General Post-Purchasing Questions

[Kent]

I'm planning to purchase a capture card to record TV shows through a channel decoder. Seeing I'm new in the capturing field, I hope someone can help me clear a few questions...

1. I'm confused about the differences of cards with real-time capture features and cards without those features. What are the drawbacks if I purchased one without real-time capture feature?

2. The TV decoder has an audio(L/R) and video output together with a S-Video output. I presume that most cards support these outputs?

3. Besides the Dazzle DVC II thats recommended in the forums, is there any other cards that is recommendable for the problem task above? I'm on a tight budget(everybody is) so I'll be only making one purchase and am hoping its a good one.

Many thanks if you can help.

[equinox]

2. I can only help with this one. Many capture cards don't have their own audio inputs, so if you got one without audio inputs, you can just plug the audio plugs into your sound card, most cards have an S-Video input, and I think all cards have RCA inputs.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: equinox on 2002-01-06 03:04:05 ]</font>

[SHS]

1)
If we are talk about MPEG capture there are two type real-time capture hardware vs software.
Hardware keep system CPU usage down where Software Max out your system CPU usage, Hardware can max out the screen size 720 without drop frames where software can not do this at max screen size 720.
2)
Yes just about all TV decoder&capture card have thoses input.
3)
The Dazzle DVC II is OK card but not that highlee recommended read there forum http://stop.at/dazzle2.

You need ask your self what do you want make VCD,SVCD,DVD?.
If want do VCD only all need is MPEG1 format and this sould work for you check out http://steve.kittelsen.com/pv231/ this I would recommended.
SVCD is ok but it kind of a bit hard to work with and min Home DVD Player don't support it very well.
DVD is way go I think but DVD-R going cost some hard cash to get one around $500bucks hopelee in the next 6to9mos they come down $250buck that when I buy one.

[Kent]

Okay, I guess I have a rough picture of what to buy now... thanks again for helping!