ATI TV Wonder - SE or nonSE ?

[suAve]

I'm looking for a cheap capture card. My goal is only to capture from straight VHS and dump on VCD.

I believe that the regular model would capture to VCD directly, though the rumor is that with the new drivers, the SE model can do the same.

Is the captured MPEG comparable to capturing to AVI (at NTSC standard resolution) and then encode via TMPEG ?

I also know the SE is not stereo.

Otherwise, any other recommendations ???

Thanks in advance...

[alucard2050]

hello! i have the se card. correct! it is in mono. but it is the cheapest. i purchased mine about 2 months ago. i like it but, i'm probably going to upgrade to another where i can get stereo sound. unless there is a way to get it do capture stereo.....

[suAve]

Hi... But have you tried the new drivers ? Do they allow you to capture now to MPEG1 or MPEG2 ???

TIA...

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>
On 2001-09-03 20:56:39, alucard2050 wrote:
hello! i have the se card. correct! it is in mono.
</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

[alucard2050]

actually since i put in thre card i have only used the new drivers. i have never captured with the old drivers. first thing i did was go to ATI site and download the updates. yes you can capture mpeg1/2. and in my case, the updated drivers provided a MUCH petter picture quality for me.

[Beavis]

The TV wonder cards can only do SOFTWARE-based realtime MPEG encoding. There are several packages which will let you do this in addition to anything which might actually come with the cards. Keep in mind that you'll need a really fast computer to do this and I doubt that the quality will be as good as an MPEG encoded with, say, TMPGenc.

Sound capturing is all done with your soundcard so it will work with any stereo source (ie Hi-Fi VCR) and record in stereo. The only thing which won't be in stereo is direct recording from the internal tuner.

I would highly suggest you consider the Hauppage WinTV GO instead of the TV Wonder VE. It's basically the same card with much better drivers and support.

[mikero55]

Hello,
Do not get the TV-WONDER VE. I've got the TV-WONDER and have used it for over a year now. You can go into the custom settings and set the bit rate to 1150k and the audio bit rate to 224 and capture directly to MPEG1. It gives decent results. The VE ONLY captures to ATI's proprietory format and you can only capture about 20 minutes under win9x before the 2gig file size is hit.

Hope this helps.

[alucard2050]

beavis, so what you are saying is if i were to capture with the software provided with the tv card then i will only get mono. but if i capture with another software program then it will be in stereo. i am capturing from a Hi-Fi vcr but i have to combine both audio outputs into a single line to plug into my computer. so even doing this will allow stereo sound or am i doing something wrong?

[Beavis]

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>
On 2001-09-04 20:33:02, alucard2050 wrote:
beavis, so what you are saying is if i were to capture with the software provided with the tv card then i will only get mono. but if i capture with another software program then it will be in stereo.
</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

No. All sound with these TV cards is handled through your soundcard's line-in jack. They come with a short little patch connecter which goes from the TV card to the line-in on your soundcard. If the TV card does not have a stereo decoder then the signal delivered to your sound card is in mono. When you capture from a VCR, you'll hook up the composite video out from the VCR to the TV card and the line-out on the VCR directly to the sound card and thus you'll have stereo audio because that's what your VCR is delivering. The case will be the same no matter what capture program you use.

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>
i am capturing from a Hi-Fi vcr but i have to combine both audio outputs into a single line to plug into my computer. so even doing this will allow stereo sound or am i doing something wrong?
</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

Converters for L/R RCA outputs into a single 1/4" stereo phono plug to go into the sound card are available and cheap. This keeps the left and right channels separate.