Directly record from different codec?

[Flying dutchman]

Hi everyone,

has anybody ever succeeded in recording video using a different codec than Matrox' own hardware codec? I've heard that you can use other codecs like Picvideo as well, but in every video recording program I've tried only the Marvel shows up as a recording device. Any hints?

[Grigory]

In vidcap32 application, choose Marvel, set RGB video format, and then choose any software codec in compression dialog.
This may work. However, the inability to use native YUV format as uncompressed output of RR_G and Marvel, limits the performance of software codecs.
With RR_G, the CPU power was used to convert internal YUV to RGB format, which took up to 50% of CPU time.
Furthermore, RGB data is always made from single field - you cannot capture interlaced video.

This technique works with any videotuner card much better, because they do not use CPU for useless conversion to RGB, and can actually capture both fields.

The last example that I have is Canopus DV Raptor analog capture kit that enables to use this card as analog capture device. With Canopus software MJPEG codec, I was able to get good quality at 360x288 PAL.

Grigory