Advice: any HD Cap card with Hardware Encoder

[Cesar Schrega]

Hi Everyone

My first post here even thou i lurk around since i dunno... 2002?


I'm looking for a card (usb or pci-e) for HD capture (hdmi and component) with hardware encoder, high bit rate output (i would like something around 50 Mbps or more) and Interlaced video support (without deinterlacing).


So far I got a Live Gamer Portable, it fills almost all the requirements except for interlace support (it deinterlaces the video and I couldn't figure how to disable it). (actually, for anyone who doesn't care about having the source deinterlaced this is a great card)


I'm looking for a card that can do this cause i like to record long lengths of TV schedule to later on re-encode.


The reasons for 'why' I'm not really intersted in raw/mjpg capture:


- I remember avi capture sync. to be mayhem, specially when you cap like 12/14 hours straight;
- I believe I would need some raid setup for being able to capture raw or mjpeg (and I really don't wanna go there -.-)

[usually_quiet]

I'm looking for a card (usb or pci-e) for HD capture (hdmi and component) with hardware encoder, high bit rate output (i would like something around 50 Mbps or more) and Interlaced video support (without deinterlacing).

I have seen no other HD capture devices with a with hardware encoder other than the AVerMedia Live Gamer Portable where there is something at the manufacturer's product page indicating that it has a maximum bitrate of 50 Mbps or more. The elgato Game Capture HD can do 30 Mbps maximum. The AVerMedia Game Capture HD II says 20 Mbps maximum. The Hauppauge Colossus has a maximum bitrate of 20 Mbps and their other HD capture devices have a lower maximum bitrate.

[vhelp]

WHATTTT! 50Mbps?

anyway. i only need it for SD 720x480 content. i just saw amazon stating 60Mbps, selling for $165 w/ free shipping.

if it does composite and svideo and comes with the cables and i can connect it to my desktop and netbook, then i'm ordering one today!

i hope there's good reviews on it, quality, especially.

http://www.amazon.com/AVerMedia-Portable-Capture-Xbox360-60Mbps/dp/B00B2IZ3B0/ref=sr_1...gamer+portable

[Cesar Schrega]

Thanks usually, i wasn't really sure the elgato could cap 30mbps !

I guess i'll look for it and give it a try.


Does anyone thinks 30mbps from elgato (i'm not sure bout the quality of their encoders) is good for posterior re-encoding?

[Cesar Schrega]

WHATTTT! 50Mbps?

anyway. i only need it for SD 720x480 content. i just saw amazon stating 60Mbps, selling for $165 w/ free shipping.

if it does composite and svideo and comes with the cables and i can connect it to my desktop and netbook, then i'm ordering one today!

i hope there's good reviews on it, quality, especially.

http://www.amazon.com/AVerMedia-Portable-Capture-Xbox360-60Mbps/dp/B00B2IZ3B0/ref=sr_1...gamer+portable

Seriously don't get it for sd....

Sd is usually 480i/576i. When the card deinterlaces it u'll sortta loose half of that resolution! (unless u are capping content that is native 480p/576p).



If you are looking towards capping SD interlace support is very important :3.


As for connectors... it comes with a ps2 (yes playstation 2) connector, hdmi inputs and component video input, no composite/svhs.... I guess u would need to do some cable-moding.

[usually_quiet]

if it does composite and svideo and comes with the cables and i can connect it to my desktop and netbook, then i'm ordering one today!

AVerMedia's Live Gamer Protable only records via component video or HDMI. There is no accessory cable available that would allow recording via composite or S-Video.

[vhelp]

thank you for the info, saved me potential grief.

[jagabo]

Does anyone thinks 30mbps from elgato (i'm not sure bout the quality of their encoders) is good for posterior re-encoding?

Yes, it's fine. Cleaner than say a Hauppauge HD PVR 2 at ~15 Mb/s. I don't have any interlaced samples handy right now but here's a 30 Mb/s 1080p30 cap from a Blu-ray source (the player was putting out 1080p60).

There are a lot of other things I don't like about the ElGato though. It has high CPU usage all the time the software is running (even when you're using the editing portion and not capturing or even previewing). That makes it more likely to drop frames and lose A/V sync. You're pretty much stuck with using their software to capture. The DirectShow capture filter only provides uncompressed output (and still has high CPU usage). So you can't use other software unless you want to recompress the video.

[vhelp]

i'm also looking for an alternative to the hauppauge hdpvr, one that offers higher than 13.5Mbps bitrate.

[vhelp]

the "30Mbps.ts" clip looks very good. now i understand the 1080/60p to 1080/30p limitation better, but it is was still a good transfer at that bitrate. maybe if used through graphstudio the cpu usage won't be affected. at least that is my current experience with the hauppauge hdpvr. there is no cpu usage.

[jagabo]

maybe if used through graphstudio the cpu usage won't be affected. at least that is my current experience with the hauppauge hdpvr. there is no cpu usage.

The DirectShow capture driver is the CPU suckage culprit with the ElGato. They don't supply access to the hardware compressed streams like Hauppauge does. The driver decompresses the video and only outputs uncompressed frames. Using GraphStudio won't help. In fact, it will make things worse since you'll then have to re-compress the video.

[vhelp]

if it does composite and svideo and comes with the cables and i can connect it to my desktop and netbook, then i'm ordering one today!

AVerMedia's Live Gamer Protable only records via component video or HDMI. There is no accessory cable available that would allow recording via composite or S-Video.

i made an error in my process. although my output source is { directv -> s-video } i am ultimately capturing off of component video connection. my actual capture connection process entails:

directv[svideo] -> vcr[svideo] -> toshiba dr430[component] -> hauppauge hdpvr -> graphstudio* -> h264 file

* i used graphstudio to create and save the hdpvr graph and use that in my custom capture app.

and this has been my capture process for the last 6 or 7 months now, also because the dot-crawl is removed and quality is improved.

can someone verify all the possible bitrate settings limits for this device. i may consider the avermedia live gamer portable after all.

[Cesar Schrega]

Ok sorry for the delay....

The advantage for Live Gamer Portable is that there aren't really bitrate limits, u can set the higher possible (60mps) for 480p, 720p or 1080p as you wish.

Only thing I've came to noticed is that '60 mbps' is not really 60mbps, but some sortta vbr that floats around 45mbps and 60mbps.

I do not still recommend it for sd capturing, since the loss of one field is more "catastrophic" when u go from 480 lines to 240.