avertv card:that uses the same bt8x8
It's an bt878 on the Aver card. Bt878A on the Pinnacle. Don't know what the "A" stands for, though. Perhaps a revised version? :)

VDub is a VFW application-so you can't use it w/ Pinnacle's 5.01 WDM drivers.
Btwincap is also WDM drivers. So, if you can't capture using VirtualDub and Pinnacle's WDM drivers, then the problem lies in Pinnacles drivers somehow limiting third-party software to access the full potential of the card. This was exactly the case with the drivers that came with my Avermedia card. The drivers were limited, so that vfw-based programs, like Vitualdub, could only capture in 352x288. With Avermedia's drivers removed and Btwincap drivers installed, I could capture in 720 x 576 in VirtualDub. The problem is most likely not that Pinnacle's drivers are WDM, because so is Btwincap.
Was this the exact problem with Pinnacle's drivers? That they did not allow you to use higher resolutions than 352x288 or 352 x 240 in Virtualdub?

/Swan

[therick]

"Original WDM drivers limits card a lot; can't capture in resolutions over 352x288 in software like VirtualDub, Ulead Videostudio"

Did you try to use a WDM application to capture? I have never had good quality when using VDub + WDM drivers...always problems...


"the problem lies in Pinnacles drivers somehow limiting third-party software to access the full potential of the card"

I am using 3rd party software to capture now...that is what VirtualVCR and iuVCR are...third party software. The limit is not Pinnacle's drivers...it is the difference between WDM and VFW you are running into-and there is a difference. If I install WDM drivers, why on earth should I expect to be able to use a VFW application to do my captures??

"My hopes with the Pinnacle is that I'll be able to capture in full PAL res. of 720 x 576, interlaced Mpeg-2, "

I wasn't aware that PAL streams were interlaced...I thought it was 25 fps progressively scanned...but I am an NTSC kid so I may be mistaken.

I have messed around with MPEG2 capture, and trust me...the card doesn't matter, as ^^-+I4004+-^^ said, any Bt card can capture to MPEG-2 with software...what you need to be worrying about is CPU power in that case.

"The problem is most likely not that Pinnacle's drivers are WDM, because so is Btwincap."

right from the sourceforge site:

"Under WinXP or Win2000, it is much better to use a DirectShow-based capture program than a VFW capture program, because WinXP is optimized for DirectShow. Despite the fact that VFW apps will work, you will very soon discover that you can get more CPU power to compress video (expect 20% more CPU power available for compressing) with DirectShow (AMCAP is a DirectShow based application)"

So he is basically telling you NOT to use a VFW application to capture...Pinnacle's drivers aren't supposed to support VFW capture...they are WDM drivers...VFW is dying...WDM lets you capture full screen with less CPU use...which might help you...DING! DING! DING!-get more power for your realtime software MPEG-2 compression.

[Bull]

Okay help me out for a sec, cause I only installed the motherfucker and then it has all been working for me...

What is btwincap drivers???

Fast forward to today and I have the 5.01 drivers...which are WDM drivers, so no VDub...BUT I have found that with VirtualVCR AND iuVCR I can capture full screen beautiful video in YUY2 or RGB24...check it-

What is WDM drivers????

I remember when I tryed the 5.01 drivers in Virtual, I couldn't do shit. I couldn't pick RGB24 og YUY2 og Huff or PICvideo or anything...
Did you hvae the same problem with Virtual dub?? and can you use thouse things in VirtualVCR and iuVCR????

When I installed 5.01, the deinterlace sucked and it made it look like there was alot of noise, like the deinterlacing mad the noise.

Did you have that problem, cause it does look like you have when you look at the picture???
So what drivers are you using now???

There is 2 driver with 4.02, Pinnacle and miroXL, now I use the miroXL driver, anyone else tryed that??

therick, what codec are you usesing now, and are you capturing to MPEG??

[Swan]

I am using 3rd party software to capture now...that is what VirtualVCR and iuVCR are...third party software. The limit is not Pinnacle's drivers...it is the difference between WDM and VFW you are running into-and there is a difference. If I install WDM drivers, why on earth should I expect to be able to use a VFW application to do my captures??
It has got to do with the drivers! I cannot see any other explanation.

Facts:
The Avermedia drivers I got with the card were WDM drivers.
Btwincap drivers are WDM too.
OK?

1. When capturing in VirtualDub with Avermedia's drivers, it was not possible to set a higher resolution than 352 x 288 (for NTSC that would be 352 x 240).
2. When capturing in VirtualDub with Btwincap drivers, it was possible to capture at resolutions as high as 768 x 576.

Conclusion:
Both drivers are WDM, VirtualDub is a vfw-based software.
The reason why I can use higher resolutions when capturing with Btwincap drivers can only be, in my view, differences in the drivers from Avermedia and Btwincap.The Pinnacle drivers are WDM, so the same goes for them. If installing Btwincap drivers for the Pinnacle card opens up the possibility to use VirtualDub for capturing in the resolutions (704 x 576, 720 x 576, etc), then the answer is that the Pinnacle drivers are restraint, they prevent this use of the card in vfw software. Perhaps this is because Btwincap takes better advantage of the The VfW-to-WDM mapper?
"The VfW-to-WDM mapper allows VfW applications to interface with the new WDM capture drivers on Windows 98 and Windows 2000. The objective is to provide.." Look here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dndevice/html/vfwmap.asp

I am not a programmer, but I'm sure someone else on this knowledge filled Forum can give us the exact details as to why the Avermedia drivers and the Pinnacle drivers prevent full resolution capture in VirtualDub. That capturing in full resolution is a feature of Btwincap drivers (http://btwincap.sourceforge.net/features.html) also tells me that this is not the case with all WDM drivers... :)

said, any Bt card can capture to MPEG-2 with software...what you need to be worrying about is CPU power in that case.
I have an Athlon XP 1900+ and have not had a problem with dropped frames, etc, so far, so I'm confident that if I can just get a card that ships with good drivers from the manufacturer (that allows me to capture 720 x 576, interlaced Mpeg-2, *YUY2*, in *Videostudio*), then I'll have all I want, in terms of my capturing needs.

Bull:
What is btwincap drivers???
You can read all about it here: http://btwincap.sourceforge.net/description.html
It is an "WDM Video Capture Driver for WinMe, Win98SE ,Win2000 and WinXP for Capture Boards based on Brooktree´s Bt848 / Bt849 / Bt878 & Bt879 Chipsets."

What is WDM drivers????
VFW is the old standard for drivers, it stands for Video For Windows.
WDM is the new standard. It means Windows Driver Model.
This is from Microsoft:
"WDM defines a unified driver model for Windows 98, Windows Me, and Windows 2000 and later..." " WDM drivers will not run on operating systems earlier than Windows 98 or Windows 2000."
"By conforming to WDM, drivers can be source-compatible across Windows 98, Windows Me, and Windows 2000 and later operating systems."

From: http://www.microsoft.com/hwdev/archive/desinit/wdmvid.asp
"A new infrastructure for capturing video debuted with Windows 98. This infrastructure replaces the old method provided by Video for Windows (VfW). Video capture is now based on a close coupling of WDM Stream class and Microsoft DirectShow®. This new architecture is founded on a series of layers that allow hardware abstraction and reduced IHV software development."

You can read loads more about it on Microsoft's MSDN.
And I found this on http://www.iulabs.com/eng/drv/faq.shtml#Q1

"Q1: What is a WDM-driver and why do I need it?

A: The technology for creating and editing video was first developed by Microsoft in November 1992. It was called simply УVideo for WindowsФ (VFW). This was a long time ago. But today PC hardware is much more powerful and therefore requires an extended control interface that VFW does not offer. For example, VFW lacks a standard way to change TV tuner channels, decode teletext and so on. Each hardware vendor developed its own implementation of features that were not in the VFW standard.

To overcome the limitations of VFW, Microsoft created a new multimedia technology called ActiveMovie. Then, as part of the DirectX library, Microsoft created DirectShow. The new standard is based on a new hardware driver model named WDM (Windows Driver Model). The advantage of using WDM is that the same drivers can work on a Win98 PC or on a machine running Windows 2000. WDM drivers provide extensive hardware control that can simplify software development and hide hardware-specific implementation details from a programmer.

Windows 2000 and Windows XP not only use WDM drivers; they require them. Plus with Windows 2000 or XP you get an additional advantages in video capture and editing, because the files can be over 4GB if you use the NTFS file system. Windows 95/98 can only use the FAT32 file system, in which files much be less than 4GB. Also Windows 2000 offers better memory management, drive caching and accurate multitasking support which reduces the number of dropped frames."

/Swan

[^^-+I4004+-^^]

>I am not a programmer, but I'm sure someone else on this knowledge filled Forum can give us the exact details as to why the Avermedia drivers and the Pinnacle drivers prevent full resolution capture in VirtualDub. That capturing in full resolution is a feature of Btwincap drivers (http://btwincap.sourceforge.net/features.html) also tells me that this is not the case with all WDM drivers...

_i have pixelview bt8x8 card (no bt8x8A doesn't differ much from "non A" version...)
with vfw drivers in vdub i go to "set custom format",with wdm also no problems for hi-res

so it seems that problems are in the drivers (vfw ones...)
i think anyone should be able to find correct drivers
(i have bt's generic vfw drivers..)
in vfw mode you cannot use "overlay" for hi-res,just "preview"...
but ti 've mentioned that already.....

so:
any bt8x8 based card will capture hi-res with appropriate set of drivers!

(vdub uses wdm->vfw "wrapper" to stay on his vfw capturinig system:
i need to OC my celeron to achieve no-drops on hi res in this mode...)

[netzfuchs]

There are pretty many answers and strange things going around in this thread.

Ok, I am a Pinnacle PCTV Pro User, I am using the 5.1 drivers on a XP System. These drivers are WDM drivers and I would recommend them for the use with the PCTV. I have used all the other generic drivers, too, but.... These are good now.

Why you can't use WDM-drivers with VirtualDub? Simply because Avery Lee doesn't want to integrate WDM support in his program for several reasons I can very well understand (hard to program, etc.) Go to his homepage and read if you care.

So this leaves you with either the vision software (which can only in the PRO version capture directly to MPEG2). The SVCD quality is lousy though. I recommend using WinDVR 2.0 which I use to capture with the SVCD template and directly burn on a cd to watch it on my standalone DVD Player. It works. They are still working on it and improving it with every version.

The advantage of the vision software is that you can really use all of the options of your PCTV (AEsDigital Sound Pin on the card, options to change between 2fields interlaced, 2 fields deinterlaced, 1 field only, etc).

Try it. I can recommend the card though as long as it concerns picture and sound quality. Have not seen anything better in that price range, yet.

So long,

John

[thorazine]

Originally posted by Swan

It has got to do with the drivers! I cannot see any other explanation.

Facts:
The Avermedia drivers I got with the card were WDM drivers.
Btwincap drivers are WDM too.
OK?

1. When capturing in VirtualDub with Avermedia's drivers, it was not possible to set a higher resolution than 352 x 288 (for NTSC that would be 352 x 240).
2. When capturing in VirtualDub with Btwincap drivers, it was possible to capture at resolutions as high as 768 x 576.

Conclusion:
Both drivers are WDM, VirtualDub is a vfw-based software.
The reason why I can use higher resolutions when capturing with Btwincap drivers can only be, in my view, differences in the drivers from Avermedia and Btwincap.The Pinnacle drivers are WDM, so the same goes for them. If installing Btwincap drivers for the Pinnacle card opens up the possibility to use VirtualDub for capturing in the resolutions (704 x 576, 720 x 576, etc), then the answer is that the Pinnacle drivers are restraint, they prevent this use of the card in vfw software. Perhaps this is because Btwincap takes better advantage of the The VfW-to-WDM mapper?

That's the reason. I can't find the exact quote right now from the btwincap site (or was it in the readme?) but IIRC the problem is the VFW-WDM wrapper is giving priority to preview over capture and tries to preview AND capture at full res at the same time which is imposible for the bt8xx hardware. The btwincap drivers are patched against this wrapper's behaviour but other WDM drivers are not. So both microsoft (for writing a buggy wrapper) and conexant-pinnacle and other WDM drivers' programmers (for not having a clue about that or not caring about VFW compatibility) are guilty of all of our troubles with VirtualDub and WDM. :D

[therick]

@Bull-Swan gave you the answer for your btwincap and WDM questions. I will try to answer your other questions. The first WDM capture that I got to work was VirtualVCR: http://www.digtv.ws/ You have to install the DirectShow filters included, but it works wonderfully for me. iuVCR also works well- http://www.iulabs.com/eng/index.shtml - I just got VirtualVCR to work for me.

"I couldn't pick RGB24 og YUY2 og Huff or PICvideo or anything..."

I capture full frame with HuffyUV-PicVideo works as well.

"Did you hvae the same problem with Virtual dub??"

With the 5.01 drivers installed, VirtualDub wouldn't even go to capture mode for me, so I had problems before I even got to set up the capture.

"When I installed 5.01, the deinterlace sucked "

I don't do any realtime filtering...so I cannot tell you if this is the case or not.

"Did you have that problem, cause it does look like you have when you look at the picture???"

See above, that is an interlaced capture from a DVD player.

"So what drivers are you using now???"

Pinnacle's v5.01 WDM drivers.

"now I use the miroXL driver, anyone else tryed that??"

No, never tried the miroXL driver...

@Swan, I wasn't talking about the Avermedia card...I don't have one, so I don't know the first thing about that card. All I was doing was telling you about my experiences with the Pinnacle PCTV.

You say that you couldn't capture over 352x288 w/ Avermedia's drivers-but with the btwincap drivers you are able to capture at 720x576. Hurray! This is what they are supposed to be used for. I have already said this once...

"The reason why I can use higher resolutions when capturing with Btwincap drivers can only be, in my view, differences in the drivers from Avermedia and Btwincap."

Are you expecting an argument on this? Of course that is the reason! My main point was that why would you want to use the wrapper? The btwincap people advise against it. Just get a WDM capture program! Are you doing some realtime filtering that is making you stay with VDub?

The real problem here is that you want to use a VFW capture application to capture with WDM drivers. I know that there is a wrapper-but I don't think that Pinnacle gives one rat's ass about VFW support. But, really, if this is true:

"Avery Lee doesn't want to integrate WDM support in his program"

And everyone knows this to be the case. So again I say why on earth even try to use VDub to capture with WDM drivers unless you wish to do some realtime filtering? What does Vdub gain you? I am really curious now.

Bull has said he is using the 4.02 driver- and I know people (on vcdhelp)who got this driver to work with full frame capture-I had already set my PCTV aside at that time and decided to wait for new drivers. Well, this little post has made me want to go get those drivers and try full D1 in VDub, maybe I will do that.

[Swan]

TherickI wasn't talking about the Avermedia card...I don't have one, so I don't know the first thing about that card. All I was doing was telling you about my experiences with the Pinnacle PCTV.
I know. But it has WDM drivers bundled with it, just like the Pinnacle card. I think we misunderstood each other. Instead of going into why I wrote what I wrote, let me just say this..
I don't care about capturing in VirtualDub at all. But since you were not familiar with capturing in Ulead VideoStudio, I used VirtualDub as an example and asked if you could capture in full resolution with it. I didn't want to complicate things more by talking in details about VideoStudio, since you had not used it. You see, Ulead Videostudio is *also* vfw-based. The limitations I experienced with the original drivers for my Aver card were the same, in VirtualDub *and* Videostudio. Btwincap solved that, but with those drivers I can no longer select Color Space in Ulead's software. I could select color space with the original WDM drivers.

Now, why do I care so much about using VideoStudio or DVD Workshop? Because VideoStudio and DVD Workshop for that matter, are the best Mpeg-2 capturing softwares I've used. And believe me, I've tried most consumer apps available on the market! You name one and I can tell you what annoyed me about them. :)

No other software let me capture *interlaced*, control so many aspects of the compression and give such wonderful quality.
Right now I am forced to use Cyberlink's PowerVCR to capture Mpeg-2 and I can only capture deinterlaced because I have figured out where to hack in the registry to disable deinterlacing. It is not a feature of PowerVCR to turn deinterlacing off. In Ulead's software it is!
Sadly, I have not found a single WDM capturing software that outperforms Ulead's. PowerVCR is WDM and it's good. But not good enough. PowerVCR is excellent for scheduled recording, though, and the quality is quite good. WinDVR was bundled with the Terratec. I have not been able to figure out how to disable deinterlacing with it, so I don't use it.

So, which driver from Pinnacle do I need to use for the Pinnacle card, so that I can capture in 720 x 576 in a vfw software (Ulead VideoStudio)? That's what I really want to do. Plus use WDM software (PowerVCR)
I have ordered it now. :D

/Swan

[therick]

Ahhhhh! Alright! Now I get it. I knew there was something I was missing. Gosh. That was rough. There is no question that the btwincap drivers should work for you. As I said it is my experience that the pre-5 version Pinnacle drivers suck ass. So go with btwincap. I only had two problems w/ the btwincap drivers-that I would drop 1-2 frames per 1000-always. Never got around that-but this isn't really a problem...I made SVCDs out of that captured material-1-2 drops in 1000 is acceptable. But unfortunately I have no idea how the btwincap drivers play with Ulead. I am sure they play do fine, cause they do fine with VDub. My second problem was btwincap's default color settings. I will see if I can dig up the color settings it took me hours to get with btwincap+PCTV-the default color settings are awful on the PCTV! The defaults look great with my WinTV, but what are you gonna do.

I didn't care for PowerVCR either. Gimme CCEs VBR output at that level any day of the week. I prefer to do my encoding the software way until I can get a realtime hardware mpeg-2 encoder...and even then, I will probably just capture 720x480 @ 9MB/sec and use CCE!

I will have to try this Video Workshop..although I am not sure what my little 950 Duron is gonna be able to do with it...hehe

[Swan]

I didn't care for PowerVCR either. Gimme CCEs VBR output at that level any day of the week. I prefer to do my encoding the software way until I can get a realtime hardware mpeg-2 encoder...and even
I really like PowerVCR. It's the second best Mpeg-2 capturing software on the market (consumer marketI, in my view. It's very reliable and with a few registry tweaks, it is close to perfect.
I would prefer if I could hook the computer to the satellite digital receiver and just "tap" into the mpeg-2 stream that way. One day it will be possible, perhaps it already is? Not with the receiver I have, though. :)

Ahhhhh! Alright! Now I get it. I knew there was something I was missing. Gosh. That was rough. There is no question that the btwincap drivers should work for you.
Hahah!! :-D

But.. No, no! I *don't* want to use Btwincap drivers. The whole reason why I'm buying a new card is that I want a card with the manufacturer's drivers that work (allows capturing at 720 x 576 in vfw software). :-D
Because the Btwincap drivers, which I am using now with the Aver card, *don't work well with VideoStudio*. I can't select any other color space than RGB24 in Ulead's software with the Btwincap drivers. That's crucial, I really *need* to be able to select YUY2. So, unless Pinnacle's *original drivers* work with *vfw software* (VideoStudio, VirtualDub, etc), I am back to where I started. So please, someone.. Please, someone.. Help! :)
Can or can't the Pinnacle card, with Pinnacle's own drivers, capture in full resolution in vfw software, such as VirtualDub?
By full resolution I mean 720 x 576 for PAL and 720 x 480 for NTSC?

/Swan

[therick]

I think the drivers that Bull mentioned will do it- I will test it for you tonight and let you know if they let me get 720x480 in vdub.

[^^-+I4004+-^^]

Originally posted by Swan




Hahah!! :-D

But.. No, no! I *don't* want to use Btwincap drivers. The whole reason why I'm buying a new card is that I want a card with the manufacturer's drivers that work (allows capturing at 720 x 576 in vfw software). :-D


/Swan

now we at least know what is happening!(perhaps we could now have new thread as this one sooo full! of unrelated info & misinfo.....for instance some even say you can't capture with vdub &btwincap drivers....NOT TRUE off course...)

ok .....Swan i don't get you (and it makes me sad cause you're so far away..hehehe)
seriously:you're buying another card just because of drivers???
both have bt8x8 chip,both connect DIRECTLY to the PCI BUS!(i guess you know what that means:problems are JUST DRIVER ISSUE!!!)

on my card i have drivers signed by "Brooktree"...(so they are generic)
they work in vfw mode!and have 768x576 (hi-res enough?)
if they are small enough i can email them to you so give them a try

i myself wouldn't buy card just because i can't find working vfw drivers (although cards are cheap enough...it's more of a principle..)

but as i see that you've ordered it already:then why any questions..you'll see soon enough....(won't you?)

+what's that stuff on mpeg2 capturing?saving space & loosing quality
(my god:bt itself isn't the shiniest star on the capturing heaven & on top of that you compress it real time to mpeg2???)

buy decent hdd instead of capture card,capture raw & convert to anything you wish.....
for viewing purposes you'll still be able to capture to mpeg2....
as you did so far....

btw. "noisy image" has nothing with card itself!
use video-in (no tuner)
i use that i loong cables:no signal loss....

and perhaps you could be more precise and stay on topic:
just tell us what do you wan't,what happened to your system
(that changed previous situation),hardware ,software....
perhaps that way we could help you even better...
(you leave the essay's to me....hehehe)

cheers_

[Swan]

Dear ^^-+I4004+-^^

Swan i don't get you (and it makes me sad cause you're so far away..hehehe)
I see that you are concerned about my mental health and I am touched. ;)
Don't worry, I am fine. :)

both have bt8x8 chip,both connect DIRECTLY to the PCI BUS!(i guess you know what that meansroblems are JUST DRIVER ISSUE!!!)
Yes, I am buying a new card. And yes, it's mainly because of the lousy drivers that came with the Aver card. And because the Btwincap drivers won't let me do what I want: select YUY2 in Videostudio.
This is what I want to do. Capturing deinterlaced is not my thang.
Capturing using other compressions is not my thang. I spend a lot of time capturing and I capture a lot from the TV everyday. I know what I want and how I want to do it. :)

I think I have a different approach to video capturing than the majority of you guys that post here. I am totally for Mpeg-2 capturing and also I only want to capture interlaced. I output to the TV and actually use the computer instead of the SVHS video I have. The quality is so much better, it's amazing. I can't tell the difference on the captured clip and the live broadcast.
I am *not* knocking how others capture. I just want to make that clear.

myself wouldn't buy card just because i can't find working vfw drivers (although cards are cheap enough...it's more of a principle..)
Ever since I bought the Aver card and struggled with their support, who offended my intelligence, I've felt that I bought a card, without any drivers or software. It was all crap, all of it. Until I installed Btwincap drivers. Only then could I actually use the card as I had intended when I bought it. All was well until I noticed weird artifacts in the videos I captured and realized it was because I could not select any other color space but RGB24. I mailed the author of Btwincap and he said it works for him (selecting YUY2) in Ulead Mediastudio. So, there is nothing more I can do but buy another card, with better drivers. My principle is that life is short and capturing video is the most fun I've had in years. It's not that expensive, the Pinnacle card. And if it doesn't work, I'll send it back. :) The card will not be available until the first of October, so if the tests a guy was good enough to offer show that I won't be able to use the card as I want, then I can cancel the order.

+what's that stuff on mpeg2 capturing?saving space & loosing quality
Look, man.. :)
I don't think I need to defend myself, I know what I'm doing and why. But FYI I have an 80 gigabyte drive, dedicated to video capturing. Each night I capture an hour long show and even with Mpeg-2 compression that file is 3 gigs large. Then, I capture loads from Vh1 and cut out the videos I want. Those are also saved on that drive. See what I mean? It builds up and after a while I only have 20 gigs left or so. It would not be possible for me to capture avi-huffuv style because the drive would fill up too fast and it would also mean a lot of extra work for me. Because I can't save the huge avi-huff file. It has to be compressed into something. I don't know why you're so keen on questioning me and and my method of capturing video. I don't care, but it's just a bit boring to read it all the time. ;)

btw. "noisy image" has nothing with card itself!
The problems I have can be related to the card itself. Do a search for the thread where I put a link to the grounding problem that occur on some cards with Bt chips.

just tell us what do you wan't,what happened to your system
(that changed previous situation),hardware ,software....

I appreciate that you want to help me. But I have clearly stated what the problem is: with Btwincap drivers, YUY2 color space is no longer selectable in Ulead's software. I've even posted a thread about it. In a different thread, in another forum here, another guy stated that he could only select RGB24 in Ulead's software too. So it's not just me.

and perhaps you could be more precise and stay on topic:
I think I stay on topic. The reason why this thread got so long was that a few kind guys here wanted to help out and and guy and I we kinda misunderstood each other. Also, I gave out some info on WDM and VFW that stretched out a bit.

/Swan

[\AX]

Well i don't know what this discussion is about now...but i can say this. I have had a Pinnacle PCTV for over a year now. It is what comes in a IOMAGIC PC PVR...that only cost 40usd. It's the same thing as a one you buy frrom pinnacle or in a pinnacle box (Ive bought one just to make sure)

You can use the wincap with PCTV just, if not more, effiecently.

Yeh ive tried the 5.01 driver...it's nothign special. I still use the wincap driver.

The ?'s about colorspacing i don't understand. There both supported the same way in either driver.

I have the PCTV still because it's a alternative to my hauppauge.

The PCTV i can capture at 704x480 in both the 5.01 and wincap. I however won't use this driver because i can just have the btwincap driver in my system and it will recongize all bt8x8 cards. Since i have atleast 2 of them i use this one.

I see this thread pointing to driver issue's more than anything.

Also, i have never tried it, but can't you capture in Premiere with cce sp plugin?? that would own over uleadstudio or whatever...and it would be interlaced.

All i can say is that my pctv yields good quality, but in my systme, the hauppague does a better job no matter what driver.

good luck.

[thorazine]

Originally posted by Swan
Yes, I am buying a new card. And yes, it's mainly because of the lousy drivers that came with the Aver card. And because the Btwincap drivers won't let me do what I want: select YUY2 in Videostudio.


If you can't select YUY2 in VideoStudio but you can select it on VirtualDub or other capture apps I would think the problem lies with Ulead's software. I tried VideoStudio some time ago and I'm quite sure that it worked in YUY2 (even in YV12 or I420 IIRC) for me too so maybe something is wrong in your setup?

Also, don't know what version you are using but Ulead changed their MPEG plugin from Ligos to MPEG.now in the latest version. Could it be that MPEG.now only accepts RGB24 no matter what the drivers are offering?

[^^-+I4004+-^^]

>I see that you are concerned about my mental health and I am touched. ;)
Don't worry, I am fine. :)

_no,i ment it quite literally!(not metaphorically!)

just a joke...




>I am totally for Mpeg-2 capturing and also I only want to capture interlaced.


_ANY resolution above yyyx288 is interlaced:nothing to do with mpeg2 etc._and as we talked in another thread (bigger than this one...hehe)
i got that correctly on my tv-out....why don't you set divx or xvid bitrate real high (as with mpeg2) perhaps it will be better than mpeg2 & smaller?
(and get rid of that matrox card...hehehe..i didn't read the post to the end (too long) did you got your interlaced xvid correctly to tv?(just yes or no....i don't wan't to worsen things even more...heheh)


>The card will not be available until the first of October, so if the tests a guy was good enough to offer show that I won't be able to use the card as I want, then I can cancel the order.

_i didn't do a whole lot of research on this ,but i think some good vfw drivers could be found.(as i've said prehaps from my card)..i know you already are at the "edge" with all that avertv problems etc.,but what if they are repeated with
pinnacle?( i guess you'll be able to return it to salesman?)




>See what I mean? It builds up and after a while I only have 20 gigs left or so.



_yeap!i know that feeling! (i have 35Gb partition (not just )for capturing : it's always full!heheh
so sometimes i use mjpeg at 15....(for hi-res even that "passes" some
(crude) quality tests....)

do you left that in mpeg2 form (& burn that on cd's?)_
(not waiting for the "blu-ray" (hehe)?


>It would not be possible for me to capture avi-huffuv style because the drive would fill up too fast and it would also mean a lot of extra work for me. Because I can't save the huge avi-huff file. It has to be compressed into something. I don't know why you're so keen on questioning me and and my method of capturing video. I don't care, but it's just a bit boring to read it all the time. ;)


_perhaps we thought that you're encoding that to divx or xvid?
& were conserned for your eyes(?)...heheh
offcourse: capture as you will...
i have a different approach:my vhs is still a workhorse:only anything worthy goes to CD's:so i re-record same VHS tapes (constantly) & burn CD's (also constantly..hehe)

off course that i also sometimes capture directly from tv,but i find this to be more hazardous than recording to vhs (powercuts, OS crashes, software problems..etc)
for me PC saved a lot of money i would spend buying videotapes : cd's are much cheaper!
(yes,i compress heavily!)

sorry if i offended you!

i'm just surprised that you say s-vhs has worse picture than PC video capturing....but i'll believe you...(there are some lousy vcr's..hehe)


>The problems I have can be related to the card itself. Do a search for the thread where I put a link to the grounding problem that occur on some cards with Bt chips.


_you mean shielding the tuner?
i'm not taking tuner in account for good quality capturing....



>I appreciate that you want to help me. But I have clearly stated what the problem is: with Btwincap drivers, YUY2 color space is no longer selectable in Ulead's software. I've even posted a thread about it. In a different thread, in another forum here, another guy stated that he could only select RGB24 in Ulead's software too. So it's not just me.

_do you have dual-boot?is this samo on every OS?
if ALL other software can select YUY2 than Ulead is problem....
how about this:btwincap drivers have "apply" button ( as i can remember.. )->set format to yuy2 & "apply" ( perhaps Ulead just offers what it got from driver? )
could it be this simple (?)

>I think I stay on topic. The reason why this thread got so long was that a few kind guys here wanted to help out and and guy and I we kinda misunderstood each other. Also, I gave out some info on WDM and VFW that stretched out a bit.

_yes,that was valuable info for many entering the capturing world...

cheers

Ivo

[Swan]

thorazine If you can't select YUY2 in VideoStudio but you can select it on VirtualDub or other capture apps I would think the problem lies with Ulead's software. I tried VideoStudio some time ago and I'm quite sure that it worked in YUY2 (even in YV12 or I420 IIRC) for me too so maybe something is wrong in your setup?
Could be. But I don't think so. I tried everything, installing, uninstalling, registry hunting, ini-file hunting etc, etc. Nothing fixes the unavailable YUY2 setting. I also mailed Ulead's tech support three times and they do not respond. After I had a discussion with another Btwincap driver user in another Forum, he confirmed that he had the same problem in Ulead Mediastudio. Also, what speaks against Btwincap, in this case, is that with the original WDM drivers, all color spaces were available. If you want to see what the problematic selection boxes look like, I've put screen shots here:
http://w1.837.telia.com/~u83704167/formats/
I am aware of the ULead MpegNow patch. It's an essential patch to install, for quality reasons. Ligos' encoding filters are poor.
I have also installed the available patches for the other Ulead Video products, BTW.
About the versions and programs I am using:
1. Ulead VideoStudio 6
2. Ulead DVD Workshop 1.2
3. Ulead MediaStudio 6.5
Videostudio is the best for me. DVD Workshop gives the same quality on the captured files, but VideoStudio has a setting to force Preview (not Overlay) during capture, so I can see what I am doing. In DVD Workshop, the capture window goes black when I hit record.
I must also rectify my statements about Ulead VideoStudio and DVD Worsksop being Vfw based software. When one captures with these programs, one selects the "plug-in" to be used. The programs offer both DirectShow based plug-ins and VFW plug-ins, so I am not so sure about what I said earlier (that it's vfw based).

I have also updated everything else I could think of; installed the latest Via-4-in-1, DirectX 8.1, etc.

\AX
Also, i have never tried it, but can't you capture in Premiere with cce sp plugin?? that would own over uleadstudio or whatever...and it would be interlaced.
I have not tried that. But I don't get along with Premiere. I wouldn't want to pay for it. Its design is not geared towards analog capturing and in the tests I did it often hung. :)

^^-+I4004+-^^ i got that correctly on my tv-out....why don't you set divx or xvid bitrate real high (as with mpeg2) perhaps it will be better than mpeg2 & smaller?
I tried that, on the suggestion of another user in another Forum. He gave me the settings he used, he had a P4 2 GHz. I have an Athlon XP 1900+.
However, I could not use his suggestions for settings. I guess my CPU is not powerful enough. :) And to achieve the same quality I get with my Mpeg-2 captures, I needed to set very high bitrates in the Xvid settings. And as soon as I did that, I dropped a lot of frames, etc. It just doesn't work for me. Mpeg-2 works best for me.

and get rid of that matrox card...hehehe..i didn't read the post to the end (too long) did you got your interlaced xvid correctly to tv?(just yes or no....i don't wan't to worsen things even more...heheh)
The Matrox card works fine. I really like the "DVD Max" feature. I am not using it to capture with and as a 2-D graphics card and tv-out card, it's all I need.
Yes, interlaced TV-out on the Matrox works brilliantly with Mpeg-2, also with that Xvid encoded clip of 480 x 576.

do you left that in mpeg2 form (& burn that on cd's?)_

Why don't one of us create a new thread? About what we capture, in what format, and what we do with the files we capture? :)
If you don't create that thread, I will. I'd love to know what others here are capturing and how they deal with the file size problems of high-quality capturing on a daily basis. :)


i'm just surprised that you say s-vhs has worse picture than PC video capturing....but i'll believe you...(there are some lousy vcr's..hehe)
It's a good VCR, no doubt it's much better than any previous hi-fi VCR I've had. But I don't think *any* consumer VCR can achieve the same quality as a high-quality capture.

_do you have dual-boot?is this samo on every OS?
I run Windows 2000 SP3. Don't have any other OS to try it on.

how about this:btwincap drivers have "apply" button ( as i can remember.. )->set format to yuy2 &
If I could set the default to YUY2 in the driver itself, then that would be neat. I have not figured out how to do that, I don't think it is possible. If it is, I'd love to know how to do it.

/Swan

[^^-+I4004+-^^]

Swan.....
when selecting format (of btwincap) in vdub...the "apply"
button will activate if format change is detected...

so if it was set to rgb,change to yuy2 & hit "apply"
then see what happens in your capturing software....hope it helps..

ie. connect to btwincap driver through vdub....

btw.i don't remember what happened to your system?
you were pretty satisfied with mpeg2 capturing
how come all of a sudden that you cannot capture like before?

i don't remember you talking about it preciesly...
(but i cannot remember a lot of other stuff too...hehe
too much on my mind...)

Ivo

[Swan]

If you want to take a look at what the junk (lines) I get when capturing in RGB24 looks like, I've uploaded some screen shots here:
http://w1.837.telia.com/~u83704167/formats/rgb24.htm
I've tested and verified that these lines do not occur when capturing in YUY2 (tested with Amcap). When you see the screen shots you will be horrified :)

when selecting format (of btwincap) in vdub...the "apply"
I tried that, but it did not stick. When starting up Videostudio, RGB24 was selected and YUY2 unavailable.

btw.i don't remember what happened to your system?
1. Avermedia's drivers did not allow me to capture in 720 x 576 in any other software than its own junk (AverTV) and in PowerVCR.
I wanted to use other software (VirtualDub, Avi-Io, Ulead Videostudio, etc). With Aver drivers, only 352 x 288 was available.
I could select any color space, including YUY2 in VideoStudio.

2. I wanted to capture in 720 x 576 in Videostudio, VirtualDub, etc. I installed Btwincap drivers. Now, I can capture at 720 x 576, but I can't select YUY2. I can't select anything and RGB24 is the only available color space in VideoStudio.

This is my problem. I can't select color space in Ulead VideoStudio.
Screenshots: http://w1.837.telia.com/~u83704167/formats/

/Swan

[thorazine]

Originally posted by Swan
thorazine
Could be. But I don't think so. I tried everything, installing, uninstalling, registry hunting, ini-file hunting etc, etc. Nothing fixes the unavailable YUY2 setting. I also mailed Ulead's tech support three times and they do not respond. After I had a discussion with another Btwincap driver user in another Forum, he confirmed that he had the same problem in Ulead Mediastudio. Also, what speaks against Btwincap, in this case, is that with the original WDM drivers, all color spaces were available. If you want to see what the problematic selection boxes look like, I've put screen shots here:
http://w1.837.telia.com/~u83704167/formats/
I am aware of the ULead MpegNow patch. It's an essential patch to install, for quality reasons. Ligos' encoding filters are poor.
I have also installed the available patches for the other Ulead Video products, BTW.
About the versions and programs I am using:
1. Ulead VideoStudio 6
2. Ulead DVD Workshop 1.2
3. Ulead MediaStudio 6.5
Videostudio is the best for me. DVD Workshop gives the same quality on the captured files, but VideoStudio has a setting to force Preview (not Overlay) during capture, so I can see what I am doing. In DVD Workshop, the capture window goes black when I hit record.
I must also rectify my statements about Ulead VideoStudio and DVD Worsksop being Vfw based software. When one captures with these programs, one selects the "plug-in" to be used. The programs offer both DirectShow based plug-ins and VFW plug-ins, so I am not so sure about what I said earlier (that it's vfw based).

I have also updated everything else I could think of; installed the latest Via-4-in-1, DirectX 8.1, etc.



Have you tried iuVCR? I get similar weird options when selecting color spaces with the latest iuVCR version: instead of getting empty spaces I get several copies of each color space in the drop down box. Something like:

RGB24
RGB24
RGB24
RGB24
RGB24
YUY2
YUY2
YUY2
YUY2
YUY2
YVU9
YVU9
YVU9
YVU9
YVU9

(I can't post a pic right now, sorry)
Selecting one of them does not work, not only that but also sets the capture dimension to 0x1 pixels!!!
I mailed both Eduardo J Tagle and Ivan Uskov and Eduardo answered that it was a problem with iuVCR colorspace dialog box; Ivan didn't acknowledged, just recommended a workaround to access the native WDM dialog box. At the moment I believed Eduardo's answer, that it was an application problem, being iuVCR the only one affected, but if Ulead's apps are also problematic it could be a driver bug as you suggested.

Also, I must say I tried Ulead VideoStudio months ago, shortly after it came out, so I was for sure using different btwincap drivers version at that time.

[Swan]

I'll download IuVCR and see if the phenomena occurs there as well. Hopefully it's a new version and hopefully it will let me try it out. I tested it a while ago and then it behaved very oddly. As soon as I entered the selection window where one sets the resolution, the window hung the application. Had to kill it with the Task Manager. It just froze, as soon as I tried to change the capture res. I tried a while later, then IuVCR said it had expired! :(

Also, I must say I tried Ulead VideoStudio months ago, shortly after it came out, so I was for sure using different btwincap drivers version at that time.
I think it came out in February or March this year.
How much would you like for testing it with Btwincap drivers and selecting YUY2 again? ;)

/Swan

[\AX]

You could try opening up your driver...finding all the spot's relative to rgb24...and replace them with yuy2 or whatever you want. This way the driver could only perform in a certain mode. If it still makes you choose rgb24...then your fuc't. But i would try to edit the driver before i went any further. Or maybe find one that only supports yuyv ro whatever.

Or you could replace the value of rgb24 with yuy2 and then select rgb24 but really it is yuy2...you understand.

Im not a guru programmer or anythign...yet. Im currently in school for it..know alittle c++ and java (and visualGaysic). Ive tried to make my own bt8x8 driver once...failed miserably...although i got it to appear fine...it wouldn't capture.

If i where you i would jst try to simple replace the value of rgb24 with the one yuy2 or whatever in hex. That way you would be tricking it. This shouldnt be that hard to due...i will try it later this week when i get soem hours.

[Swan]

thorazine
Have you tried iuVCR? I get similar weird options when selecting color spaces with the latest iuVCR version: instead
I downloaded and installed iuVCR. 4.0.0.230 (the latest, not the beta).
It won't even start. I get a cute error window when I start the software saying "EAccess Violation". Sigh! :-(

You could try opening up your driver...finding all the spot's relative to rgb24...and replace them with yuy2 or
OK. But what file would that be, you think?
What files does btwincap install?
bt848.sys is the only one I recall seeing.

If anyone has the time, I'd really appreciate if you could try VideoStudio 6 and see if you can select YUY2 with Btwincap drivers. If no one can, then perhaps Eduardo, who wrote the Btwincap drivers, can be persuaded to look into it. :)

/Swan

[thorazine]

OK you owe me 1 million dollars ;)
I downloaded and installed Video Studio again: I get only RGB24 as you do and a bunch of empty spaces in the colorspace list.
But I found some kind of workaround that may be suited for your needs: you can directly access the DirectShow capture and preview pins from the capture properties menu option in the Options button in the Capture tab: and from there you can choose all of the colorspaces available on the driver including YUY2. You will be limited to the native Dshow resolutions, so no 480x576, PAL square pixels or custom resolutions but it should be enough if you just need 720x576.

BTW, this is what Eduardo Jose Tagle has to say about this issue (copy & paste from the FAQ):

Q07: Under the video capture/preview format settings of the video app. I am using, I get several times listed each Colorspace format (YUY2, YUYV, YV12, etc). Why?
A: This is a problem with your video app. The program is listing ALL the formats the driver supports, without taking into account that some of them are unavailable because they don´t apply to the current video standard (NTSC, PAL, etc) that the video decoder is using right now. DirectShow SDK tells somewhere that you must check that the format is available to the current video standard. Nevertheless, the driver will function properly, but if you capture at a frame resolution higher than supported, or at a framerate higher than allowed, you will probably dropped frames or a black border to the right of the image. Simply tell the app. author to fix it. I am doing it the right way.

This is a good explanation for the iuVCR problem, I'm not sure if Ulead's is the same but they look quite similar to me.
Good luck trying to convince Ulead they are wrong and this guy is right (I tried to convince Ivan Uskow and failed miserably and I bet Ulead's engineers will be much harder to contact ;)

[Swan]

OK you owe me 1 million dollars
:) But, yeah. I would actually pay for a driver that worked with Ulead's doftware.

I downloaded and installed Video Studio again: I get only RGB24 as you do and a bunch of empty spaces in the colorspace list.
Sigh! But also, good! Then I know for sure, three people have now tested and verified that the problem I have is real. Thank you so much!

But I found some kind of workaround that may be suited for your needs: you can directly access the DirectShow capture and preview pins from the capture properties menu option in the Options button in the Capture tab:
Thorazine, I don't understand how?
Under Options, I have the following subs categories:
1. Capture Options (here one sets only "Capture to Library" and "Use Preview Mode")
2. Video Format (RGB24 is the only one available, but I can select various resolutions)
3. Input Source (setting the input to composite, tuner, etc)
4. Capture Properties (setting the brightness, contrast, sharpness, etc)
5. MPEG Settings (where one controls the compression aspects, GOPS, audio and video bitrate, etc).

Where have you been able to directly access the Directshow capture and Preview pins?
I have version 6.01.0000 (with the MpegNow patch).

I'm not sure if Ulead's is the same but they look quite similar to me.
Not to me :)

Good luck trying to convince Ulead they are wrong and this guy is right (I tried to convince Ivan Uskow
I don't trust that someone is right just because they say they are right. ;)
It has to do with the drivers, in this case I am sure. Because color space selection worked (with Aver's drivers). It was not until I installed Btwincap drivers that RGB24 became the only available color space in Ulead's software. Also, now three people have verified that this is a problem with Ulead's software and Btwincap drivers. When I mailed him, the author of Btwincap claimed it works for him (in MediaStudio 6.5). So, I've got nowhere to turn.

/Swan

[thorazine]

Originally posted by Swan

Thorazine, I don't understand how?
Under Options, I have the following subs categories:
1. Capture Options (here one sets only "Capture to Library" and "Use Preview Mode")
2. Video Format (RGB24 is the only one available, but I can select various resolutions)
3. Input Source (setting the input to composite, tuner, etc)
4. Capture Properties (setting the brightness, contrast, sharpness, etc)
5. MPEG Settings (where one controls the compression aspects, GOPS, audio and video bitrate, etc).

Where have you been able to directly access the Directshow capture and Preview pins?

In the Capture Properties: by default it selects Video Capture Filter but if you open the Property Type dropdown box you should see all the directshow filters involved in the capture including the capture and preview pins.

Originally posted by Swan

I don't trust that someone is right just because they say they are right. ;)
It has to do with the drivers, in this case I am sure. Because color space selection worked (with Aver's drivers). It was not until I installed Btwincap drivers that RGB24 became the only available color space in Ulead's software. Also, now three people have verified that this is a problem with Ulead's software and Btwincap drivers. When I mailed him, the author of Btwincap claimed it works for him (in MediaStudio 6.5). So, I've got nowhere to turn.


Well, if you can select YUY2 with the standard directshow dialog but not with Ulead's dialog I think it's clear where the problem is ;)

[Swan]

Thorazine!

How can I thank you?
It appears to work! :D
I've been messing with VideoStudio and this problem for so long that I've become blind to the fact that the Capture Properties was a drop down box! Ohh, thank you!
You made my day.

It seems that after selecting YUY2 in the DirectShow filters options (the default is RGB24 and a frame rate of 1, by the way), one must not even breathe on any of the other settings in the main preferences of the software itself, or it will reset to RGB24 again. But this is a workaround and as long as one is careful when one sets the options in the DirectShow filters, I'm sure will work out fine.

/Swan