Happauge capture device issue (hi8 tearing image)

[usually_quiet]

That last one was ATI 650 both PCI and PCIe also know as Theater 650 Pro which have been re-label back to TV Wonder 650 be side there no longer being made by ATI or AMD in fact Diamond Multimedia bought all the chipset form AMD and beside it well know that ATI capture card are very sensitive cam home movie for can set off macrovision protection and I have saw that as well don't get me wrong there nice all but after seeing his above screenshot I beat that what going to happing.

None of what you wrote in the quote above has anything to do with the hardware inside TV Wonder USB. If you had bothered to read post #9 in this thread, you would know that the TV Wonder 600 USB doesn't use a Theatre chip. Its chip was made by EMPIA.

The only capture screenshot in this thread is from a capture made using a Hauppauge USB Live 2, so maybe you should just stop typing now before you make an even bigger a fool of yourself.

Wrong the EMPIA is nothing more the a USB bridge and analog audio part
A list of the chip on device
Xceive xc3028LCQ (tuner & analog demodulator)
LG DT3303 (digital demodulator)
Texas Instruments tvp5150 (video decoder)
Empiatech em2883 (USB bridge and analog audio)
So who the bigger fool now.

You are. The Theatre chips seems to be implicated in the false Macrovision detection problem as well as the AGC issue in more recent ATI products. The TV Wonder 600 USB simply does not have the same problems.

DOA just look at it what make you think it going come out any better, Just because the chipset is joe's that make no diff it still has to support CGMS-A Macrovision Protection or ATI will not sell them you know that, Do you not recall this.
http://www.nepadigital.com/articles/macrovision-protection-and-non-commercial-vhs-tapes

Nice try, but that article highlights a much older and very different device from a different ATI product line, and the capture software detects CGMS-A, in my experience. You are in a deep hole already. Stop digging.

[usually_quiet]

ATI 750 USB is a subsequent versions 600 USB

I don't think that is a fair assessment. The 750 USB supposedly has a Theatre 750 chip (Diamond says this in its product description). I know for certain that it includes a far more advanced TV tuner than the TV Wonder 600 USB. It isn't physically impossible. I have seen a PCI-e mini card version of the TV Wonder 750, and the circuit board for that would certainly fit inside the 750 USB's enclosure.

[PuzZLeR]

PS there is no 700 USB

Yes. True. It was merely a typo on my part and edited my post, and didn't mean to confuse. Thanks for pointing it out.

[PuzZLeR]

ATI 750 USB is a subsequent versions 600 USB

I don't think that is a fair assessment. The 750 USB supposedly has a Theatre 750 chip, and I know for certain that it uses a far more advanced TV tuner than the TV Wonder 600 USB. It isn't physically impossible. I have seen a PCI-e mini card version of the TV Wonder 750, and the circuit board for that would certainly fit inside the 750 USB's enclosure.

The 750 USB does have a better TV tuner than the 600 USB. However, its analog capture was very bad, and nothing compared to the ATI 600 USB.

Given that there are better dedicated TV tuner devices available than the 750, and given that anyone using the 600 (at least in this Forum) really doesn't care about its tuner, is my reason to say that the 750 was rather useless and sucked. It was nothing like the 600.

[usually_quiet]

@PuzZLeR I'm sure that you have captured a larger number of VHS tapes than I have. I take it you have not noticed any unusual problems with false Macrovision detection using the TV Wonder 600 USB, since you don't seem to need a full-frame TBC or a Grex to use it.

[Edit]My comments about the TV Wonder 750 USB were to spell out that the hardware used is very different from that used in the TV Wonder 600 USB, so there is no good reason think of them as similar devices.

[SHS]

ATI 750 USB is a subsequent versions 600 USB

I don't think that is a fair assessment. The 750 USB supposedly has a Theatre 750 chip, and I know for certain that it uses a far more advanced TV tuner than the TV Wonder 600 USB. It isn't physically impossible. I have seen a PCI-e mini card version of the TV Wonder 750, and the circuit board for that would certainly fit inside the 750 USB's enclosure.

That nice find with that mini PCIe
That I do know never saw any pic of the Diamond TV Wonder 750 USB Stick crack open

[Event3horizon]

A lot of video capture chips include a line TBC function -- but few drivers enable it.

This would make sense wouldn't it??! I mean even if there was a half-assed TBC on the usblive-2 I would probably be happy. Happague support guy emailed me back and asked if I tried the arcsoft showbiz capture software. I lol'ed, I'm tired of installing crapware (I have a bit of prejudice admittedly, I dunno, maybe it's a nice piece of software??) but I will try it out.

He also said about the 'vcr input' option being greyed out that it's because the driver doesn't support it. And most worryingly, he said he doesn't know why video is flickering.

[usually_quiet]

A lot of video capture chips include a line TBC function -- but few drivers enable it.

This would make sense wouldn't it??! I mean even if there was a half-assed TBC on the usblive-2 I would probably be happy. Happague support guy emailed me back and asked if I tried the arcsoft showbiz capture software. I lol'ed, I'm tired of installing crapware (I have a bit of prejudice admittedly, I dunno, maybe it's a nice piece of software??) but I will try it out.

He also said about the 'vcr input' option being greyed out that it's because the driver doesn't support it. And most worryingly, he said he doesn't know why video is flickering.

I suspect there is no TBC in the USB-Live 2. It is relatively inexpensive, and the need for analog tape capture has greatly diminished over the past 10 years.

Showbiz by itself won't let you use the TBC in the USB-Live 2, assuming there is one. I have a capture device that has a TBC, the Hauppauge Colossus, which costs a bit more than 3 times as much as the USB-Live 2, and hardware encodes its captures to H.264. The TBC can only be enabled by using a registry hack. As far as I can tell, there is no such hack for the USB-Live 2.

[PuzZLeR]

@PuzZLeR I'm sure that you have captured a larger number of VHS tapes than I have. I take it you have not noticed any unusual problems with false Macrovision detection using the TV Wonder 600 USB, since you don't seem to need a full-frame TBC or a Grex to use it.

Never any induced by the 600.

When I do notice a false positive, this happens also with other capture devices and the problem is the tape, VCR, TBC or whatnot, and nothing to do with the ATI 600. Even though having the ES15 is rather beneficial, for a large majority of the tapes I capture, I'm quite confident without a full-frame or Grex in the chain.

Worth noting, I have never seen any AGC issues either with the 600.

I say this after about 5 years of using the 600 with many tapes and many hours of analog TV recordings. (I'm still using/abusing the first unit even though I have two backups.)

The 600 is quite solid.

My comments about the TV Wonder 750 USB were to spell out that the hardware used is very different from that used in the TV Wonder 600 USB, so there is no good reason think of them as similar devices.

The 750 and the 600 were indeed two totally different devices.

I have been looking for some link I remember seeing years ago on the 750's architecture. I can't find it now unfortunately, so working from memory here, but the chipset under the hood of the 750, even the 650, was quite a different story from the 600.

[PuzZLeR]

A lot of video capture chips include a line TBC function -- but few drivers enable it.

This would make sense wouldn't it??! I mean even if there was a half-assed TBC on the usblive-2 I would probably be happy.

I don't think you would. There are many "TBC"s around, and many of them rather weak, such as internal ones in some VCRs, and other products claiming one, or something similar (ex: "video stabilizer" in the discontinued ADVC 300). Many can be very misleading, and the term "TBC" has been often loosely used. So, having a substandard TBC IMO means you may as well not have one. They don't do much unless it's an established real one. Don't bother with any "claims" from companies on this. Many of them have no clue or will twist things.

Happague support guy emailed me back and asked if I tried the arcsoft showbiz capture software. I lol'ed, I'm tired of installing crapware (I have a bit of prejudice admittedly, I dunno, maybe it's a nice piece of software??) but I will try it out.

He also said about the 'vcr input' option being greyed out that it's because the driver doesn't support it. And most worryingly, he said he doesn't know why video is flickering.

Thanks for reporting back on the "Support". But I'm not surprised at this response, even from a good company like Hauppauge.

Packaged software that comes with many capture devices is usually inferior, buggy, and has limited features. Don't bother with it. Of course the company will recommend it, but that's not because it's good.

Even if the software is good, such as VirtualDub is, it still won't solve your problem.

True, the driver maybe doesn't support the "VCR Input" function, whatever it is supposed to be doing, but the fact that he has no clue of the erratic video - typical of analog tape to digital - from one who is supposed to be "Support" for a product supposedly dedicated to analog capture, is pathetic.

He probably is a peon, or script reader, or got in because he knows someone in the company. Or maybe he's just winging it, or even hiding something. Who knows.

Then again, I have never gotten any good advice on capture devices from any company I've contacted about them for over a decade now. (Pinnacle/Dazzle also come to mind here too.)

[SHS]

A lot of video capture chips include a line TBC function -- but few drivers enable it.

This would make sense wouldn't it??! I mean even if there was a half-assed TBC on the usblive-2 I would probably be happy. Happague support guy emailed me back and asked if I tried the arcsoft showbiz capture software. I lol'ed, I'm tired of installing crapware (I have a bit of prejudice admittedly, I dunno, maybe it's a nice piece of software??) but I will try it out.

He also said about the 'vcr input' option being greyed out that it's because the driver doesn't support it. And most worryingly, he said he doesn't know why video is flickering.

The Conexant CX23102 on the USB-Live 2 doesn't support TBC in fact there very few chipset that even have build in TBC support and as must of you know the Hauppauge Colossus dose

[Event3horizon]

Well I'm getting nowhere with the Happauge support (it's a joke) and I've tried an old samsung miniDV cam that has analog input and to my surprise it DOES correct the video, sadly though.. there is no way to use it as a pass-through. I must capture it on miniDV tapes. Sucks.

The panasonic es10-15 are going for at least 90-100 dollars on ebay and a bit past my budget at the moment. This is where I start hating analog tape technology.

[PuzZLeR]

Well I'm getting nowhere with the Happauge support (it's a joke)

We should dedicate a thread here, and post it publicly to what we hear from "Support" teams from all sorts of video products. Many of these folks are comedians.

What may work is we give them full disclosure, and a disclaimer from the start, that their "advice" will be publicly posted. I'd love to see how they would react to this.

The panasonic es10-15 are going for at least 90-100 dollars on ebay and a bit past my budget at the moment.

I believe those are just the "Buy It Now" deals, which may be a convenience in some ways, but it takes some of the fun out of eBay. I'm sure it would be cheaper in an auction (I got mine for ~$40).

But, yeah, it does appear the price is rising on these units (as I was expecting, from another thread). But this, in some ways, is a good sign. The forces of supply and demand are raising the price because it's something people want from much advice on the 'Net about these units, and the fact that other TBCs, or similar, are in bad production, flaky, discontinued, over-priced, or just plain useless or bad.

and I've tried an old samsung miniDV cam that has analog input and to my surprise it DOES correct the video, sadly though.. there is no way to use it as a pass-through. I must capture it on miniDV tapes. Sucks.

Yes it does suck. It sounds like alot of work, and further lossiness. Ponder this: is all this time you will spend, and quality you will lose from these tapes worth it to save $100? You will already have enough challenges without this, which leads to the next point.

This is where I start hating analog tape technology.

Honestly, it's a total application of yourself and complete commitment to get it done properly (but Forums help tremendously ).

Yes my friend, this is indeed only the "start", and gets more and more involving. You're in for quite a ride!

I hate VHS. I always did.

[Event3horizon]

Well there has been an interesting twist to my story. I've finally found the solution, and the solution was to ditch the usblive-2 (returning it) and continue to use my Pinnacle 500 USB. Someone in this thread gave me an idea of reviving the usage of XP for analog to digital capture and this proved key.

I found an amazing capture program, called 'CaptureFlux', that works on detecting the Pinnacle 500 device properly. Not only that, but I can select the s-video source (this is where some capture programs failed) and I can use it as an audio source (yet another thing other programs failed on)

So I'm able to use captureflux in windows xp with the pinnacle 500 usb and use it to capture interlaced material and into a .DV file. THE BEST PART is, the pinnacle 500 HAS to have some sort of line corrector because all my flicker and tear problems have gone away. And I was almost going to throw this thing away because it was horrible with Win 7!

Problems solved. I can't believe happauge can't put some corrector in their device like the 500-usb has. Shame.

[jagabo]

I can't believe happauge can't put some corrector in their device like the 500-usb has.

The Pinnacle 500 doesn't have a line TBC. The problems on the Hauppauge are intentional. They err on the side of their Macrovision masters now. Any hint of a time base error and they intentionally screw up the picture. Not like the old days when the PVR 250 and PVR 350 ignored macrovision.

[Event3horizon]

I can't believe happauge can't put some corrector in their device like the 500-usb has.

The Pinnacle 500 doesn't have a line TBC.

This to me is an assumption until you have evidence to prove otherwise! I didn't say it is a full fleged TBC, but there must be something that resembles it.

I'm not too familiar with macrovision but it's absurd for a home made hi8 tape to trigger that mechanism, if true.

[usually_quiet]

I'm not too familiar with macrovision but it's absurd for a home made hi8 tape to trigger that mechanism, if true.

See http://www.mediacollege.com/video/editing/macrovision/

Homemade tapes can have noise in the VBI that confuses the automatic gain control in some capture devices just like Macrovision. Some capture devices are known to filter out all or part of the VBI. My guess is that the Pinnacle device does that, depending on whether VCR input is on or off. The VBI doesn't contain any picture information. The only part of the VBI that people might be interested in capturing are analog closed captions, but most file formats and video capture formats don't provide a way to store them.

[Edit]...or another guess is that checking the VCR input box turns off the capture device's automatic gain control.