Hauppauge WinTv PCI - Dropped frames?

[DiMarco]

I recently purchased a Hauppauge WinTv PCI, and after installing the BtCap WDM drivers to enable the full framerate, full resolution rather than VCD size, it drops frames like mad, but only when captureing any higher res than about 320x240. Why would the drivers allow you to go higher if the card is gonna drop frames?

[steveryan]

What are the specs of your PC? Capturing in full D1 using your card would require a hefty CPU.

[DiMarco]

1.15 ghz Athlon
512mbs RAM
Windows XP
128gbs HD

I used to own a DC10+ that could capture D1 perfectly without dropping, and I believe that may have only had 256mbs RAM at the time. I was wondering if it might have been the hacked drivers that weren't functioning properly with the Win TV?

[ulapines]

Check cpu usage in Task Manager, if it's 100% or close to that you need a faster cpu.

[deckard8]

Try capturing with FlyCapDS.

http://www.asvzzz.com/flycap.htm

deactivate all other running tasks e.g Antivirus.

Use Huffyuv or Xvid codec (set highest bitrate - all other options off).

[DiMarco]

Thanks for the tips, I'm trying FlyCapDS and it crashes when I hit start, even though I have all the settings in correctly. Does DScaler do captures particularly well?

[deckard8]

There are plenty of different capture softwares you can try.
Flycap worked best for me with dropped frames.
Did you also try FlyCap v2.5.2 ?
Descaler is good software -not sure what sort of system resources,
it uses, which is probably the most important consideration with your
system. The massive array of options is for me also very confusing/bewildering

Good luck anyway!

[DiMarco]

Thanks to all your suggestions, I managed to get a perfect capture with VirtualDub 1.6.11 rather than 1.6.4 which I have always used. After 2 minutes it hadn't dropped any frames whatsoever, so I believe I've managed to get it working very well, especially for the £10 I paid for the card!