MediaStudio Pro 6.5 & Matrox G450 DH - How record to VHS?

[DAR]

This is my first attempt at doing this, and I am hoping someone can help me.

I am having problems outputting from Mediastudio Pro to VHS tape through my G450 DualHead setup.

Within MediaStudio Pro video Editor, I have a project consisting of 3 large MPEG2 clips that I have assembled on the timeline. I then select
File -> Print to Tape -> Timeline -> Entire Project. When I do this, the MSP preview screen pops up on my primary monitor and the video plays OK (but at half-speed), but nothing happens on the TV screen that I have connected to G450 Head#2.

My G450 DualHead settings are as follows (Matrox driver package 6.82.016):
Everything remains at installation defaults, except that "Dual-Head Multi-Display" shows as "Enabled and active", and "DualHead DVDMax" shows as "Enabled but not currently active".

My AV connections are as follows:
Matrox G450 Head#2 is connected (through Matrox adapter) to RCA video cable which has the other end connected to my VCR Video In.
SoundBlaster PCI 128 Rear Speaker (= unamplified Line Out) stereo jack is connected to an adapter that allows connection of White and Red phono plugs. On the other end, the phono plugs are connected to VCR's Audio In Left (White) and Audio In Right (Red).

I don't think the problem is with my physical AV connections, because I am able to use PowerDVD to play a DVD through the G450 DualHead and out to my TV (which is connected to my VCR) with no problems at all. So I assume my problem is with the configuration of MediaStudio Pro and/or G450 Dual Head.

One more bit of information that might be useful - I have tried using PowerVCR with this setup to try to play a video file (from various sources) to my TV, and it also fails. What happens in this case is that the video image initially shows up on the TV, but then the video seizes up immediately on the TV (but it keeps playing fine on the primary computer monitor).

FWIW, my system also contains a WinTV-Go card installed as per instructions (WDM drivers) which works fine.

I am running Win98 SE, P3-1GHz, 512MB RAM.

Can anyone offer any tips on what I can check to diagnose the problem, and what I can do to fix it so that I can record to VHS?. I would especially like to hear from people with direct experience with same configuration, who have been able to successfully record to VHS. What are your DualHead settings, and what are your MediaStudio Pro settings?

Thanks for any tips or directions anyone can provide. It's been an extremely frustrating experience so far!

[Dr Mordrid]

The key is making DVDMAX active. Set it to use field based scaling and stretch to fit.

This will make eveything that uses DirectShow export to the analog output. This means MSPro 6.5's preview window, MediaPlayer etc. This will include the playback of DV, DVD and SVCD formatted MPEG-2 & VCD. VERY nice feature.

MSPro 6.5 scrubs and Instant Preview will not go to the analog output as they still use the Video for Windows display system. This may well be changed in MSPro 7.

Some codecs (mainly Video for Windows types) will require a frame width evenly divisible by 32 pixels (704, 352 etc.). Examples are DivX, Matrox/PICVideo/Morgan MJPeg, Cinepak, Indeo etc.

Dr. Mordrid

[Fred H]

To be exact, I am running the Marvel G400 TV and MSP6.5 with PIC Video MJPEG codec on Win XP. I did it with W2K and W98SE too.
I can't record to VHS directly from the MSP6.5. I never did it I and asked several times here at the Forum. No ansver.
I use to record to VHS the edited file from PC VCR or Media Player, but no success from MSP6.0 or 6.5.
I know, this is not too much help, but, maybe someone has a good idea to resolv this problem.
Come on boys...

[DAR]

Hi Doc,

I tired your suggestion but it had no effect - still cannot display MSP6.5 "Print to Tape" output on my VCR/TV.

Some observations:

Video played through PowerDVD displays on TV/VCR, full-screen with no problem.
MPEG2 DVD video file on my HD played through PowerVCR II displays on TV/VCR, full-screen with no problem (managed to get this working by unchecking one of DVDMax settings, as per context-sensitive help).
The same MPEG2 DVD video test file, played through Windows Media Player (WMP) 6.4, displays on TV/VCR - BUT image is NOT full-screen - I see the entire window including title bar, and I can drag the window around the TV screen.

Now that got me thinking - started up MSP6.5, dragged one of Windows slightly to the right, and it displays on the TV screen.

So it seems that the TV screen is simply acting as an extended desktop when playing videos through WMP6.4 or MSP6.5 via "Print to Tape" (I should have noticed that TV screen was similar colour to Windows background - Duh!)

Then I created a new project using same MPEG2 DVD video test file - did File -> Print to Tape -> Timeline -> Entire Project - again, the preview window plays the video on the centre of my monitor, but the window cannot be dragged over to the TV screen - it is fixed in place. So no way to get preview video to display on TV/VCR. And even if it could be dragged, this is not satisfactory for recording to VCR because you cannot get rid of the window border or window title bar.

I did a little more digging at Matrox Tech Support forums. According to a Tech Support reply by Haig,

"Note that some codecs/players will not enable our dvdmax if it doesn't use Ddraw overlay."

(See http://forum.matrox.com/mgaforum/For...ML/004030.html for entire thread. Search Matrox TS forum on "Media Studio Dualhead" for more.)

So now I am starting to suspect that maybe the codec invoked by MSP6.5 "Print to Tape" doesn't use Draw overlay? If this is true, then there is no way to get full-screen output to TV/VCR using MSP6.5 "Print to Tape".

Can anyone confirm whether MSP6.5 "Print to Tape" used Ddraw overlay, or know of any way to determine this?

Fred H, maybe this is the reason you (and I) have been unsuccessful in our attempts?

All of this begs the question - what exactly is the intention of the MSP6.5 the "Print to Tape" command, if it cannot output to TV/VCR?

And has ANYONE using Matrox DualHead along with MSP 6.5 with MPEG2-DVD video files been able to successfully use the Matrox DualHead features to record video to VCR or play it to TV full-screen?

[DAR]

Well the problem was with my lack of patience and lack of familiarity with video editing software and principles, not with hardware or software. I did not realize that that the entire video had to finish rendering before it gets displayed. Dual-Head works great for displaying full-screen video on TV, using settings as advised by Dr Mordrid.

I apologize for wasted bandwidth but I hope this posting prevents someone else from wasting a whole bunch of time and even more bandwidth.

The A/V stream going out to the TV is out of sync, but that's another problem!