DAZZLE DIGITAL VIDEO CREATOR USB

[freelander]

ANY OWNER OF THIS CAPTURE CARD :
DOES THIS CARD ENCODE IN HARDWARE MPG1 ?
IS THE MINIMUN SYSTEM REQUIREMENT A NORMAL PENTIUM MMX FOR THIS REASON ?
THE ONLY THING THAT PC HAS TO DO IS TO WRITE MPG ON DISK?
AND WHAT ABOUT MPG1 QUALITY ?
SEMMS LIKE LIGOS PLUG-IN FROM PREMIERE?

[bprothero]

Yes, the Dazzle DVC uses MPEG1 hardware compression. It will work with even a Pentium. The encoding is done by the Dazzle and then sent to the PC via the USB port to be written to disk.

The quality is pretty good for real-time MPEG compression from a consumer product. However, I still prefer to capture in AVI using my Matrox Marvel G400-TV and then encode to MPEG1 using TMPGEnc to create VCD because the result has more detail much fewer artifacts.

The Dazzle's VCD template is not bad; but if you want higher quality VCDs from the Dazzle, then I would recommend you capture at the highest bitrate possible and then re-encode to VCD.

However, if you are interest in SVCD, then you will need to get the Dazzle DVCII because the DVCI only captures in MPEG1 at a max resolution of 352x240.

[FM80]

I have been attempting to use my DVC-USB for the past month to capture DVD -> VCD.

The quality is good, as bprothero stated. However, every VCD I attempted to create with the resulting MPG stopped playing after 20-30 minutes in my Panasonic RV32.

I created a VCD, using the same authoring software, from a ripped MPG and it worked fine.

Quality=good.

VCD usability, at least in my recent experience=bad.

[bprothero]

FM80,

I experience audio studders on my Sony DVP-S3000 DVD player when I capture with the Dazzle DVC using the VCD template. I suspect that this may be a related problem because some others have experienced similar things on some stand-alone DVD players when authoring a VCD from a Dazzle capture. There is no studdering if I re-encode the clip to VCD spec using TMPEnc prior to burning to VCD.

My guess is that the Dazzle DVC is not creating the correct audio buffer size for 100% VCD spec.

That is another reason why I capture using the "Movie" template, or with my Matrox card as AVI, and then encode to VCD spec with TMPEnc. However, not everyone has this same problem. I think it is specific to the DVD player and how tolerant it is to VCD specifications.

Brian

[FM80]

bprothero,

That sounds good. I probably won't try it until I have a non-DVD video to capture.

I guess I never thought to reencode a VideoCD template MPEG to a VideoCD template MPEG. Go figure

freelander, looks like you can disregard my gripes!

FM80

[jbarr]

Hi!

I just purchased a Dazzle DVC-80, and unfortunatly, I must say that I am not really happy with the results. I am running Windows XP on an eMachines box with a Pentium 4 1.6GHz CPU, 256MB RAM, and a 40GB HD (30GB free). My VCR is connected using the composite connection (I don't have an S-video out on my VCR.) The VCR's L & R audio out connectors are connected to the DVC-80.

Given that, I have two main problems:

1. I get a lot of frame drops
On every recording, I initially get 30-40 frame drops. I can live with that because I suspect that happens because the capture is "ramping up". Then, I get an average of 1-2 frame drops per second, sometimes as high as 5-10 per second. The video cable I am using is not a high-end cable. Maybe I need to try a higher-end Monster cable?

2. The sound os out-of-sync
Initially, the sound was in sync on recordings, but now, with every recording, the sound is out of sync (delayed an undeterminable amount of time.)


As for the capture software, I tried using the following with the following results:

1. The included version of VideoWave 4SE
This program has some limitations, but overall, it worked well. The first time, I got video and in-sync audio capture. Unfortunatly, this is the program where I now get the most frame drops. The resulting output has great audio, but the video is blocky and choppy. The output looks more like streaming video over the web than smooth video. I tried adjusting the settings, but some seem to "take" and some don't. I created new video and audio templates, and things improved, but I still get lots of frame drops.

2. Windows Movie Maker
This program is veryeasy to use and the video looked pretty good. Initially, I was impressed, but the majorproblem is the audio: I get audio, but it is unintelligible, ultra-fast audio that lasts for about a second or two, and then I get no audio throughout the remaining video. It's like the entire audio track was compressed into the first couple seconds of the video. The other problem is that there are very few options to "tweak". I feel like my hands are tied and I can't tailor the program to do efficient VCD production.

3. VirtualDub
This program, though a bit cryptic for the novice, seems to be very feature-rich and very powerful. I was actually able to get some pretty nice looking video capture. Not too much blockiness, and not many frame drops. Unfortunatly, at first I could not get any audio. I tried some of the suggestions at VCDhelp.com, and eventually did get some audio, but it was the same as with Windows Movie Maker: unintelligible, ultra-fast audio in the first second or two and then no audio throughout the remaining video. I admit that I tweaked the heck out of the settings, and probably screwed up something along the way. Maybe it's time to jut go back and select "default" for everything and try again. Another annoyance is that the some settings don't seem to "take", even after I save them, and sometimes, I keep getting "Video format not supported" errors. when I try to do some tweaking.


OK, all that said, maybe my expectations are too high. I don't know. I was hoping that the output quality would be better. As I said above, the video quality looks more like video streamed over the internet--blocky and choppy-jerky. Not quite what I was hoping for. I am thinking of returning the DVC-80 and purchasing an ATI graphics card with capture capabilities or maybe the higher-end Dazzle PCI product.

Any comments, suggestions, or tips?

-Jim

[Barnabas]

Marco,

If you want great realtime VCD hardware capturing, take a look at the ProVideo PV-231 and PV-233 cards. They capture via hardware in realtime and have much better quality than the Dazzle does IMHO and cost about the same as the Dazzle. You only need a 233 mhz computer with these units. The mpeg 1 files produced with these cards looks very good, and you can also record at higher bitrates for even better quality. If you can't locate these cards in your country, you can sometimes find them on eBay by searching "ProVideo".

Another unit with hardware compression is the ADS Instant DVD. It records both mpeg 1 and 2, but editing the files is a problem without losing sync. Another negative is that it uses your sound card to record the audio, so sync tends to be a problem. It costs twice as much as the ProVideo and Dazzle units too. The VCD's made by the ADS don't look good at all though, but the DVD settings look good. I own both the ProVideo and the ADS unit, but mostly use the ProVideo for capturing now. The quality is great and audio sync is never a problem.

ANY OWNER OF THIS CAPTURE CARD :
DOES THIS CARD ENCODE IN HARDWARE MPG1 ?
IS THE MINIMUN SYSTEM REQUIREMENT A NORMAL PENTIUM MMX FOR THIS REASON ?
THE ONLY THING THAT PC HAS TO DO IS TO WRITE MPG ON DISK?
AND WHAT ABOUT MPG1 QUALITY ?
SEMMS LIKE LIGOS PLUG-IN FROM PREMIERE?

[bprothero]

I think the problem with the Dazzle DVC-80 is that it uses software compression. The more expensive Dazzle DVC (http://www.dazzle.com/products/vidcr.html) uses hardware compression and I get NO dropped frames and few artifacts (blockiness).

Brian