Hollywood Bridge vs Dazzle DVC 2

[Leander]

I just bought a Hollywood DV bridge last week but I'm already thinking about exchanging it for the Dazzle DVC II product. My only problem with the DV bridge is that it captures video to avi.

The avi files are usually very large (3-4 gig per 15 minutes) and since I want to make SVCD files I have to spend lots of time converting them over.

The only reason I'm hesitant about getting rid of the Bridge is because in the future I'd like to be able to author my own DVDs in best possible quality and since the Bridge captures DV I know this would work for me down the line.

So is anyone out there familiar with both products

[spidey]

Here's your 2 spec's to compare. It does look as if the bridge only goes to DV/avi, while it seems the MovieStar software in the DVC 2 gives you an mpeg output.

I'd suggest reading the user comments and reviews of both of them under the capture card area. If you have a large enough capability of bandwidth capture in the DVC 2 (ie capping the Mpeg 2 at like 7000 kbps), then I'd see no worry for loss at all. However, in just looking at it again, the DVC 2 does not incorporate Firewire inputs,...for that you'd have to cap to Vegas Video or Premiere using a Firewire card...

DVC 2
http://www.dazzle.com/products/vidcr2_gut.html

Hwood
http://www.dazzle.com/products/hw_bridge_gut.html

Sorry I wsn't more help. Just wanted to make sure you'd seen all the direct spec's on them both

[Allan55]

Hi,

My Major decision points for the DV Bridge are:

High quality capture (including audio in one device... no sync problems). This is beyond what I need now but maybe I won't have to upgrade so soon.

The Bridge is a completely external device; therefore no motherboard compatibility issues which seem to exist for the 'Digital Video Creator II' (this appears to be true; it's been plugged-into 2 different VIA chipset MBs (KT133A and KT266A and works fine). Both MB use no-name firewire cards with Texas Instruments chips. My friend's is also plugged-into VIA boards.

Longer life (no special drivers) because it "looks like" a digital camera on a firewire port (I hope).

Allan

[Allan55]

Hi Again,

This wasn't a decision point when I bought the DV Bridge but...

I've put another firewire card in a second computer and I can capture and process on two boxes with one (expensive) capture device

Allan