Whats The Best Digital TV Card For Me?

[lance]

hey.. i want to record at least 4 or 5 tv shows that are 30 mins each on tv (usually 23 mins after exctracting ad's) and i was wandering which is the best card 2 do so with very high quality and if possible... without re-encoding... and im in australia.. i wanna get quality lyk this:
http://www.peridyme.com.au/images/clip.mpg .. with that i just used DVD Patcher and patched it to 8000 kbps and added it to TMPGEnc DVD Author with no problem so its easy to do it.. is their any cards that do that also? i realised when u convert the 15000kbps video to 8000kbps or so it makes it even bigger... so yeh whats the card for me that i can use to record tv showz in australia?

thankz

[bunyip]

The DVICO FusionHDTV DVB-T is one of the best (maybe the only) Australian-configured Digital Cards available at present.

Default capture is to Transport Stream format 'TP' but the latest drivers support capturing to MPEG (although not DVD compliant - GOPs are too long). Using third party tools to edit commercials etc. can create DVD compliancy.

The capture quality is excellent.

I'm running one (LITE version) through tests at the moment and am very pleased with the results.

[lance]

hey thanks for the info... could u tell me what software is good to edit the commerical's while fixing the GOP's to make it DVD Compliant?

thanks

[SatStorm]

Without re- encoding you can't change the GOP.

[lance]

bunyip said there is a way to make it dvd compliant with the right software.. just waiting on him to post what software..

[bunyip]

Satstorm:
Yes I thought so too, but I use PVAStrumento to demux the captured file and it makes GOP adjustments during demux (without re-encoding).

Lance:
I have found that you get better results if you stick to the default TP capture, it captures 2 audio tracks MP2 and AC3 so you get the choice. I have also found that audio synch is better in TP.

So the Tools I use are,
PVAStrumento to demux either the TP or MPEG streams (you need to rename the TP file to TS extension first otherwise it it doesn't interpret the file correctly).
To do cutting I use either Cuttermaran or Mpeg2Schnitt.
(If the file has audio synch problems Mpeg2Schnitt has a very good adjustment option).
All captures are in 16:9 format so if the show being captured is 16:9 I don't re-encode but I do use DVDShrink after authoring to make it fit on a DVD. If the show is 4:3 format I use TMPGenc to clip the 16:9 and re-encode to 4:3 format.

I'm still testing the card but so far all results have been great and I can recommend it.

[lance]

i keep getting this error in PVAStrumento:



can u help me? i get that msg once i click on demux.. do i hav to change any settings? i took the .TP sample and renamed it to .TS thats what im trying to demux to test...

thanks

[lance]

Sorry... error im getting is attached in this msg...

thanks

[SatStorm]

PVAStrumento correct / patch what can be patched / corrected.

It is impossible to change the GOP without re-encoding. It's like saying, change the colours of a painted picture, without paint new colours!

There are plenty ways to foul authoring applications to accept files non DVD like.
DVD Lab and TMPGenc author can also ignore those GOP issues. Only few DVD standalones do care about correct 100% legal GOP stracture.

[bunyip]

Yep - I suspect it does a fiddle to make to GOPs look legal. Certainly DVDAuthor complains about the length before running the mpeg through PVAStrumento but doesn't after.

[Capmaster]

PVAStrumento correct / patch what can be patched / corrected.

It is impossible to change the GOP without re-encoding. It's like saying, change the colours of a painted picture, without paint new colours!

There are plenty ways to foul authoring applications to accept files non DVD like.
DVD Lab and TMPGenc author can also ignore those GOP issues. Only few DVD standalones do care about correct 100% legal GOP stracture.

I do hope Wiljo has gotten the kinks out of it. We corresponded a fair amount 2 years ago. He was struggling with PVAS then and didn't sound too hopeful.

I had used PVAS to try to repair a few dozen muxed files. His verbose analysis worked fine, but the actual repair of the PTS values left a lot to be desired. Every file I tried to repair with it ended up being unusable because of some code anomalies he was chasing. Never did hear if he got a handle on those.

[SatStorm]

PVAStrumento basicly exists because of the need to transfer from a DVB receiver with HD (and especially Topfield) to PC.
Then it start gathering support for other various DVB receivers with HDs and end up today as a more "wide" application.

I rarelly need to use this tool myself, but many users worldwide state that it is a God sent!