JVC miniDV video capture on a pc ?

[silverclaws]

Hello, I am both new to here and new to the idea of capturing video from a mini DV onto a computer for editing and I pretty clueless except for the fact I once heard my camera can be connected to a computer for editing, so, am about to try.

Ok, I have a JVC GR - DVX 507 EK miniDV camcorder, a sweet little machine that has never failed me, the recordings are superb, when I recorded to VHS, well certainly better than my old 8mm camcorder, and the machine is very portable too, unlike the 8mm, which was a bit of a chunk.

Now as technology appears to have moved on, instead of creating VHS tapes, I now wish to create DVD's, along with the benefits of DVD, menus and such, but can I do it with my miniDV and a pc running Vistaster (Vista basic 32bit) ? The pc is a notebook with only USB ports and a weird D shaped socket, but it does have provision for a PCMCIA card, I have been told would take a firewire card, but I am pretty clueless as to what to do and the high street shops are zero help. So I come here to ask the experts, can anyone offer any help ?

[edDV]

See here a collection of PC Cards that support IEEE-1394 Firewire. Some support both IEEE-1394 and USB2.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Order=BESTMATCH&Descr...E-1394+cardbus

You will need a card like one of these and a cable to transfer 720x576i DV video to your hard disk. Expect about 13GB per hour or data.

WinDV is a simple capture program. Vista Basic lacks video editing apps. You will need to buy editing and DVD authoring software.

[silverclaws]

Excellent, thank you very much, but a few questions based upon your answer ;

The firewire card, which one would be recommended for my machine, I have no knowledge of iee whatever standards ?

What video and editing capture software is recommended for use by a beginner with ideas about creating DVD style menus ?

As you can understand, I am very new to this.

[edDV]

Excellent, thank you very much, but a few questions based upon your answer ;

The firewire card, which one would be recommended for my machine, I have no knowledge of iee whatever standards ?

What video and editing capture software is recommended for use by a beginner with ideas about creating DVD style menus ?

As you can understand, I am very new to this.

General spec is IEEE 1394 PCMCIA Card (OpenHCI specification V1.0 and V1.1 compliant)

You will also need an IEEE-1394 cable with 4 pin connector on the camcorder end and usually a 6 pin connector on the PC card end.



Some popular starter edit/DVD authoring suites are

Adobe Premiere Elements
Corel-ULead Video Studio
Sony Vegas Movie Studio

Premiere Elements is probably the most beginner friendly.