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  1. Hello,

    This is my first post here.

    I will need your help if anyone can help me of course. I start transferring some old Digital 8 tapes, my camera is this Sony DCR-TRV325E, i'm connecting it to my PC through IEEE 1394 port, and for capturing i'm using the Sony Vegas Pro v11 or WinDV, and i'm capturing on uncompressed AVI with LPCM audio. While transferring to my PC after 40 tapes i start having some issues, i start the capturing with both softwares i mentioned the captured video was having several audio drops, some bigger some very minors and not happening in the same period. Here is a sample of the issue i am having:

    http://www.adrive.com/public/czkYhZ/test.mpg

    Meanwhile the video and audio is playing fine from camera's speaker, the audio also from camera's speaker is very good, there aren't those audio drops that i am having on the captured video. This issue isn't happening with all the transfer it might happen to some but some are tranferred fine without that audio issue. The PC i am using for the transfer is Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 @ 2.4GHz with 4GB RAM on Win7 32bit, i also did some transfers in another PC Inter i5 with 4 GB RAM on Win7 64bit, same issue i got and with that pc on some tranfers. I also changed 3 firewire cables 1 4pin to 4 pin and 2 4pin to 6pin and i am still getting the same issue.

    Why is it happening and what i have to do to avoid it?

    Any help is highly appreciated.

    Thanks in advance.

    PS: What's the best software to use for join uncompressed AVI without re-encode? Is Virtual Dub the best software to use?
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  2. First is not uncompressed AVI, probably DV codec, you can check in mediainfo program
    did you try run 10-20sec Head Cleaning cassette like this: http://www.amazon.com/Sony-V8-25CLD-Digital8-Camcorder-Cleaning/dp/B00005TQKQ

    if everything fails you can capture only WAV sound from headphones connection on camera to PC
    then sync and replace sound in video on Sony Vegas Pro
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  3. Thanks for the reply.
    You are right it's DV codec my mistake.

    I already run a Head Cleaning Cassette still the issue remains.

    this way capturing the audio separately it's a double time plus then i have to sync the audio then.
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  4. Originally Posted by deadimo View Post
    this way capturing the audio separately it's a double time plus then i have to sync the audio then.
    In case everything fails and you want to save footage
    and sync audio its easy just move audio track until waveform identical to old:
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    I remember I have this problem with DV tapes long time ago
    then I capture with Edius to solve the problem
    you can try 30 day trial
    don't know if its help you
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  5. thanks a lot i will check that software.
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  6. Its probably don't help, because I capture with Edius hardware DV card

    I think on fast computer you can capture from DV and headphones connection same time
    don't need double time
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  7. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    Unlike an asynchronous file transfer, with DV you are synchronously capturing a realtime data stream. That means all the various components of your system must be up to par at capture time: fast, contiguous/optimized 2nd HDD (NOT your boot drive), lean pc (plenty app ram, few running processes/services), and needless to say no viruses/malware.

    Assuming you don't have timecode discontinuity, you shouldn't be having dropouts, PERIOD. Properly set up and outfitted modern PCs should be able to fairly easily handle DV data rates.

    Scott
    Last edited by Cornucopia; 31st Aug 2014 at 16:07.
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    Originally Posted by deadimo View Post
    Here is a sample of the issue i am having:
    Can you capture a very short segment that has a dropout and link the actual AVI file here?

    You might try running the DPC Latency Checker to see if one or more drivers is giving you timing problems. When the computer can't keep up with the 1394 data stream, audio is usually the first thing to go.
    Last edited by JVRaines; 31st Aug 2014 at 18:26.
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  9. Originally Posted by JVRaines View Post
    Originally Posted by deadimo View Post
    Here is a sample of the issue i am having:
    Can you capture a very short segment that has a dropout and link the actual AVI file here?

    You might try running the DPC Latency Checker to see if one or more drivers is giving you timing problems. When the computer can't keep up with the 1394 data stream, audio is usually the first thing to go.
    i ran the DPR, and i attached the screenshot from the result.

    Here is a short segament with the actual AVI after the captured:

    https://www.dropbox.com/s/c9t2wxjursltcdo/audio%20drops.avi?dl=0

    those audio drops are happening in weird periods and not in sequence, for example i might get a few in the first 2 minutes and then nothing for the rest video which might be in total 2 hours, or i might having audio drops in very short period as on the video i attached for 15 minutes and then for the rest tape nothing.

    I'm looking forward for your help and reply if anyone has something else to suggest me.
    Image Attached Thumbnails Click image for larger version

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    Did you run the latency checker during the capture? We want to find out if you have red spikes at the same time as the dropouts. The goal is to confirm or eliminate your computer as the source of the problem.

    You have already eliminated the tape and physical playback mechanism because you never hear dropouts on the analog output. And you have eliminated the FireWire cable (unless you have 3 bad cables!) So it's got to be the computer or the analog-digital converter in the camera. You mentioned that the problem happens after you transfer a lot of tapes. Could the camera be overheating? Try putting a fan on it and see what happens.
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  11. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    Except I've witnessed cams which had dropouts on tape that were compensated for on the analog-out but not in the digital stream...

    Scott
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    If it's the tape, wouldn't the dropouts happen in the same place every time? The latest sample has a 0.5-second gap … that would make a noticeable glitch even with compensation.
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  13. Originally Posted by JVRaines View Post
    Did you run the latency checker during the capture? We want to find out if you have red spikes at the same time as the dropouts. The goal is to confirm or eliminate your computer as the source of the problem.

    You have already eliminated the tape and physical playback mechanism because you never hear dropouts on the analog output. And you have eliminated the FireWire cable (unless you have 3 bad cables!) So it's got to be the computer or the analog-digital converter in the camera. You mentioned that the problem happens after you transfer a lot of tapes. Could the camera be overheating? Try putting a fan on it and see what happens.
    no i didn't ran it during the capturing i will do it tomorrow and i will let you know.

    Correct i eliminated the tape and physical playback mechanism since i never hear dropout on the camera's speaker during the capturing. Yes i already used 3 different cables. I also eliminate the overheating of the camera because it happened to have dropouts in the first tape when I start the capturing and the camera wasn't in use from the last night.

    thanks for the help!!!
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    What a puzzle. As Cornucopia mentioned, check if you are getting dropouts in the same place every time, which would point to the tape. Otherwise, try capturing to a different computer — if the problem goes away, it's your computer hardware/software. If the problem remains, and it's not the tape, then it's definitely the camera.
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    Was the problematic PCM audio recorded as16-bit/48kHz or 12-bit/32kHz? Your capture software may be having a problem recognizing what type of PCM audio is playing.
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  16. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    Filmboss80 is correct, it could very well be due to audio incompatibilities.

    Scott
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  17. Originally Posted by filmboss80 View Post
    Was the problematic PCM audio recorded as16-bit/48kHz or 12-bit/32kHz? Your capture software may be having a problem recognizing what type of PCM audio is playing.
    Thanks for that never think of that before. is there any way to find out what's the master audio recorded from the camera? Or i will just simple go to camera's settings and change the audio settings from 16-bit/48KHz to 12-bit/32KHz and just check it?
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    Originally Posted by deadimo View Post
    Originally Posted by filmboss80 View Post
    Was the problematic PCM audio recorded as16-bit/48kHz or 12-bit/32kHz? Your capture software may be having a problem recognizing what type of PCM audio is playing.
    Thanks for that never think of that before. is there any way to find out what's the master audio recorded from the camera? Or i will just simple go to camera's settings and change the audio settings from 16-bit/48KHz to 12-bit/32KHz and just check it?
    Your DV-AVI file contains the usual stereo 16-bit 48 KHz audio stream, FWIW.
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  19. Originally Posted by JVRaines View Post
    Originally Posted by deadimo View Post
    Originally Posted by filmboss80 View Post
    Was the problematic PCM audio recorded as16-bit/48kHz or 12-bit/32kHz? Your capture software may be having a problem recognizing what type of PCM audio is playing.
    Thanks for that never think of that before. is there any way to find out what's the master audio recorded from the camera? Or i will just simple go to camera's settings and change the audio settings from 16-bit/48KHz to 12-bit/32KHz and just check it?
    Your DV-AVI file contains the usual stereo 16-bit 48 KHz audio stream, FWIW.
    Yeah i know that, but is there any way to find out the digital8 tapes in which audio are recorded, since i can't remember it?
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    I think you'll have to check the manual to see if your camera has an information display. But seeing as it's a DV stream recorded on the tape and captured via IEEE1394, it would be surprising to find that the camera is messing with the audio stream params.
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    Are you saving as Type 1 or Type 2 DV-AVI? That can make a difference, I always use WinDV and Type 1. In saying that I would say your problems are down to only having one hard drive. DV transfer isn't particularly taxing but there's no telling what else Windoze (or your virus checker or any of the other numerous things that are going to be running in the background) are doing at the time. Try saving the files to an external USB drive and see if that makes a difference. If it only started after you'd done 40 tapes, your drive may well be getting near to full anyway at 13GB per hour, that's 520 GB you've got on the drive.
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  22. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    Neither type 1 nor type 2 should be a problem.
    Yeah, I mentioned 2nd HDD requirements back on post #7. No response about that so I assumed it was okay.
    External drives have MORE problems, not less.


    @OP, are the "dropouts" audio-only related or both A+V?

    Scott
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  23. The first thing I thought of when I started reading this thread is an audio sample rate issue ie. having different sample rates on the same tape, which causes audio to drop out on most software. However once it goes, it won't come back for the remainder for the capture (requires re-starting from the change point). So if you are having audio cut in and out, that can't be the issue.

    The next possibility is corrupted data. I had an experience like yours with one DV tape, where the capture had total audio drop outs in some areas, yet played just fine from the cam. In those areas, minor video corruption was also present, so it was clear the tape was to blame. The PC just refused to accept the full digital stream, so the only solution was to capture from the cam's audio out and sync it to the video.

    However:
    some bigger some very minors and not happening in the same period
    What do you mean by not "happening in the same period"? Does this mean that when you tried to re-capture the tape, the audio drops were in different areas? If that's the case, it's a different issue to what I wrote above because my drops were always in the exact same places every time.

    So if all those possibilities are ruled out, then I believe the issue comes down to the capturing process itself - your PC and your FireWire card. And if that's the case, the problem can most likely be narrowed down to the FireWire card and drivers, since DV is so old and undemanding that performance should not be an issue at all - unless there's something abnormal like malware/viruses.

    Originally Posted by Cornucopia View Post
    External drives have MORE problems, not less.
    It isn't ideal to have to capture to an external drive, but it can be better than capturing to the OS drive. As a long as a good ext HDD with modern drivers is used. The data is still being transferred over FireWire to begin with, so it should be just fine. While I do perform capture tasks with optimised PCs using correct procedures, to a dedicated internal drive, I've used the above method (out of necessity) in the past on an old ('05) laptop - no problems at all, consistently.

    Originally Posted by Richard_G View Post
    Are you saving as Type 1 or Type 2 DV-AVI? That can make a difference, I always use WinDV and Type 1
    You should be using neither. Type1 or Type2 will make no difference performance-wise, it is just a different way of storing the streams, but Type1 has and will always be the less compatible of the two. Type2 is always compatible and there is no modern workflow that prefers otherwise.

    WinDV should stop being recommended for DV transfer, period. The audio sample rate issue I brought up at the start of this post is the most common one and exactly why I don't recommend WinDV, because it is vulnerable to that issue. In fact, ScenalyzerLive is the only DV-centric software I know that is immune to sample rate changes, and is the only software I personally recommend for native DV transfer.

    Anyway, the main questions I have for the OP:
    1. If you capture the same tape twice, are the dropouts in the exact same places in both captures?
    2. Do they occur at the beginning of scenes, or during?
    3. Does any video corruption, even minor, accompany the audio drop outs?
    4. What is the chipset of your FireWire card?

    That's all for now, but there are much needed answers to those before we can continue.
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  24. I did that transfers in 2 different PC as i mentioned in the fisrt topic, in the first PC the captured shows are saved in a 2nd HDD on the other PC the videos are captured in the same HDD, but in both PCs i'm getting those audio dropouts.

    Also on the captured videos there are ONLY audio dropouts the video is playing fine with no problem at all
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  25. Originally Posted by deadimo View Post
    I did that transfers in 2 different PC as i mentioned in the fisrt topic, in the first PC the captured shows are saved in a 2nd HDD on the other PC the videos are captured in the same HDD, but in both PCs i'm getting those audio dropouts.

    Also on the captured videos there are ONLY audio dropouts the video is playing fine with no problem at all
    Again:
    1. If you capture the same tape twice, are the dropouts in the exact same places in both captures?
    2. Do they occur at the beginning of scenes, or during?
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  26. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    @SixFiftyThree, the part about external drives was in response to Richard_G's suggestion. It's possible I could have misconstrued what he was referring to. This might clarify...

    The ranking of drive scenarios, from best to worst capability/reliability, WRT video usage:
    1. RAIDed FibreChannel SAN/NAS
    2. RAIDed Internal (non-boot) drive array
    3. Internal (non-boot) drive
    4. External drive - eSATA, SCSI, FC, Firewire, Thunderbolt, USB 3.0
    5. External drive - USB 2.0
    6. Internal boot drive

    I was saying 2 & 3 were better than 4 or 5. You & He were saying 4 & 5 are better than 6. I agree. I also agree that #6 can still be usable for DV in a pinch as long as the system isn't already compromised. Occasionally, #6 might be better than #5.

    I also have switched to recommending mainly ScenalyzerLive. It is also not being updated, but then what DV software IS? It does have less issues and is also more versatile WRT TC discontinuities and clip segmenting (or not).

    I have to disagree about Type1 vs. Type2. Unless it has changed recently, Canopus (now GV, makers of Edius) has always been Type1 and Edius uses it as its main DV codec/format. I agree it is less compatible with overall apps.

    Scott
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  27. @SixFiftyThree:

    Here are the answers:
    1: i haven't captured the same tape twice i will do it tomorrow and let you know.

    2: The dropouts doesn't occur in a sequence, for example i might get them all in the first 1 or 2 minutes, or in other example i might get them in the middle, so they don't have any sequence it's happening in several parts and nothing standard.

    3: Only in 1 video i saw a corrupted video in the same time when the audio drop occurs, in all the other videos that i'm getting the dropouts, the video isn't corrupted you can see that in the last sample also the video is fine, here is the link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/c9t2wxjursltcdo/audio%20drops.avi?dl=0

    4: About the FireWire chipset in one PC i am using the internal FIrewire from the motherboard, this is the board i had:
    http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/P5NE_SLI/specifications/

    On the 2nd PC i'm having this: 4 Ports Firewire IEEE 1394 PCI Card 4/6 Pin for MP3 PDA
    (http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/4-Ports-Firewire-IEEE-1394-PCI-Card-4-6-Pin-for-MP3-PDA-/271...item3f2531132b)

    I can't find out the chipset but if there is a way to find it out let me know and once i will get it i will post it
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  28. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    That 2nd link (card) has a VIA chipset. The 1st link (Mobo) is an ASUS, doesn't say what chipset it is. Likely NOT a TI chipset. TI is what you want. This MAY have something to do with what's going on.

    Scott
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  29. Originally Posted by Cornucopia View Post
    That 2nd link (card) has a VIA chipset. The 1st link (Mobo) is an ASUS, doesn't say what chipset it is. Likely NOT a TI chipset. TI is what you want. This MAY have something to do with what's going on.

    Scott
    OK thanks for example can you suggest me a link with a TI chipset firewire card to have it in mind??
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  30. Member Cornucopia's Avatar
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    Couple dozen come up right away if you do a Google search for "firewire card TI chipset"...

    I like SIIG okay, but there are plenty of decent yet inexpensive choices out there.

    Scott
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