Best capture card for capturing s-video w/ RCA audio?

[bergqvistjl]

Hi, i'm looking to get a replacement capture card for capturing off of a VHS player, using s-video for the image, and rca (red and white) for the audio, so the card must have those (and i'm in the UK, so the card has to support PAL video), and also just capture as a straight raw .ts file, no compression. I've currently got a hauppauge HVR-1300 but the video quality is awful, it's wobbly and I get subtle diagonal lines running down the picture, from every single s-video device i've tried, i've also swapped cables. When I plug them into my tv via s-video, they display fine, so I'm pretty sure the card is damaged in some way.

Thanks.

[usually_quiet]

.ts files are usually created from an over-the-air source via a tuner or from a card that uses MPEG-2 hardware encoding for captured video, which that makes me think there is something missing from your requirements. Do you want a TV card with a DVB-T tuner and a a hardware encoder so you can capture an MPEG-2 TS file, or a capture device that can only supply uncompressed video to be encoded by the PC? Also, will you accept a device with a USB interface or a PCI-e interface, or must the device be a PCI card like your HVR-1300?

[bergqvistjl]

It must be a pci card (well it could be pci-e but i thought PCI-E was only neccesary for HD stuff). I just want the raw uncompressed stream as captured from the VHS. the HVR-1300 does this as a .ts file, i.e. it doesn't recompress it afterwards.

[jagabo]

Try capturing composite rather than s-video. That may get rid of the diagonal lines (dot crawl artifacts). To get rid of the horizontal jitter will require a line time base corrector. Typically found in S-VHS decks. Many DVD recorders can be used as a line TBC in pass-through mode.

Upload a short sample.

[bergqvistjl]

Try capturing composite rather than s-video. That may get rid of the diagonal lines (dot crawl artifacts). To get rid of the horizontal jitter will require a line time base corrector. Typically found in S-VHS decks. Many DVD recorders can be used as a line TBC in pass-through mode.

Upload a short sample.

Does't S-Video offer better quality than composite though? and I don't have composite output on the VHS, only SCART.

[Cauptain]

Try capturing composite rather than s-video. That may get rid of the diagonal lines (dot crawl artifacts). To get rid of the horizontal jitter will require a line time base corrector. Typically found in S-VHS decks. Many DVD recorders can be used as a line TBC in pass-through mode.

Upload a short sample.

Does't S-Video offer better quality than composite though? and I don't have composite output on the VHS, only SCART.

YES. S-Video is very good compare to composite input. Its look like:

COMPOSITE= 4.0/10 * S-VIDEO= 7.0/10 * COMPONENT= 9/10 * HDMI= 10/10

Claudio

[hech54]

It must be a pci card (well it could be pci-e but i thought PCI-E was only neccesary for HD stuff). I just want the raw uncompressed stream as captured from the VHS. the HVR-1300 does this as a .ts file, i.e. it doesn't recompress it afterwards.

1) Hauppauge cards are not known to be able to capture uncompressed video. My PVR-350 cannot.
2) The .TS files (as usually quiet points out) captured by Hauppauge cards contain MPEG2 video.
3) I find it VERY hard to believe that a functioning card gives you "awful" quality. You have yet to tell anyone
at what bitrate you are recording, with what software are you recording?
In my opinion...by you mentioning uncompressed video in .TS form...you do not know much about this card or "video capturing" to begin with.....not to mention your VHS tape(or VHS machine itself) might be of questionable quality.

[bergqvistjl]

It must be a pci card (well it could be pci-e but i thought PCI-E was only neccesary for HD stuff). I just want the raw uncompressed stream as captured from the VHS. the HVR-1300 does this as a .ts file, i.e. it doesn't recompress it afterwards.

1) Hauppauge cards are not known to be able to capture uncompressed video. My PVR-350 cannot.
2) The .TS files (as usually quiet points out) captured by Hauppauge cards contain MPEG2 video.
3) I find it VERY hard to believe that a functioning card gives you "awful" quality. You have yet to tell anyone
at what bitrate you are recording, with what software are you recording?
In my opinion...by you mentioning uncompressed video in .TS form...you do not know much about this card or "video capturing" to begin with.....not to mention your VHS tape(or VHS machine itself) might be of questionable quality.

Well I have decided it's my VHS player that is at fault. I passed it through a dvd recorder that has TBC (SCART from VHS to DVD recorder, DVD recorder -> PC via S-Video) and the jitteryness was gone, along with the diagonal lines. I'm going to invest in a VHS player that has tbc built-in though, as that seems to be the root of the problem (I don't want to use composite/SCART unless I have to, the video quality is less crisp than direct s-video, and the colours are more vivid with s-video). Regarding the quality, the TS files that are produced give me roughly 5GB per hr, and the video bitrate is 9384kbps.

[jagabo]

Does't S-Video offer better quality than composite though?

Yes, but...

The problem you're having appears to be dot crawl artifacts in your s-video signal (without seeing a sample there's no way to say for sure). That indicates your VHS deck doesn't have a real s-video output and the s-video signal you're getting from the SCART adapter is the result a poor luma/chroma separation circuit. The capture card's comb filter should work better. The capture card's comb filter isn't applied to the s-video input because real s-video would not need it.

The resolution difference between composite and (real) s-video is negligible for VHS. VHS has lower resolution than either.

and I don't have composite output on the VHS, only SCART.

I suspect your VHS deck is putting out a composite signal and the SCART adapter has a very poor composite to s-video circuit. Try a SCART to composite adapter instead.

[bergqvistjl]

Does't S-Video offer better quality than composite though?

Yes, but...

The problem you're having appears to be dot crawl artifacts in your s-video signal (without seeing a sample there's no way to say for sure). That indicates your VHS deck doesn't have a real s-video output and the s-video signal you're getting from the SCART adapter is the result a poor luma/chroma separation circuit. The capture card's comb filter should work better. The capture card's comb filter isn't applied to the s-video input because real s-video would not need it.

The resolution difference between composite and (real) s-video is negligible for VHS. VHS has lower resolution than either.

and I don't have composite output on the VHS, only SCART.

I suspect your VHS deck is putting out a composite signal and the SCART adapter has a very poor composite to s-video circuit. Try a SCART to composite adapter instead.

Nooo sorry.

The vhs player has an s-video out port, as well as a scart port. The only adapter i'm using is to plug the scart lead into the composite port on my capture card. Apart from that i'm going direct from the s-video socket on the VHS to the S-Video socket on my capture card.

[usually_quiet]

Regarding the quality, the TS files that are produced give me roughly 5GB per hr, and the video bitrate is 9384kbps.

If so, then your HVR-1300 definitely captures using MPEG-2 compression, and probably uses hardware encoding. If you were capturing uncompressed video, your file size would be on the order of 60GB per hour, and it would likely be in an .avi container. I have never seen a .ts container used for anything but MPEG-2 or H.264 video.

[bergqvistjl]

Regarding the quality, the TS files that are produced give me roughly 5GB per hr, and the video bitrate is 9384kbps.

If so, then your HVR-1300 definitely captures using MPEG-2 compression, and probably uses hardware encoding. If you were capturing uncompressed video, your file size would be on the order of 60GB per hour, and it would likely be in an .avi container. I have never seen a .ts container used for anything but MPEG-2 or H.264 video.

Ah OK my fault then. Well I don't want it compressed any more than the hauppauge card does

[chowmein]

So what is the solution? ATI cards have gain issue, Blackmagic cards are problematic with VHS...? How do you convert VHS to raw avi, not DV-avi?

[usually_quiet]

So what is the solution? ATI cards have gain issue, Blackmagic cards are problematic with VHS...? How do you convert VHS to raw avi, not DV-avi?

Well, hech54 has great things to say about the Hauppauge USB Live 2, which is a USB capture-only device with no hardware encoder, for capturing VHS. If the OP was looking for something that really did allow uncompressed captures, that would have been my recommendation, because it is still in production and I know it is available in the UK. As things stand, I have to do some research before giving the OP advice.

[bergqvistjl]

So what is the solution? ATI cards have gain issue, Blackmagic cards are problematic with VHS...? How do you convert VHS to raw avi, not DV-avi?

Well, hech54 has great things to say about the Hauppauge USB Live 2, which is a USB capture-only device with no hardware encoder, for capturing VHS. If the OP was looking for something that really did allow uncompressed captures, that would have been my recommendation, because it is still in production and I know it is available in the UK. As things stand, I have to do some research before giving the OP advice.

Well I actually think my capture card could be OK, it looks like it was the VHS player that was causing the quality issues due to not having a built-in tbc.