Card for capturing TV shows?

[Michelle Cox]

I hate to post another “choose a card for me” message, but I’ve spent months wading through way too much information and I’m no closer to knowing what I want. Every time I decide on a card, I read something that tells me I don’t want it. One thing I have decided is that I really like the Matrox dual-head display, so I decided to try posting here.

I am looking for a card to capture TV shows (NTSC) off of cable and VHS. I don’t plan on putting them back on VHS or playing in a DVD player. I just want to put them on CDs and play them on my computer. So I want to get the best quality possible to put one episode (around 45 minutes) on one CD. I need to capture into an editable format because I want to remove the commercials.

Here’s my system specs:

PIII-600 (not upgradable)
Nvidia TNT-A video card (not sure how much memory)
IBM Deskstar 20.4GB 7200RPM
128MB memory (Can go to 256 if it would help)
Windows 98SE

Video card is AGP and I have a free PCI slot.

Planning on adding an IBM Deskstar 45GB 7200RPM for video

20” TV and VCR (not combo) near my computer

The latest thing I had “decided” on was the Matrox Marvel G450 E-TV. I was just waiting for it to be released and then I found this forum. A post mentioned that it won’t capture full screen with my system speed. It also captures to MPEG and, if I’m not mistaken, that’s not editable. If I understand the process correctly, I need to capture to AVI, then remove the commercials, then encode it to MPEG.

I want to get something that will replace my video card because it can’t output to the TV. Ideally, I’d like to play the video on my computer but send it to the TV while my normal desktop is on my monitor. The all in one solutions are preferable, but if I would get better quality getting a new video card and a separate capture card, that’s do-able.

One other thing that would be nice, but not an absolute requirement is a card that ignores the macrovision. I just want to be able to take my movies with me on trips to play on my laptop. I don’t have a DVD player, so getting the DVD versions isn’t an option. That part’s not a big deal to me, but would be a perk.

My budget is up to around $300 US, but preferably less than $250. What card(s) do you recommend?

Thanks,

Michelle

[bongo]

I would buy the ATI wonder pro...decent tuner card..good TV capture..edits analog..AND allows you to IGNORE MACROVISION. Something that still bums me out with my G400 as I have an old TV and must plug it thru my VCR to watch DVD's...friends with the ATI love it. Not bitchin' just reportin'.

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"Every minute I stay in this room, I get weaker. And every minute Charlie squats in the bush, he gets stronger. "

ABit BE6 II UDMA 66 w/ PentiumIII 500mhz
Matrox G400 DH 32 meg MAX
Maxtor 13gig UDMA66 7200 Seagate 9gig UDMA33 7200
SBlaster Live Mp3+ (with gold connectors and robot voice
Aureal Vortex SuperQuad2500
19" PF790 Viewsonic (superb flat screen)
19" Samsung 950p (amazing quality for the price)
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Pioneer DVD 114 10x40x
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3COM ADSL HOME CONNECT WarpMODEM
One big case fan and standard retail CPU/HS cooling
MicroSofty Optical IntelliMouse Explorer (sheesh, who would have thought a mouse could make such a difference)
ACK 580 crdless k/b

[Anatoly Neverov]

AVER TVPhone is not bad. I have had the one and it worked just perfectly. It is PCI device, has VHS and S-VHS connectors for capture from videocamera or VCR, and FM tuner.

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Anatoly Neverov
Minsk, Belarus

[Michelle Cox]

Ok, I guess I wasn't very clear in my post. I want the dual display capability. The ATI doesn't have that and that AVER card is so old it doesn't look like it's sold anymore.

I was hoping to get information on which Matrox card(s) to buy. There are so many different versions and it's confusing to try and figure out which has what.

I was looking at the G450 and the RR card, but then I saw a footnote that they won't work together. The G450 E-TV doesn't do some of what I want to do. Some people are saying the older G400 cards are actually better. I'm going through the Matrox site trying to sort this out, but they don't make it very easy.

So, any more advice?

Thanks,

Michelle

[Dr Mordrid]

At this point in time a DualHead Matrox G450 for display and the Hauppage WinTV for capturing would be a very nice combination. The second head of the G450 could be used for either a TV monitor or VGA, depending on your requirements.

The Hauppage could capture using any number of softcodecs such as PICVideo MJPeg or HuffYUV. HuffYUV can then be turned into beautiful MPEG's using TMPGEnc.

Dr. Mordrid


[This message has been edited by Dr Mordrid (edited 02 January 2001).]

[Michelle Cox]

Dr. Mordrid:

So am I correct in that the G450 doesn't have a video in? I was thinking that I could get that card and use my VCR for the tuning, but I couldn't find any mention of video in on the site.

I'll take another look at the Hauppauge cards. The one I was looking at was the WinTV-PVR, but that is an all-in-one solution and I would really like to have the Matrox card for the dual display.

One thing I haven't been able to figure out about the dual head is if it's possible to put a program on the second display (TV) that isn't on the main monitor? I would like to be able to put something like Media Player in full screen mode and have that full screen on the TV while still having use of the desktop for other programs. Is this possible?

Thanks,

Michelle

[Dr Mordrid]

Only the Marvel G400-TV or a G400 with the Rainbor Runner-G addon have video in capability.

The Marvel also has a TV tuner and many other nice features like a breakout box with composite and S-Video in/outputs and a cable TV connector. Where it's at a disadvantage vs. the G450/WinTV setup is that its second head is used up by the breakout box and is unavailable for use with VGA monitors. If this isn't a problem then the Marvel G400-TV may well be suitable for your uses. I have 4 of them myself.

An example of dualhead flexibility is that the Matrox Dualheads will provide, Marvel included, the ability to play virtually any codec to the video output given proper formatting using the Dualhead/DVDMax feature. This allows you to use a much wider choice of output codecs for your projects.

The multitude of ways I've put this to work would take a book to document. One is the capturing of lossless HuffYUV clips that then are encoded into high quality MPEG-2 (or DivX) for storage and output to tape. These are much smaller than the Marvels native MJPeg files.

As for your question about sending MediaPlayer to the second display, why bother? When Dualhead/DVDMax is enabled everything MediaPlayer plays is sent to the video output and recordable. Of course this works best when you format the video to the proper aspect ratio and frame size, but that isn't too hard.

Dr. Mordrid



[This message has been edited by Dr Mordrid (edited 02 January 2001).]

[Michelle Cox]

I guess I need to learn more about the dual-head. I wanted to send MediaPlayer to the second display simply because I didn't realize there was another way. I've been wandering the Matrox site for a while, but what I've found seems to be more oriented to press releases than the nitty-gritty details. Maybe I'm looking in the wrong spot?

At this point, not being able to use a monitor for a second display isn't a problem, but it's hard to say if I'd need it in the future. One thing that bothers me about the G400-TV is that it's more expensive than the G450 E-TV is supposed to be. Is there a reason for this?

Well, at least you've narrowed it down to two options. I guess at this point, the best thing I can do is look at the G400-TV VS the G450/WinTV and figure out the pros and cons. Unless you know a URL that has already done this?

Thanks for your help,

Michelle

[Anatoly Neverov]

I also was fluctuating between G400-TV and G450 E-TV. I have chosen G400-TV because of one and only reason: MJPEG format is better for edition than MPEG2. Besides, G400-TV allows to capture not only in its native RGB MJPEG, but in various other formats, including YUY2. I am not sure if G450 allows that. In all the rest those cards, as far as I understand, are identical.

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Anatoly Neverov
Minsk, Belarus

[wkulecz]

All I can add is if Windows 2000 is in your future plans I wouldn't buy anything with video on it from ATI or Matrox right now. Neither has decent w2k drivers. I've heard mixed reports about the Radeon-TV, but since it looks like the've orphaned the rest of the AIW line, its a strech to expect it to work with "whistler" 6-8 months from now.

--wally

[Michelle Cox]

Anatoly - Yes, the E-TV definitely doesn't meet my needs. Now I'm trying to decide between the G400-TV and the G450 with a seperate TV card.

wkulecz - I've decided to stick with Win98SE. I like W2k, but there are too many compatibility issues with hardware to make it practical to use at home. I'm hoping Whistler addresses these issues, but not holding my breath.

Thanks,

Michelle

[bongo]

Michelle...another option is to get the ATI wonder pro and a sexond cheapo ATI card for your PCI slot...that way you will have macrovision cracked, unlike the matrox...which makes me wonder why matrox could not allow a macrovision bypass on the G450...and also why the dualhead with the Marvel DOES NOT ALLOW for 2 computer monitors to be hooked up..only one monitor and one TV...not 2 cmptr monitors...

[Michelle Cox]

bongo - I hadn't looked at the Pro because of the Radeon being released. So I just took a quick look at it. It says it captures to MPEG-2. I don't want that. I want to capture AVI.

If I'm going to go the two card option, I think I would be better off with a Matrox video card and a PCI TV tuner. My worry with the two card option, though, is that my free PCI slot is right next to the video card. I heard that they share IRQs and that can cause problems.

The macrovision part would be nice, but isn't my biggest concern. Most of what I will encode is TV shows and they don't have macrovision.

Thanks,

Michelle

[bongo]

Looks like you answered your own questions...glad I could help

[Michel Carleer]

Michelle,
Just to add to the confusion, but this is a quite expensive solution:
I am using a Pinnacle PCTV Pro for TV viewing. The internal tuner output is connected to the composite input of a Pinnacle DV500. I capture directly in DV format at 720x576 full PAL res, edit with Premiere and then, if necessary, recompress to MPEG1 to put on CDs. Or record to tape through the breakout box of the DV500. Additionally, the S-Video out of my Marvel G400 is connected to the S-Video in of the DV500, so that I can also capture scenes from any DVD played through the DVDMax output. I am not using the RR-G part of the Marvel anymore because of unusable drivers under W2K and a really too bad TV picture quality, so a simple G400 would be just as good for me.
Michka