ATI TV Wonder USB Help!

[solysk]

I recently got an ATI TV Wonder USB. The sofware version is 7.3. I bought it so I could record programs and watch them later as well as put some of my tapes onto CD's. My problem is when I record I get massive amounts of frames dropped and the audio is not synchronized. I looked all over for some info, most people seemed to have luck with MMC 7.5. I downloaded that, but everything but the TV/Recorder was installed (I guess it doesnt come with it?). So next I tried virtual dub. I installed the 8.0a unpdate and virtual dub, but when I start a capture AVI it seems to be stuck on one channel without any sound (even after I open the MMC TV and change the channel). I seem to be running out of options I could use any help.

My computer stats:
AMD Ath. 1gig
3d Prophet Pro (Geforce 2)
256 mb ram
TV Wonder USB (on its own usb hub)
SBLive X-Gamer

[benjilafouine]

Hi,

First, I am missing the version of your OS (XP, 2000, ME or else). I own the USB Wonder but I don't use it anymore since I purchased a All In Wonder PCI.

My video card is different from yours but I assure you that I was able to capture AVIs with Virtualdub. Here are a few tips:

First, use your line-in input for sound, not the audio input from your USB Wonder. Second, use composite or Svideo cables since the coax interface does not give good results. Third, in VirtualDub, make you video source in properly selected: video composite or svideo (depending on how you plugged the card). If you insist on using coax cable, make sure your source is selected as TV Tuner and that it is set to channel 3 (you have to perform all these tasks within VirtualDub) in the source submenu. In your SB Live mixer setting, make sure that Line in is selected as the only recording source (i set my volume to maximum myself).

I have to tell you however that I was never able to capture with this card at 30 fps without loosing frames. Depending on the video source, I would always loose between 3% and 8% of the frames.

Finally, if you are using Windows XP, don't use the MMC version that was provided with your card on the CD. it is not really compatible with XP: it takes 100% of the CPU resources just to use it (with an Intel 1 gig processor in my case). However, using VirtualDub and TMPGEnc, I was able to get very acceptable results with Win XP (better than 2000) by capturing at 320x240, using video compression and setting at 30fps integral)

Good luck.