MainConcept Capturing & Encoding Real Time

[jjpslu]

Has anyone ever used MainConcept to Capture and Encode to MPEG2 RealTime?

[redwudz]

I do conversion from DV to MPEG2 with Mainconcept. Have done several old VHS tapes with a ADVC-100. This isn't capturing though, just on the fly encoding.

[SatStorm]

I use it all the time with a bt8xx card and with a nvidia card.
The latest version 1.4.2 is better the previus versions.

The results are great, but there are some bugs or maybe they are limitations of the program.

For example: When you capture at a framesize smaller than 720 x 576/480, a "statering" appears at the bottom of the screen. That has nothing to do with your target framesize. What I mean:

If I capture with my bt8xx card and the btwincap drivers at 768 x 576 (or with my nvidia card and 1.08 drivers at 720 x 576) and encoder realtime to 352 x 576, the picture is excellent and with not statering. Amazing results.
But when I capture at 352 x 576, the picture has that statering at the bottom of the screen.

Also, you need a modern CPU, more than 2 Ghz for the best possible results. It is not nessesary, but it helps (I manage to capture 768 x 576 and encode realtime to 352 x 576 VBR with a Duron 1200, but I set up my PC only for this task, after a great period of trial and error)