Capturing standard broadcasts on Hauppauge HD PVR 1212 - which settings?

[Emanef]

I've got a few recordings on my Sky HD box that were from normal channels. The Sky box can upscale them to 720p or 1080i, bt as the broadcast was in 576i it seems pointless capturing at a HD level when my Popcorn can play them at 576i and do teh upscaling.

Would there be any point in capturing with it upscaled to 720p, or should I just stick to 576i?

Cheers guys

[jagabo]

You should try it yourself but the upscaled video is not likely to look any better (it will depend partly on which device has the better upscaler) and will require more bitrate.

[yoda313]

One thing to consider was whether or not these "normal channels" contained surround sound. If they did than it would be worth using the hd pvr to preserve the digital surround sound.

However I am unaware of any cable/sat/fios service that broadcasts 5.1 surround sound on standard definition channels. It would be nice if they did but I don't think they do.

If it is regular stereo than you would probably be best to capture it in one of two ways - turn off the upscaling feature on your hd box - or capture via composite with a normal standard def capture device. That way if its sd to begin with capturing to sd will save you post processing time. Unless your destination is something like a popcorn hour or wdtv media player that can handle different formats.