Hollywood DV-Bridge Help

[pp05629]

Greetings...I am new to VCDHelp.Com and to Video Capture...So be gentle.

I just purchased a Hollywood DV-Bridge and connected it to my Adaptec 4300 Firewire card. I am attempting to capture some analog video from my old analog camcorder via MainActor v3.65 video software that came with the Dazzle. Unfortunatly...I am not getting any video or audio into the capture software. I upgraded to win98 se so that I could get the MS DV CAM & VCR driver. According to the Dazzle documentation (weak!), I should simply connect the camcorder to the bridge...video out on the camcorder to the video in on the bridge Audio out on the camcorder to the audio in on the bridge. The only twist is that my camcorder only has one audio out...so I connected that to the left audio in connector (perhaps I need an RCA splitter (one RCA Male to 2 RCA Males?). When I play the video on the camcorder, the Dazzle's LED for Analog-to-Digital changes from red to green, so I am assuming that the Dazzle is correctly intrperting the signal. I just do not see or hear anything in the capture software. I also have ULead VideoSutudio SE (v4.0) and MGI VideoWave 4 video software available if anyone thinks that may work bettor than MainActor.

Any direction or ideas would be most appreciated.

Below are some of my PC Specifications:

- AMD 1200Mhz processor on a ASUS DDR Motherboard.
- 50 GB of HD space
- Adaptec 4300 Firewire card.
- Dazzle Bridge.

[motoed]

I just went through a lot of this myself. Be sure you are using the DV Capture mode instead of the regular Capture application. The DV Bridge only captures as a DV native file.

I'd be happy to email with you directly if you have other issues. I know what you mean about how frustrating this can be, but trust me, when you get the bugs worked out, you'll be perfectly happy with that system. I love mine (now... not a week ago.)

-Ed

[pp05629]

Ed...Thanks for the quick response. I can be reached directly at rkrepp@bellatlantic.net. Just so I am clear...I can use the DV capture application even though I have an analog camcorder connected as the source?

your continued direction/advice is most appreciated.

[fishgod1010]

I have the DV Bridge as well. Make sure the green light is on A to D on the unit. My unit seems to default to "pass through". By the way, I use Ulead 4.0se which is a lot easier to use.

[pp05629]

Thanks for the reply. When I press play on the camcorder, the A-to-D light changes from red to green, so I think the bridge is getting the signal. I just tried capturing from within Ulead 4.0 se and nothing captures/displays on the monitor.

as an aside...I saw a readme file from dazzle that stated the following. Is this device really that tempremental?

3. It is not recommended to turn on/off analog input/output sources, while they are connected to Hollywood DV-Bridge (especially during capturing).
4. All Microsoft operating systems should be updated using the Microsoft Auto-update feature from their website. The Mac OS operating system should be updated to version 9.04.
5. Never connect/disconnect Hollywood DV-Bridge while video editing software application is open. In this case the video editing application may not be able to recognize the device and it will not function properly.
6. Apple Final Cut PRO does not switch Hollywood DV-Bridge to D to A position automatically. User should manually switch Hollywood DV-Bridge to D to A position prior to starting DV stream output.
7. Output to a DV device connected to Hollywood DV-Bridge through a 1394 connection using MGI VideoWave or Ulead Video Studio may not be possible.
These applications do not support multiple 1394 devices when in DV out mode.

[pp05629]

All...I am beginning tho think that the MainActor software is junk. Each time I try to run the MainActor DV-Capture application, I get a "This program has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down. If this problem persists, contact the program vendor" message from win98 for the DVCap.exe program.

I have re-installed it several times to no avail.

[pp05629]

Well...I just re-installed Windows 98 SE (What fun!). I re-installed the MainActor Software and I still get the "This program has performed an illegal operation..." message when trying to run the DVCap.exe program.

Has anyone successfully used another capture program (Ulead, MGI)with the Hollywood DV-Bridge?

[pp05629]

On Xmas eve, the Adaptec support line assited (in a round-a-bout way) me in getting the Hollywood DV-Bridge working. I decided to employ a basic troubleshooting technique...remove the DV-Bridge from the equation and see If I can capture basic DV from my new digital camcorder with the software supplied by Adaptec with the Firewire 4300 1394 card I purchased from them. I could not. After a few exchanged emails with Adaptec, I updated my DirectX to v8.1 and updated by video card Driver from ASUS. Those 2 changes allowed me to capture digital vido from my digital camcorder.

So for fun, I attempted to capture from my analog camcorder via the bridge, and it worked too. The only oddities now are:

1). I cannot have the analog camcorder and digital camcorder on at the same time AND capture analog via the bridge. The analog is all garbled. So long as I only have one camcorder (Analog or Digital) connected when I start my PC, I can capture video.

2). Trying to capture digital camcorder video while connected the the bridge (in passthru mode), I loose the DV camcorder remote control functionality in MGI Videowave.

Neither of these 2 issue are show stoppers though. I still have a lot to learn about video capture, editing, and burning, but the 1st major hurdle has been overcome...getting the hardware to work.