How to get highest quality video? miniDV to hard drive.

[vid83]

I have a Canon miniDV camcorder.
I use Adobe Photoshop 1.5.

I want to buy a hard drive(s) so that I can store my videos. I have a few related questions.

1.) I want the video to be in the highest quality and not compressed like DVDs. I want it to be in the original quality like my miniDV tapes. What method would I use in Adobe Premiere Pro 1.5 to save the original quality to a hard drive?

2.) Also, are there any particular software that is best for saving a file from miniDV to a hard drive in highest quality? I don't want to use some cheap software to save my videos.

3.) When saving a file from miniDV to a hard drive in the original/highest quality, does it matter what sound card, video card, etc. is installed on my computer?

Thanks[/i]

[MJA]

WinDV with FireWire (IEEE 1394) only

[jagabo]

1.) I want the video to be in the highest quality and not compressed like DVDs. I want it to be in the original quality like my miniDV tapes. What method would I use in Adobe Premiere Pro 1.5 to save the original quality to a hard drive?

Just about every editing program can save as DV AVI. This is the DV stream from the camcorder packaged in an AVI container. There is no quality loss. And yes, WinDV is a nearly foolproof program for doing this.

3.) When saving a file from miniDV to a hard drive in the original/highest quality, does it matter what sound card, video card, etc. is installed on my computer?

No. That would only effect what you see and here while capturing (if the program is displaying the video and playing the audio as it captures), not what goes into the DV AVI file.

[edDV]

I have a Canon miniDV camcorder.
I use Adobe Photoshop 1.5.

I want to buy a hard drive(s) so that I can store my videos. I have a few related questions.

1.) I want the video to be in the highest quality and not compressed like DVDs. I want it to be in the original quality like my miniDV tapes. What method would I use in Adobe Premiere Pro 1.5 to save the original quality to a hard drive?

2.) Also, are there any particular software that is best for saving a file from miniDV to a hard drive in highest quality? I don't want to use some cheap software to save my videos.

3.) When saving a file from miniDV to a hard drive in the original/highest quality, does it matter what sound card, video card, etc. is installed on my computer?

Thanks[/i]

I wrote this earlier but didn't send. Very similar to jagabo's.

1. Premiere Pro can do the transfer. WinDV may be easier and less system intensive. Both make a bit for bit copy from the tape. There is no generation loss in capture-transfer to a DV-AVI file.

2. The transfer is already bit for bit identical. If you edit in Premiere, Premiere can export to DV format. Only processed frames will differ from the camera tape.

3. No for data path. A DV codec (often the generic MSDV) is used for monitoring the video-audio capture but none of this affects the data captured.