CODEC

[1111]

erte5yu56u

[fwbaumann]

I believe it will work with just the fire wire. The mini dv format is supported by Ulead and I have a Panasonic and have had no trouble capturing video. If you use the S-video input then a Codec becomes an issue. The existing AVI codec will compress the file and you would be going from digital to analog (AVI) back to digital for a DVD. This recompression will cause a loss in quality. I have done this, but when I do I used a lossless codec such as Y2U2 or Huffy. Be prepaired for some humongous files 50 to 100 gig. My current thinking is I use the firewire from the camera. From a VCR I input to a lossless AVI and make my DVD from that. Just for the record I really can't see much difference and probably only fast moving/many scene changes would strain the MPEG conversion. For home use I would use the MPEG capture with a high bit rate 8000 or so (DV Best quality) MPEG capture.