Best capture card and method for VHS to DiVX?

[Vantage]

Hi everybody, I have a collection of about 700+ off-air VHS recordings which I would like to convert to both DiVX and DVD format. The DiVX files will be stored on an external hard drive (or drives!) and obviously the DVDs will be on DVDs.

I have been experimenting with a Lite-On DVD recorder, taking the SCART output from my Samsung video recorder, and putting it into the Lite-On, but a lot of my older tapes (about 15 years old, if not more) have an overabundance of red when viewed through the Lite-On. When put straight into my TV, they are much better. I presume this is because the Lite-On is amplifying that part of the signal for some reason.

Anyway, having experimented with a standalone DVD recorder, I've realised that I really need to use a PC to adequately edit my tapes, as many of them have 50 odd music videos on them, etc. and I'd like to be able to individually capture each music video as a single DiVX file.

Can anybody recommend the best quality video capture card I should buy? I don't mind spending up to £400, as this project will take me a couple of years at least, to go through all my tapes, and I will then sell the capture card for (hopefully) about 50% of its purchase price.
Or should I try using an external capture box? I have a second PC which I use as a backup PC, which I can use for the capturing and editing process, so it doesn't matter if the converting is 100% done in software - all I'm concerned about is getting the best version of the VHS signal into the PC in the first place. Should I consider buying a TBC like the CTB100G? A website that sells it (I don't know if I can link directly to the shop here) shows an example of it taking a colour saturated screen and making it normal again.
I only have this saturation problem on a couple of the clips I've looked at so far, and they are on really old tapes, but I don't mind spending money on a CTB100G if it will help me get the best possible results, as I will eventually no longer need it when I've finished converting all of the tapes, and can then sell it.

Should I invest in a better video recorder for playback purposes? I have four recorders, a Toshiba, a Samsung, a ProLine and a Sharp - all of them are just your common or garden models, but all give out perfectly good pictures.

Many thanks in advance for any help anybody can give.

[Vantage]

I'm happy to say that I've found a solution to my problem, and it was dirt cheap! I bought a Philips TV card from Ebid.co.uk, which uses a 7130 chip, for about £14. (FOURTEEN pounds!) It has brightness, saturation, contrast, and sharpness controls built in, will record to MPEG 1, 2 and 4, and AVI, and I have recorded the tape I had problems with before, using the Philips card, and all the colour saturation problems have gone, so it was obviously the Lite-On DVD recorder that was the problem.
I plan on recording everything as AVI files, then editing them to DiVX files, to get the smallest files with the best quality. (I already have DiVX which cost me about £12 IIRC).
I can then just rename each DiVX file and put them into folders according to subject, such as Music, Comedy, General, Documentaries, etc. and then I'll create an Excel file which has the name of every recording, and where it's stored, so I can easily find anything.

I am, to say the least, VERY impressed by the Philips card. Great stuff!

[guns1inger]

What sort of avi files ?

AVI is a container format. How the data is stored within it is defined by the codec. It can be heavily compressed - Divx/Xvid, losslessly compressed - Lagarith, Huffyuv etc, or uncompressed. Or somewhere in between. The codec you choose (and the settings you use) will determine the quality of the cpature, the size of the captured file, and the load you will have to put on your system to encode it.

You may wish to run some tests before you get too crazy.

[Moontrash]

Hauppauge 150

https://www.videohelp.com/capturecards/hauppauge-wintv-pvr-150/503

[Vantage]

Thanks for your replies. I don't know what sort of AVI files it captures, but they are BIG. I think it says something like 28GB per hour, when you select it. I used DiVX Author to convert one of the AVI clips to DiVX and it was very fast and exactly the same quality as the original AVI file, but the original AVI file was around 650MB and the DiVX conversion was 24MB!

But I've now discovered the card (or the software at least) only records mono sound, (see my other post) so I'm looking for a new card, and I'll definitely investigate the Hauppauge 150, Moontrash. Thanks for the tip.

I'm keen to convert everything to DiVX format though, and I see that the Hauppauge 150 captures as MPEG 1 and 2, I'd rather have a card that either captures to lossless AVI (whatever you call it!) or direct to DiVX.

[shads]

I know it's not a card but check this out...

http://www.canopus.com/products/ADVC110/index.php

https://www.videohelp.com/capturecards/canopus-advc-110/495

http://www.amazon.com/CANOPUS-77010150100-Canopus-ADVC110-Converter/dp/B00030ATTO

[Vantage]

Thanks for the links Shads, that looks interesting too. It doesn't have to be a card, basically anything that works is what I want!

[shads]

Vantage-

I built a second PC from and unused MB, mem and HD at work. I had to buy the case and PS and I got the ATI AIW 9800 Pro from a friend who works for ATI (He gets new ones for almost nothing). One of the reasons I built it was to record programing from TV. I have Verizon Fios (fiberoptic) TV and the picture output to the ATI is perfect. The quality of the ATI recording though is crap! It has horizontal lines and noise. My 10 year old VCR does a better job. He and I had tried over 10 different driver combinations with different degrees of "crappiness". His new X1900 AIW does the same thing on his PC so its not my PC. I haven't taken the plunge on the Canopus yet but after my long research, it looks like the best out there for the price. Remember, it needs a powered firewire connection. I don't have one so I have to get this as well...

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16815103103

Good luck and let us know if you go for it.

[Vantage]

Well, after much too-ing and fro-ing, I've bought a Pinnacle Studio Deluxe 8, and also a Pinnacle DC10 (because it was very cheap!), and I should get them early next week. Will report back with my results.
Thanks for the heads up about the ATI, Shads.

[DarrellS]

I'm using an old ATI AIW VE 64MB PCI card (7500) in my Windows 2000 machine and after installing the updated MMC software, 9.03 (was informed that the video driver was outdated and needed to be updated also), I'm happy to say that I am able to capture Home Theater quality DivX files (24MB a minute) that look great.

With the new version of Virtualdub (1.7.2 build 27700), I am able to cut commercials and any other unwanted material without having to recode the files. This is great since most of my captures get converted to DivX/XviD anyway to be uploaded or played on my Philips Player.

Updating the drivers and software used to be a nightmare, trying to guess what files to download and install but since AMD took over, the files I downloaded came in one simple installer package.