Looking for advice on capturing with a Laptop, and capture device....

[etecnifibre]

In the past I've used my PC, but after I got a Laptop I like the freedom it offers, so, both of my PCs are growing old and I really don't feel like getting them back up and running again. My PC that works well still has an ATI AIW 9600XT. I've always used Ulead Video Studio, I think the version was 10, which was simple to use and produced the results I wanted. I capture basketball games and make a simple highlight reel with crossfade between clips, nothing fancy.

Now that I'm switching to a Laptop, I just need to know what is going to be powerful enough. And I'm thinking the Canopus ADVC 110 would be good for Mpeg2 capture to burn to DVD (now that the Hoosiers are good again). My PC has 1.5G of RAM and a P4 3GHZ CPU and it always worked fine in conjunction with a WD Raptor. I'm not really concerned with High Def capture, S-Video and component for the audio is fine. I guess I really just don't want to have to learn a bunch of stuff again. Thanks for any input!

PS, as for the Laptop, 13.3" screen is good enough. I have an Iphone and my wife has an Ipad, and we have an HP laptop, so the new one will pretty much be dedicated for video stuff. I don't need anything brand new or with a 3 grand price tag, and I don't mind buying refurbished from NewEgg.

[etecnifibre]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834256113 Along with the ATI USB 600 Tv Tuner

[sanlyn]

My PC that works well still has an ATI AIW 9600XT.

And the AIW is what you expect to replace? It's still working? You can't imagine how many people are desperately searching for it.

[etecnifibre]

It still works. The fan on it does not work, however. I am not ready to scrap my old PC just yet.

[sanlyn]

The fan on the AIW, or the PC's cooling fan?. A case cooling fan is cheap to replace (unless it's a Dell, in which case you should just dump the PC). If you mean the AIW's fan doesn't work, then the AIW's a loss.

[etecnifibre]

It's been like that for years still works fine. It's an antec sonata case fans are easy to replace.

[usually_quiet]

Most standard definition USB capture devices use software encoding, so you will need a laptop that exceeds the hardware requirements for your capture software. Also, get a laptop with an e-SATA port so you can use an external hard drive as your capture drive.

This is a list of Windows-compatible SD USB 2.0 capture devices worked well for this sites members. All use software encoding so their ability to encode DVD compatible video and audio depends on the capture software used. If you want closed captions, the TV Wonder 600 USB can capture them, with the right software. I don't know about the other two.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/VisionTek-ATI-TV-Wonder-600-HDTV-Tuner-for-PC-Laptop-Notebook-...item2a264ff3d3
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815116048
http://www.amazon.com/StarTech-SVID2USB2-S-Video-Composite-Capture/dp/B000O5RIWO

This is the only Windows-compatible external USB 2.0 capture device that offers hardware MPEG-2 encoding.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815116029

[etecnifibre]

2.5Ghz Intel i5, 160G SSD hard drive, 4GB RAM, eSATA port. I'll probably try to just capture to the computer and see how it works. I'm not making a production for Disney, just a highlight reel for Indiana basketball games for a few hundred people to download. Thanks for all the replies.

[usually_quiet]

2.5Ghz Intel i5, 160G SSD hard drive, 4GB RAM, eSATA port. I'll probably try to just capture to the computer and see how it works. I'm not making a production for Disney, just a highlight reel for Indiana basketball games for a few hundred people to download. Thanks for all the replies.

I somehow missed your post where you said what you bought.

In case you don't already know, Catalyst Media Center can be difficult to get working with Windows 7, but other software can work with it. Also, there are no Windows 7 drivers available from AMD for the TV Wonder 600 HD USB. AMD's Vista drivers will work or there are Windows 7 drivers from EMPIA. If you need help with EMPIA Windows 7 drivers, look here: https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/331817-Best-MPEG-2-Capture-Device?p=2059630&viewful...=1#post2059630

[etecnifibre]

Thanks I've worked with ati stuff before so I'm familiar with how picky it can be.

[etecnifibre]

I have everything hooked up, choppy video. I was worried that the ATI USB TV Tuner 600 would not work at all. I have video and the program works. I can capture and stop recording and it saves the file. I've had ATI programs lock up in the past with no video file to be found when I stopped recording.

So, where do I go from here? Someone suggested an external HD to capture to, which I always used a separate drive on my old system, but I could also record to my operating drive if need be. I'm wondering if I should go with a higher quality capture system, one with hardware encoding. Thanks for the help.

[sanlyn]

No. You didn't say what format you captured to. Or what your video source is. If you're capturing analog tape directly to MPEG2, that's one of several low-quality ways of doing it.

[etecnifibre]

I'll be capturing whatever I can get on my computer in decent quality. I'd like to burn to DVD but it's not necessary. I've captured Mpeg2 in the past. Right now my objective is to just get it on my laptop without the choppiness. I will admit, I didn't play with it a whole lot yet, plan to tonight. I did try Mpeg2 and Mpeg4, both in 720x576, 128K 48khz audio. My source will be S-video and composite for audio, from my cable box. If there is anything else you need to know, just ask, I may be forgetting something. I've done this for a long time, but once I figured it out I kind of forget all the specs! Thanks for the help!

[etecnifibre]

Seems to be working ok now. I switched it to the regular USB port instead of the SS port. We shall see. Now I have to find a video editing program that I like. Hopefully Ulead VS10 will work with Windows 7.

[usually_quiet]

I have everything hooked up, choppy video. I was worried that the ATI USB TV Tuner 600 would not work at all. I have video and the program works. I can capture and stop recording and it saves the file. I've had ATI programs lock up in the past with no video file to be found when I stopped recording.

So, where do I go from here? Someone suggested an external HD to capture to, which I always used a separate drive on my old system, but I could also record to my operating drive if need be. I'm wondering if I should go with a higher quality capture system, one with hardware encoding. Thanks for the help.

What program are you using for capture, Catalyst Media Center? When I used it, I installed a patch for Vista, and I have a 32-bit version of Windows 7. Unfortunately, AMD no longer has the patch available for download. You may need to find different software or build a capture graph.

[Edit]Some have said Ulead VS10 does not work with Windows 7. If that is so, MPEG-VCR and VideoReDo would be worth looking at.

[etecnifibre]

It seems to be working now. I'll worry about editing after I get a completed basketball game on my computer. Will probably have more questions then!

[etecnifibre]

Got it captured and downloaded the trial of the new Corel Video Studio which seems to work well. Thanks again for the help.