Which is best - TV tuner or ITVDig to capture card?

[Emanef]

I want to be able to capture movies from the tv and my ITV Digital box. I can either get a TV Tuner/capture card such as an ATI All in wonder or Creative Personal Cinema (like the Xtasy Everything) and capture from the main aerial. This would also give me the bonus have having the on demand type thing, where my pc could record set programs, etc (though this is not essential, it would just be nice....!)

Alternatively, I could get a capture card such as the Dazzle 2, and connect my video or ITV Digital box to the Dazzle and capture that way. As the video or ITV Dig box would act as the tuner, I would not need one in my PC, though I would then not get the video on demand stuff.

Which would give better results? The main thing is quality of the capture (I want to be able to burn movies to svcd, and then eventually dvdr when they're cheaper, so I'm also looking ahead - I'd rather pay a little extra now to have better quality for when I can appreciate it.....!), and I've read that TV Tuner cards do not give as good results.

Which would give best results, and would they be considerably different?

If anyone can recommend a good alternative to the Dazzle, that'd also be appreciated.

Thanks guys......

[Tool Man]

As a fellow UK user I can tell you that using the ariel will only give you channel's 1>5, you will need to hook-up your ITV digital box via a composite video-in. However, it's worth remembering that ITV and SKY use macrovision on digital movie channels, so most capture cards will refuse to record.

Tool Man.

[Emanef]

Yeah. If I get a tv tuner, I'll connect it to my main aerial which is pumped through my ITV box & vcr, so it'll have channels 1-5, plus the ITV dig & vcr channel (I know I'll still have to use the ITV box to change channels on there).

I've had not probs recording to vcd from ITV Dig.....presumably because the card I use takes away macrovision as well as opening up the channels.....!

My main issue really is the difference of quality between capturing from a vcr or ITV dig box through the scart or svideo compared to a card with a built in tuner capturing straight from the rf feed. The tuners in vcr's and the ITV box is presumably stronger and of a higher quality than that on a card?

[Craig Tucker]

I have a similar set up to you, my signal is from an NTL cable box which goes to a ten way amplifier-splitter to different TV's in the house and my pc (giving me access to channels 1 to 5, Digital channels - which have to be changed on the cable box, VCR and DVD which goes through the VCR). I have an all in wonder 128pro 32mb and I am very happy with the results I get from it. I capture to YUY2 with huffyuv compression using Vdub and then convert to mpeg using TMPGenc.

Craig

[SatStorm]

The best solution for ITV digital:

Hardware:Hauppague Win TV dvb/s, expention card for 2 Common Interface slots, Aston 1.5 (seca/mediaguard cam)
Software: Win TV Live! (www.odsoft.org)
Subscription card (or a hacked one, very easy to find for ITV )

Alternative:
Hardware: Nokia 9600, Aston 1.5 (seca/mediaguard cam)
Firmware for your receiver: DVB 2000 (www.dominance.net/overflow)
Software: DVB recorder 1.06 (www.no-access.de)
Subscription card
You also need a SCSI card for your PC.

With those 2 solutions, you get MPEG-2 transmission direct to your pc. The format is ready to burned to DVD - R discs, without re-encoding etc, and with no quality loss

1 hour of DVB transmissions, is about 1.8 GB for a full 720 X 576 broadcast. Most DVB transmissions are much less. Let say about 1.4 GB per hour...

using Tuner or whatever to grabb to avi, is
a) Waste of space
b) Waste of quality
c) Waste of time

BUT (there is always a "but")
it is much-much cheaper....

A forum to read (using a german to english online translator) about DVB transmissions on www.dvb2k.de

Have fun

[AIH]

I have my ITVdig box connected to a WINTV card, the quality is slightly better with the scart connection. Used in conjuction with Digiguide www.digiguide.co.uk and Showshifter www.showshifter.com it makes a great low cost solution

[Emanef]

Thanks for the advice guys, especially SatStorm.....!

I've been wondering about that, but haven't really seen any advice on it before.

SatStorm, re the options you've listed:

Option 1: With the Win TV dvb/s, do you not need a satellite dish? I've had a look at the Hauppague site, and that seems to suggest you need a dish, or can you just plug in a normal outside rf aerial? And where does the card plug into? I also saw the Win TV Nova on the site; that allows free to ait digital broadcasts, but does it also allow subscription channels? If so, how does that work? Could I use a gold card and program it using Elvis to work? Would I need to buy a seperate expansion thing for the card to plug into?

Many thanks.....

[SatStorm]

Hi,
I post it here, 'cause "suddenly" my mail os full with questions!
This answer is for everyone interesting in this matter

First, let mention that I don't live in UK.

Basics
ITV transmit in Seca/Mediaguard encryption system.
Sky Digital use Videoguard encryption system

For receiving those transmissions, you need a digital receiver.
Terrestial for ITV, Satellite for Sky Digital.
In UK, they use to say those receivers "digi Box"
The only difference between terrestial and satellite recievers, is the tuner.
Many manufactures, present the same model with different tuners for different markets. Swap tunners and you will notice that there are no problems using the "sat" model as a terrestial one and vice versa.

There is no way today, to "grabb" the transmissions of sky digital, 'cause there is no cam for common interface, to use it with a satelllite reciever. There an alternative: Some people, succeed ripping grabbed transmissions from Sky+ DigiBoxes. There is 2 ways to do that:
1. Open Digibox and disconnect the HD. Connect the cable of the HD on your RAID motherboard. Now, you need some special software, which don't even think to ask me where to find....
2. Open Digibox, disconnect the HD and connect it as "slave" to your PC. With a patched version of "partion magic" or a special software (don't ever ask me which one....) you can read those HD. So, you can rip anything from them. And guess what, there are mpeg 2 files there....
- Soon, from Italy a new Videoguard Cam will apper on the market. With this cam you can fool your sky digital card and rescable the channels on a Nokia 9600s Digital Reciever, using the DVB2000NoManDidIt1.2 version firmware.

About ITV digital now...

ITV was hacked from the first day. It use seca/mediaguard encryption. Keys are all over net to watch it for free. There is also a Cam for Seca/mediaguard system, called Aston Cam. There are 2 version of the cam. Aston 1.3 (old) and Aston 1.5 (new). Aston 1.5 is better.
I know people with a special version of Nokia 9600S digital reciever, the Nokia 9600T . This receiver has a common Interface (it is a PCMCIA slot) and also a SCSI 2 output. They put an Aston Cam on that slot and with there card they can re-scamble ITV Digital. Then, using the SCSI 2 port, they grabb the trasmission to mpeg 2 ready files. Those files are XSVCD like. Burn them on a DVD-R disk, and your player might play them...
You need also the right firmware: DVB2000 and DVB Recorder 1.16. Go to google to search for those.

In case you don't find a Nokia 9600T reciever, you can modify a satellite one. Get a Nokia 9600s (mediamaster) and change the Tuner to a terrestial one...
Other solution: Get a Nokia 9200 or 9500 with embedded Cam Irdeto, Patch the embedded Cam to Amon 1.2 and then you can emulate all the encryption systems of Europe (even videoguard, but there are no public keys for skydigital thosedays, only a few for the "free" BBC digital channels). You also need DVB2000 firmware for your receiver. Better use ver NoManDidIt1.1

An Alternative to the Nokia recievers are the DVB/S Cards of PCs
Not all of them, only those supported by the windvblive software. You can find this software here: www.odsoft.org
You need to trick those cards for getting terestial digital transmissions. There are 2 ways:
1. Change the tuner. It is easy and you can find them on the net
2. Use a frequency convertor. You need special hardware for this. It is the best solution, but not cheap

As you see, you can grabb ITV and Sky Digital, but ain't easy. It is much more easy go and get equipment for realtime analogue to digital grabbing.
The quality doesn't suffer that much.
But if you can do it direct, then do it! It is worth it, I know!

I hope to help some people out there!
Have fun!
(and stop mail me for this matter!)

[Panash]

If you have a TiVo, there is a modification to extract the data directly from the disks at

http://www.9thtee.com/tivonet.htm
http://www.digitalregime.com/tivo2svcd/

not for the faint hearted (that includes me as well!)

PN

[tobyed2]

I feel I have to chip in here ...

After struggling for many months to capture with my Matrox G400 ... I finally got round to reading the manual for my Sony PC110E digital camera (always a good thing).

Connect Sky digital box (non +, but will probably work anyway !) to AV IN/OUT of Sony PC110E via scart/phonos.

Important bit, set in the menu of the PC110E in the ETC setting that the AV port is INPUT and OUTPUT (default is OUTPUT only).

Connect Camera to PC via Firewire.

Full frame 720x576 no dropped frames (in VirtualDub the CPU registers at most 5% !!!).

As far as macrovision this was an issue with my G400, not at all with the PC110E.

While Im here anyway ... My Sky boxes Display setting is set to 16:9, does this mean my captures are ALL 16:9 and should be treated as a source of ?

[Emanef]

Thanks for the detailed reply SatStorm.

It does look a pretty complicated and expensive process at the moment.....!

I've read somewhere that Hauppauge intend making a terestrial tv card like the Nova, but with the ability to connect a common interface module to allow pay channels with cards. I hope this is true, as it would be a damn sight easier to capture the digital broadcast that way.......!

[Emanef]

Do I actually need a satellite receiver with this card? Can I not just use a dish and the card? If so, what channels could I get (free and subscription in the UK). Can I subscribe to Sky?