Pinnacle PCTV Pro vs AVI_IO

[Arkansas]

I have a question to the owners of the newest Pinnacle PCTV Pro tuner card (PAL version). Can any of you let me know if the tuner works well with AVI_IO, please? I'm in search of a tuner that works well with this program. I can't get any sound out of my ATI TV Wonder with AVI_IO, and I'm seriously thinking of a replacement for this tuner. I thought of the PCTV Pro, but only if it works flawlessly with AVI_IO. So, is there any experience of this kind you can let me know? I would appreciate any help.

[Dave B]

I have a Pinnacle PCTV card with the same chipset as the PCTV Pro.

When I got the card I spent most of an evening trying to get it to capture in VirtualDub. While my tinkering made improvements, I still seemed to be dropping 4-5 frames a minute. In my frustration, I downloaded AVI_IO and it was absolutely brilliant. Capturing on a Duron 700 at 352x576 (MJPEG Q18/19) I haven't dropped any frames since using AVI_IO.

I'm going to treat myself to an early Christmas present and buy a licensed copy.

[Arkansas]

That's great! You know, I also have a Duron 700. I thought it's a problem of the bt878/879 chipset that its sound cannot be turned on with other programs than the tuner's own, but if it works for you with AVI_IO, it proves that I was wrong. Let me ask you just one more question: how old is your Pinnacle PCTV?

[vhelp]

Arkansas,

I have a 1996 Hauppauge Wintv pci card.
Actually, I just laid it to rest. It was time! He, he...
But, I got some good caps out of it, with avi_io and
virtual dub. I have a couple of samples if your
curious what came out of it befire I retired it.

Also have some other as well (below)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Visit my WEB site for some ( ATI-TV Wonder/PVR usb/Haup WinTV PCI/DC10+ ) Latest samples
* compare what you have with what I layed out for you all (guage)
I believe that these are a big improvement over the others I've
seen here at this site (for guaging)

[Jeomite]

the Pinnacle PCTV Pro (NTSC/USA) works fine for me under VirtualDub and AVI_IO (occassionaly one frame drops every 5 minutes or longer) its because of my SB Live 5.1 soundcard, its weird. heh

[Ronin2]

Hi Arkansas,

I've also have a PCTV card and it works great with AVI_IO. My systen is a Celeron 850 with 256M memory and a dedicated 40GB Hard drive for capturing.

I found that AVI_IO drops less frames than VirtualDub and with the PicVideo codec I've been able to capture at a resolution of 704 x 576. VirtualDub is then used to resize and frameserve to Tempgenc.

I can't comment on the tuner side of the card as I only capture composite video from a VCR or a DVD player.

BTW, the PCTV card knocks out the Macrovision protection.

Regards,

Ronin2

[Arkansas]

<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 2001-11-26 02:48:54, Ronin2 wrote:
...
BTW, the PCTV card knocks out the Macrovision protection.
...
</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

Really? That's great!

Anyway, I'm also interested in the composite video in, but I assume there are not much differences between tuners at this chapter. But I want the tuner side to work just as well, and that's the bigger concern, since I've already seen 2 tv tuners (ATI TV Wonder and Avermedia TVPhone9 which didn't work with AVI_IO (their sound couldn't be turned on). The composite side is different, since the VCR takes care of the sound there, you just plug it in the sound card, and that's it. On the tuner side, it's the tuner card that takes care of the sound, and if the driver doesn't work well with the program, you get no sound.

Dave B, Jeomite have you tested the tuner side too, not just the composite video-in? One more thing: is the station manager working properly (can you find all channels with AVI_IO?)?

[Arkansas]

<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 2001-11-26 05:47:02, Arkansas wrote:
...
TVPhone9 which
...
</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

That smiley was not intentional. I didn't realize that if I put an '8' and a ')' together, I would get something like that. Sorry.

[Dave B]

I've tested the tuner input aswell as the composite input. There is a (small) degradation in quality using the tuner but the card functions fine nevertheless.

When I used the tuner inputs I was feeding UK analogue cable into it. Rather than use AVIIOs tuning facility, I used the TV (PCTV Vision) software which comes with the card to change the channel and set the tuner. I then shut PCTV Vision down and switch straight to AVI_IO where it picks up on the same channel where I left off.

My card is the cheaper version, so I don't get audio input on the card. Instead I feed stereo audio into my line-in on my soundcard (On board VIA 686.) AVI_IO retains perfect sync between the two sources and I believe it will drop the occasional frame to maintain sync when it has to - a useful feature.

Audio input through the tuner also works fine. The PCTV card separates the audio and outputs it on an audio jack socket. Using a short cable (supplied) I looped that into my soundcard input.

[Arkansas]

Just as I hoped. Dave B, thanks. And everyone: thanks for all the answers.