Which capture card for me?

[nightmare_ger]

Hi Folks

I have a new camcorder with DV in/out and I would like to buy a capture card for getting material from the camera on to my pc for editing. I would also like to be able to capture video from the television and sky etc. Firewire is a must. What card would you recommend, nothing crazily priced please.

Thanks

Nightmare

[FulciLives]

You don't need anything special when it comes to FIREWIRE aka IEEE 1394 aka i.link

Most computers come with a FIREWIRE port. If not then you can get a FIREWIRE PCI add-on card for cheap. Most expensive is maybe $50 with most being less than half of that.

This will work with your DV camcorder.

Some DV camcorders have a feature that allow you to input analog audio and video to record to a DV tape. Some will even pass this straight through to the computer via the FIREWAIRE connection.

That would be the way to capture analog video sources such as video tapes and TV etc.

If your DV camcorder does not support this feature (often called digital-to-analog pass through) then you need a capture card that can capture analog video.

You have many choices there but the best one is probably the Canopus ADVC-100 which is around $250 US Dollars.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[SatStorm]

First, seperate DV from Capture

DV is a transfer, so it is like what FulciLives says about it.

Capture from TV, or to put it correct, capture from any analogue source like TV, the video out of any satellite / terrestrial / cable receiver or a Lazer Disc needs a card which allow "video in".
Those cards are in 2 flavors: Those which have a tuner and those which only have the video in fuction.
Also, they can be AGP, PCI, USB 2, firewire, even USB 1.1 (a very bad choice).
The AGP cards rarelly have tuners, but the other types almost always do. But capturing throught tuner is a bad choice IMHO. It is far better to capture through the video in of those cards, expecially if they offer s-video in.

About what to buy now...

For dirty and decent job, the latest ATI cards are good, but pricy and picky. Don't even think to buy older -and much cheaper- cards from ATI

Great cards are the ones from nvidia. There are much cheaper / stable than ATIs, but prepare to search yourself for solutions about your needs. Third party solutions are a must

The cheapest cards which can do the hard way miracles, are those bt8xx(x) ones. Hauppauge, Kworld, etc. ONLY third party solutions for them and you also need to use advance technicks to succeed the best possible results. Those cards have the greatest fun of all if you ask me and also great third party driver support, which do wonders (capture PAL60 for example).

Top quality cards are those from Matrox. Expensive, picky but excellent.

Latelly, there are some cards based on a philips chip. Those cards are better the bt8xxx cards and they have a great official driver support. Some users are very happy with them.

IMHO, for your first steps go and buy a cheap BT8xx(x) card. Costs less than 40 GB pounds and are the best for learning about this hobby. Later, you get something better and 100% suitable about your needs, as you gonna determine them during your self-learning period.

[miksu]

If your DV-unit has A/D conversion, as at least most units made by Canon and Sony have, I would try it before obtaining any extra hardware. One hardware conflict/driver problem less to worry about.

I gave away my Formac ProTV card, when I got Canon MV-530i. It has good A/D conversion. ProTV is designed for Mac, but like most tuner cards, it's based on Rockwell/Conexant Bt chip and Philips-tuner. Most tuner/capture cards are rather generic, for example ProTV works on PC too.

But, as said, try first your camcorder A/D conversion. You might be positively surprised.

[Sam Ontario]

Hi Folks

I have a new camcorder with DV in/out and I would like to buy a capture card for getting material from the camera on to my pc for editing. I would also like to be able to capture video from the television and sky etc. Firewire is a must. What card would you recommend, nothing crazily priced please.

Thanks

Nightmare

If you are not yet an expert, forget the capture card and buy a DVD Recorder with DV input. Trust me, you will thank me for this advise later on!

[nightmare_ger]

Thanks for all the advice, I wasn't aware you didn't need a capture for transferring DV into your PC, may master this before going into capture from TV.

Sam, this is what I am doing just now. Burning on to a dvd on a standalone then reauthoring with dvdlab, just looking for ways to maximise quality.

Thanks again.

[dxj40c]

I would recommend the Pinnacle AV/DV card. I have both the ATI 7500 Radeon and the Pinnacle card and I prefer the Pinnacle. It has firewire, s-video, and composite input. I like it better because the image is better. I have seen it bundled with Pinnacle Studio 9 for the same price as the standalone capture card.

ATI annoys me because they have to change the MMC so often and every time I upgrade everything gets screwed up. I have finally gone back to MMC 7.5 because that's the one that works best with this ATI card. I wish they would do it right the first time (well, actually, I guess they did since MMC 7.5 is on the original installation disk). I use it only to capture from TV because of the tuner, but for everything else I use the Pinnacle.