Capturing VHS tapes into MPEG2 format

[Moonstomp]

Hi once again,

OK - From looking at reviews of your Capture Card on this site : https://www.videohelp.com/capturecards.php?CaptureCardRead=9

it seems that the software supplied with the card will NOT allow you to capture directly to MPEG2. In fact most users described the supplied spftware as next to useless !

If you want to get to MPEG2/DVD, here are your choices:

1. Capture to AVI, as previously described, using Virtualdub / VirtualVCR. Then encode to MPEG2 using Tmpgenc. (It won't take any longer than MPEG1 to MPEG2)

2. Try out some decent capture software (download a trial version) & capture direct to MPEG2. If it works well for you then consider buying it.

There is a listing of Capture software here:
https://www.videohelp.com/tools?s=5#5

Good luck !!

Moonstomp.

[jagabo]

Capturing in AVI will only take up more processing power and encoding time. I want to cut down on both. That's why going the capture MPEG1, convert to MPEG2 and author to DVD method is the best and most efficient way of converting my VHS tapes to DVD (well it is for me at least).

No. HuffYUV will take less CPU power than MPEG while capturing. Then it will take up less encoding time (but not much less) when converting to MPEG later. Capturing with HuffYUV and converting to MPEG later will give the best picture quality because you will only have one round of MPEG compression artifacts and you'll be able to use an encoder that can take its time doing the best job (as opposed to a real-time encoder which has to take shortcuts to make sure it doesn't fall behind during capture). The problem is the large file size created by HuffYUV (about 30 GB/hr at full D1, 1/4 that at the quarter D1 you're capturing at now) because it uses a lossless compression scheme.

The other way is to capture in MPEG then author straight to DVD. But then here, some picture and audio quality may be lost (depending on the quality of the original video source).

Capturing in MPEG1 and converting to MPEG2 will give you two rounds of compression artifacts, the quality can only get worse. Capturing in MPEG1 and burning that directly to DVD will give better quality. Capturing with a lossless codec like HuffYUV and converting to MPEG once will give the best picture quality.

[soneman]

You will loose more quality by capturing to MPEG-1 and converting to MPEG-2 compared to capture in MPEG-1 straight to DVD. The encoding time from MPEG-1 to MPEG-2 would be about the same as converting avi to MPEG-2.

Try the alternatives and see the differencies. I think your CPU really is strong enough to capture MPEG-2 at half DVD resolution 352x576. You can at least try it with Mainconcept PVR and see if it works. I could do it with my ATI All-in-wonder Radeon using ATI multimediacenter when I had a 1 GHz AMD Athlon CPU and I think a 2 GHz Celeron would be more powerful.

If huffyuv takes too much hard disc space when capturing to avi, then try PicVideo mjpeg codec which gives smaller files and then use software compression to DVD. PicVideo mjpeg is also easier on slow machines. I had no problems capturing 720x576 resolution with PicVideo mjpeg and the Athlon 1000 CPU.

The problem with Mainconcept PVR and PicVideo mjpeg is that both are trial versions. It effectively means that I can try capturing with these two programs once or twice and then I'm unable to use it again until I actually purchase the software.

Thanks, but no thanks. I think I'll stick with what I've got.

[Moonstomp]

The problem with Mainconcept PVR and PicVideo mjpeg is that both are trial versions. It effectively means that I can try capturing with these two programs once or twice and then I'm unable to use it again until I actually purchase the software.

Thanks, but no thanks. I think I'll stick with what I've got.

If you want to go the FREE way - you're best to go the avi route with Virtualdub / VirtualVCR.
Don't expect to get MPEG2 capture software for free.

Moonstomp.

[Richard_G]

At last, common sense starts to return to the thread. Your hardware is easily up to the job, it is no different to what everyone was using 3 or 4 years ago and it was considered the ultimate then! I agree that the PicVideo MJPEG codec could be a good way forward for you. I used to capture with Virtualdub and PicVideo in full resolution (720 x 576) PAL on a 600 MHz Athlon based machine. Admittedly, you will be capturing to AVI and will then have to encode to MPEG2 so it will add some time but the quality will be fine.

I suspect the bit in the setup for your card mentioned only applies if you have paid for an optional MPEG2 encoder. A lot of the cheaper cards do that, the card is capable but only if you have the plugin for the software.

[soneman]

I've tried Mainconcept PVR. It's got some decent features. But when I tried capturing in MPEG2 with maximum quality, the video started skipping and jumping towards the end of the video. It was playing fine with a lower quality setting.

But I don't think it's the solution I've been looking for. I don't know what it is but the picture looked better with a MPEG1 capture through SoftPVR than with a MPEG2 capture through Mainconcept PVR. For a start, I can adjust the brightness, contrast, sharpness and colour settings (hue, saturation) in SoftPVR (which makes a huge difference to the picture quality by the way). But I can't in Mainconcept PVR.

This is where the quality gets lost.

I've tried capturing in AVI aswell. There's no improvement in quality - with or without the use of codecs.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone but I think I'll stick with capturing in MPEG1 and then go from there.