Help. ATI8500 AIW a good start?

[Festus Hagen]

Brand new noobie posting in here for the first time and I need some advice\help with the following:

I have several VHS tapes that I want to burn to VCD (I think) and then I'll dump the tapes. I have never used a capture card before but here is my thinking on the subject.....

I want it all, the best of both worlds; a good balance between quality and price. I am also looking for a graphics card to replace my GF2-Pro.

From reading the reviews it seems that the ATI 8500 AIW would accomplish both - provide better ovarall graphics and allow me to capture some old shows from my VHS tapes. Does the AIW have a dedicated input for a VCR or would I have to feed the VCR back to the TV input?

Also, I suppose it depends on the compression, but on the average how much drive space is required per hour of tape?

I'm sure I'll have other questions but I would like to get a go or no-go on the card before I jump.

Thanks in advance.

[rsuave5]

since you are in the same spot as i was a while back ill help you keep in mind im fairly new 2 but ill save you a couple of headaches.first of all i have a tv wonder ve good card for price but i recently upgradeed to an allinwonder 128 pro are they the best cards? no are they the best for the price? yes!
install the card and dont ever use the software! believe me i know youll try so go ahead then email your apology lol
install all upgrades from there site and search the forums for advice.my best results have come from capturing with avi_io (in tools) converting with tmpenc (also in tools) then burning to dvd with spruce up trial or ulead dvd moviefactory. alot of people us virtuadub but im a dumass and cant get it right.
for svcd again convert with tmpenc and i burn again with ulead (40 bux) it costs but i love the ease of use and great chapters and menus and itll burn alot of stuff. dload alot of tools and find whats right for your tastes be patient and ask questions but only after you search and read there are five guys a day asking how to convert vhs to something read there posts and email me if i can help c ya

[Bolzani]

Festus,

I can't say I'm a expert on the subject, but I can give you some tips about the card you asked. I spent many hours already on it.

The card is great. Has great features to work as TV card, capture and game card. Its performance is fantastic. Although, the comments from RSUAVE5 are true. The SW that comes with really sucks. It conflicts with many Encoding SW (TMPEG etc...)

Another topic to mention is the card demands a lot of CPU to not loose any frame while capturing. But if you have a fast CPU, that's a great option.

A good trick to fix the issues of conflicts is to do what I did at home. I created 2 partitions on HD. So when I want to just my computer for fun, browsing or even working I load everything from ATI. However when I want to work with Video Capture and Encoding, I load from the other partition with OS and just the driver for the card. Then I can use any other SW like Premier, TMPEG, etc....

I hope it help you.

About inputs on card: It has Composite Video In, S-Video In and Cable In. Each of them operates totally independent.

About the space in HD, it'll depend on the compression. ATI web site has some analyzes, but besides that, HD is very affordable nowadays. You can get an ATA 100 7200rpm, 120Gb from IBM ( which is a great drive) for
around U$ 130,00 and this will give plenty of space.

Regards