Driver Problems!!!

[Lyris]

Thanks for looking. THis is driving me INSANE

OK, I have Windows XP and a Pinnacle PCTV Rave and use iuVCR for capturing. Every so often, it just stops working!!! The drivers somehow break and in the Windows Device Manager, there is an ! beside the Video section of the capture card (Audio part is fine). It tells me "Code 10: the device cannot start." How helpful!!!

So instead I have installed the alternate drivers from both IUlab and another site (I forget the URL, but it was located on sourceforge.net). These usually work for awhile then they screw up too!

Now I have a different problem - it is the first time I have had this one: "Unable render capture graph for current settings
Check videostream settings and capture codec and try again"

I've changed the settings around (different codecs/resolutions) and still nothing, can anyone tell me how I might fix this? Why is there no such thing as a capture card that's actually reliable?...

Thanks....

[spectroelectro]

My LeadTek video capture card has worked perfeclty for > 1 year, so the problem isn't that no capture card works.
Possibilities:
[1] Hardware defect in your particular capture card;
[2] Incompatibility twixt your capture card and iuvcr. Have you checked the FAQ and compatibility section in Ivan Uskov's site? He mentions some cards with known problems.
[3] Are you using a flaky OS like Windows ME that tends to freak out and has known reliability problems? If so, try Win 98SE or Win 2K or XP.
[4] Have you run Scandisk on your hard drive? Is your hard disk full of lost clusters? Is your FAT table corrupt and ready to fry & die?
[5] You aren't capturing to the same drive you run your OS on, are you...?

[Lyris]

I'm using Windows XP and capture to a totally different drive, however I managed to correct the problem by switching to Virtual VCR instead of iuVCR. Thanks!

[klovely78]

I am too having the same problem. Has anyone found a solution for this?

My capture settings have worked for about six months, then after a month or so of not using iuVCR, it is all of a sudden giving me the following error message when trying to use ANY codec, "Unable render capture graph for current settings. Check videostream settings and capture codec and try again"

If anyone has any solution to this, please let me know.

[disturbed1]

Pinnacle cards have notable hardware conflicts with certain systems. Usually these are with motherboards that use SIS, VIA, and NVIDA chipsets (Motherboards that use AMD processors). It isn't every SIS, VIA, and NVIDA motherboard, but these chipsets cause the most problems with capture cards.

Could also be an IRQ conflict.

Make sure your capture card is not sharing an IRQ with another device. If you have to, try switching the installed slots. You may have to remove every PCI card (besides your video card) and try the capture card into each slot until you find one your PC likes. Once the capture card works correctly, then add devices one by one. If you get a conflict while installing one of your other cards (like your Sound Blaster Audio card), try a different brand for that device (replace your Sound Blaster with a Turtle Beach or M-Audio sound card). If you don't use your parrell port or serial ports, disable these in the BIOS to free up some resources. It's better to have ACPI disabled, but you will have to do a fresh install of XP, and disable it while installing the OS (F4 or F8 during the first start procedure of the install, select "STANDARD PC", not "ACPI COMLIANT PC", this disables the auto IRQ routing with in windows, and doesn't allow IRQ sharing which Windows does by default).

Update your system with the newest chipset software. VIA has new service packs all the time. Run windows update to get the latest patches and service packs for your OS too.

Most capture cards flake out if you try too many programs all using different settings without a restart inbetween. This sucks, but usually a simple restart will fix the problem.

[klovely78]

Thanks for the suggestions and the quick response. I'll give them a try and let you know how it goes.