Preserving a classical music Laserdisc collection

[fellowweb]

Hey everyone,

after some research in this forum's archive and with Google, I would highly appreciate your help.

My father has acquired quite a comprehensive Laserdisc collection, for the most part consisting of classical music. As he is primarily interested in the classical music's audio quality, the Laserdisc player (Sony MDP-650D) is connected to a reasonable hi-fi system.
Although he really loves the Laserdisc technology and all the discs he has, he fears that sooner or later the Laserdisc player breaks. Therefore he asked me whether I could do some research on how to preserve the content of the discs.

So far I found out that what I would need is some video capturing device in order to digitise the Laserdiscs. However, several aspects are still vague for me:

1) What eventual output format would you advise?

I could obviously think of backing everything up to DVDs. Alternatively, I thought of movie files, which could be watched with the help of one of those multimedia hard disks hooked up to a TV (or something similar, e.g. the Apple TV).

As it is all about classical music and the music quality is the main aspect, the format does not matter that much. My father does not have a DVD player yet (as in his understanding DVD has primarily targeted movie enthusiasts). Therefore, whether it is eventually a DVD or a multimedia hard disk, both would imply an additional investment.

Would the audio (and video) quality of a DVD/DVD player usually be superiour to something more PC based (such as a multimedia hard disk)?

2) Which platform would you prefer? Windows or Mac?

We could either use my old Toshiba laptop (Windows XP, Pentium M 1,8GHz, 1024MB RAM) or my Mac mini (OS X 10.5.7, Core 2 Duo 2GHz, 4048 MB RAM).

As we can choose between either platform, it does not really matter to us. The Toshiba laptop could be used exclusively for this purpose. For the Mac mini I would prefer a solution with a lower CPU impact which let's me still work with it during the capturing process.

Apart from this, the only question is for which platform we would be able to get the better hardware and software for the Laserdisc conversion.

If Windows Movie Maker or iMovie 09 made sense to use, we could use them. However, we don't need to focus on these two products.

3) Which video capturing device could you recommend?

For Mac I saw the Elgato EyeTV 250 plus or the Elgato Video Capture. EyeTV 250 plus supports MPEG-2 and MPEG-1 for video and MPEG 1 Layer II (Sampling rates of 32 kHz, 44.1 kHz, and 48 kHz, Compressed bit rates up to 448 kbit/sec) for audio. Video Capture seems to focus on digitising analog content for an iPod or an Apple TV. As such, it supports H.264 (at 1.4 MBit/sec) and MPEG-4 (at 2.4 MBit/sec) and AAC, 48kHZ, 128 kBit/sec.

In general, I have read positive experiences with Canopus' (now Grass Valley's) ADVC range of products.

Are these good options?

Probably we would try to purchase a used device and to sell it after the conversion.

I would be very gladful for your knowledgable thoughts and remarks!

[jagabo]

DVD Recorder.

[Bjs]

May be a little rusty but from what I recall in general music cd's are 44.1khz with above 112kbps

You can record the audio using the laptop by connecting the laser disc units output to laptops line-in and use audacity to capture the input to file and save as wav rather than in mp3 which is compressed and this will be the master copy of the backup.

Part 1 is open choice, some devices are better just like you wouldn't buy certain products from specific companies because of poor feedback and support found by researching online prior to purchase.

Part 2 dose not matter, which ever dose the job and your comfortable with ... ie, ease of features, navigation, ect...

Part 3 ... if someone gave me anything from canopus Id set them on fire.

There's 3 main groups.

1: Dvdrecorder, final edits on pc / mac

The next two are pc / mac capture devices ... software vs hardware encoders ... hardware encoders tend to be less flexible on final output formats but suit systems with minimum specifications ... software encoders require faster system specifications

[edDV]

Laserdisc video would be composite PAL. You need a capture device with a good comb filter Y/C separator. Don't use the player S-Video out.

Audio varies on laserdisc. The latest discs used AC-3 same as DVD. You can copy as is.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laserdisc
http://www.blam1.com/LaserDisc/FAQ/

[2Bdecided]

The Laser disc format supports both analogue and digital audio. The digital audio is CD quality LPCM stereo - but it's also possible (quite common on later discs) that the analogue audio is replaced with Dolby Digital (5.1 384kbps AC-3) - and sometimes the digital audio is replaced with DTS.

More information here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laserdisc#Audio


So your challenge (for those discs with digital audio) is to bit perfectly capture that audio, archive it, and convert it to DVD sample rates (because DVDs require 48kHz, while LD uses 44.1kHz). I don't know whether the AC-3 bitstream is 44.1kHZ or 48kHz - if the latter, it can be dropped straight onto the final DVD.

There are people doing clever transfers like this - have a Google. Ask at doom9. etc.

Cheers,
David.

[Nelson37]

The Mac Mini, or at least some models of it, is apparently capable of doing the bit-accurate transfer of the audio thru SPDIF. Do you have these outputs on the player? If not, then you are stuck with standard recording methods.

[SatStorm]

Don't waste your time.
Get a DVD Standalone Recorder. It is the ideal solution for your case.

[jman98]

I do laserdisc captures every now and then for some old stuff that's not on DVD. Yes, there are indeed some videos that never were released anywhere on DVD and only on laserdisc. Mostly it's older music programs of various kinds. I have no way to capture SPDIF, so when doing this I simply set my capture card to capture the audio at the highest bit rate I can. My capture cards all record the audio as MPEG-1 layer II audio, but at a high enough bit rate it should be close enough to the original that most people can't tell any difference. Of course I can only capture in stereo this way.

DTS laserdiscs did exist, but they were somewhat rare. It is highly unlikely that DTS was used on a music program and probably even less likely that AC3 was used on a classical music laserdisc. Almost certainly we are talking about LPCM stereo on these discs.

Finally, it's worth noting that a lot of music programs only available on laserdisc in the past have been issued on DVD.
http://www.arkivmusic.com
would be a great source to see if that is the case for any particular discs you are interested in.

[fellowweb]

A sincere thank you to all of you!

Your tips and remarks are very helpful. I will now try to work my way through them and to narrow the options down. It would be very helpful if I could then come back in case of further questions.

Thanks again to everyone. Have a nice week!

[fellowweb]

Having done some further research (including your links), I would now highly appreciate your help once again.

I have been to my parents' in the meantime and I could have a look at the Sony MDP-650D. It does support PAL as well as NTSC. However, I assume all of my father's LDs will be PAL as he always bought them here in Germany (or Switzerland). For capturing video and audio it supports the following connections:

Video Out
The MDP's video out is 21-pin SCART (EURO-AV) supporting RGB.

Audio Out
The MDP's has a digital audio out which is not further specified. Sony only lists an optical cable POC-15 as an optional accessory.

In addition to these two outs there are one cinch video out and one cinch audio out. However, as far as I understand these outs would be inferiour in quality, wouldn't they?

Is it correct that the best combination for the highest quality capturing would be the SCART (RGB) and the optical out?

Is it correct to assume that the optical audio out's output mostly consists of 2 uncompressed PCM-encoded digital channels with 44.1 kHz and 16bit (as described in the FAQ referenced by edDV)? In my case with non-movie laserdiscs, I should not assume the classical music laserdiscs to have AC3 or DTS audio, shouldn't I?

Again, thank you all for your help!

[2Bdecided]

The SCART won't carry RGB. It'll only have composite, or at best (worst, in this case!) S-video.

Cheers,
David.

[fellowweb]

Thank you for your answer. I had already hoped to start understanding all the video/audio interfaces.

Regarding video: The MDP has a SCART as well as a Cinch interface. It offers the option to enable/disable RGB. Which interface offers the best quality then?

My understanding is that SCART (EURO-AV) is always superiour to Cinch. Obviously this is wrong!?

[Slayer666]

Having done some further research (including your links), I would now highly appreciate your help once again.

I have been to my parents' in the meantime and I could have a look at the Sony MDP-650D. It does support PAL as well as NTSC. However, I assume all of my father's LDs will be PAL as he always bought them here in Germany (or Switzerland). For capturing video and audio it supports the following connections:

Video Out
The MDP's video out is 21-pin SCART (EURO-AV) supporting RGB.

Audio Out
The MDP's has a digital audio out which is not further specified. Sony only lists an optical cable POC-15 as an optional accessory.

In addition to these two outs there are one cinch video out and one cinch audio out. However, as far as I understand these outs would be inferiour in quality, wouldn't they?

Is it correct that the best combination for the highest quality capturing would be the SCART (RGB) and the optical out?

Is it correct to assume that the optical audio out's output mostly consists of 2 uncompressed PCM-encoded digital channels with 44.1 kHz and 16bit (as described in the FAQ referenced by edDV)? In my case with non-movie laserdiscs, I should not assume the classical music laserdiscs to have AC3 or DTS audio, shouldn't I?

Again, thank you all for your help!

Tach!

Wenn Daddy nur die Musik haben will (ohne Bild):
LD Player -> optical -> egal welcher Audiostream vorliegt, nimm auf in 16bit/44,1khz (-> kannste dann als audio CDR brennen, mach noch ein Daten back up der original uneditierten Files zuvor)

für Video einfachste Variante:
LD Player -> Scart -> guter DVD Rekorder (am besten pro LD-Seite in XP/60min Modus mit LPCM-Ton aufnehmen, die Qualität einer semi-professionell gecaptureten und authorten DVDR nimmt zu viel zu viel Zeit in Anspruch und ist qualitativ meistens auch nur geringfügig besser)

[fellowweb]

Hi Slayer666, vielen Dank für die Antwort. Für andere Leser bleibe ich mal bei Englisch, okay?

Wenn Daddy nur die Musik haben will (ohne Bild):
LD Player -> optical -> egal welcher Audiostream vorliegt, nimm auf in 16bit/44,1khz (-> kannste dann als audio CDR brennen, mach noch ein Daten back up der original uneditierten Files zuvor)

Although focus is definitely on preserving a hiqh quality audio (i.e. uncompressed), video should still be included as well. However, picture quality does not need to be high-end.

für Video einfachste Variante:
LD Player -> Scart -> guter DVD Rekorder (am besten pro LD-Seite in XP/60min Modus mit LPCM-Ton aufnehmen, die Qualität einer semi-professionell gecaptureten und authorten DVDR nimmt zu viel zu viel Zeit in Anspruch und ist qualitativ meistens auch nur geringfügig besser)

Would you still suggest using a DVD recorder if we do not want to end up with DVDs?

In order to avoid a later need for archiving DVDs to [whatever is up-to-date then], I would prefer some type of PC video file such as a MKV container or similar. If we could have a container format supporting mid-quality video (probably with a good compression codec such as H.264) and a hiqh-quality (if possible uncompressed) audio, this would be perfect.

[2Bdecided]

Thank you for your answer. I had already hoped to start understanding all the video/audio interfaces.

Regarding video: The MDP has a SCART as well as a Cinch interface. It offers the option to enable/disable RGB. Which interface offers the best quality then?

My understanding is that SCART (EURO-AV) is always superiour to Cinch. Obviously this is wrong!?

RGB is highest quality analogue SD connection in Europe (equivalent to component / YPbPr), but the video on the laserdisc is only in composite. If you use the RGB output of the player, you're relying on its composite > RGB conversion. It's potentially better to feed the original composite signal directly into a decent capturing device, and let it convert (to YPbPr for MPEG etc). edDV has already mentioned this way up the thread WRT S-video.

Cheers,
David.

[Slayer666]

audio:
depends on the actual audiostream on the Laserdiscs! they are all in 44.1khz but some are compressed AC3, some are uncompressed LPCM. no matter the real deal IMO would be: LD -> optical out/in -> PC (WAV 16bit/44.1khz)

video/audio:
the Lasersdisc resolution itself is "under" DVD resolution.....so there is no need to capture even higher quality which cant be done for now anyway (like capturing Blu-Ray resolution). but for the ultimate capture it takes good equipment, time and knowledge. i'd do it this way:

1.)
good LD player -> optical out/in -> PC (WAV 16bit/44.1khz). this way you get as close to the original unedited LD audio as it can be done

2.)
good LD player -> svhs out/in -> DV AVI (video and audio)
now here we have an audio stream synched to the video but the audio is going: digital -> analog -> digital so there theoretical is 2 steps quality loss(which you might not even hear in the end though)

then i would replace that 2nd audio stream by synching it with the 1st pure digital one and make DVDs out of it, encoding ~8200 video bitrate (you wont see any difference to the original DV AVI files normally) and using LPCM audio (you gotta upconvert the synched version to 48khz for having it DVD standard) for each LD side. you also can back up the DV AVI on data discs, best solution IMO.

but if you can find a DVD recorder being able to do XP/60min mode LPCM.....then its way more faster to do it through SCART and you still can edit/synch the optical audio later to it and do menus on computer!

[fellowweb]

Again, a sincere thank you to all of you. Slowly I get a far better understanding. Please allow me to summarise in my own words just to make clear I understood you correctly:

So for high-quality audio (only digital, no A/D conversion), the best option remains to grab the digital audio out's output:

LD -> optical out/in -> PC (WAV 16bit/44.1khz)

(I am pretty sure that we don't have any AC3 or DTS LDs. Therefore the way recommended by Slayer666 seems perfect to me.)

For mid-quality video my options are (always A/D conversion from composite PAL LD source):

1) via DVD recorder
Step 1: Record LD to DVD via SCART/EURO-AV (RGB deactivated)
Step 2: Rip DVD to PC
Step 3: Sync ripped DVD video with digitally recorded audio

2) via DV camcorder
Step 1: Capture video via composite (RGB deactivated)
Step 2: Sync captured video with digitally recorded audio

Regarding Step 1: Capture video via composite (RGB deactivated)

good LD player -> svhs out/in -> DV AVI (video and audio)

Is using a DV camcorder what you refer to by DV AVI or am I again way off? Do you only refer to the target codec with DV AVI? SVHS ist this here, isn't it:

The Sony MDP-650D does not have this video out. Therefore, I would use the composite cinch.

3) via computer-based A/D converter
Step 1: Capture video via composite (not SCART/EURO-AV, RGB deactivated)
Step 2: Sync captured video with digitally recorded audio

Regarding Step 1: Capture video via composite (not SCART/EURO-AV, RGB deactivated)

Laserdisc video would be composite PAL. You need a capture device with a good comb filter Y/C separator. Don't use the player S-Video out.

RGB is highest quality analogue SD connection in Europe (equivalent to component / YPbPr), but the video on the laserdisc is only in composite. If you use the RGB output of the player, you're relying on its composite > RGB conversion. It's potentially better to feed the original composite signal directly into a decent capturing device, and let it convert (to YPbPr for MPEG etc). edDV has already mentioned this way up the thread WRT S-video.

I admit, it took me some time to understand this. Thank you for your patience.

then i would replace that 2nd audio stream by synching it with the 1st pure digital one and make DVDs out of it, encoding ~8200 video bitrate (you wont see any difference to the original DV AVI files normally) and using LPCM audio (you gotta upconvert the synched version to 48khz for having it DVD standard) for each LD side. you also can back up the DV AVI on data discs, best solution IMO.

I don't assume I will need this. Because I don't want to convert to DVDs, I would prefer to keep the PC-type video container file using some moderate compression video codec and trying to combine it with the uncompressed LPCM audio.

Eventually, no matter how I approach the conversion, I would manually have to sync the A/D converted video with the digitally recorded audio, wouldn't I?

[2Bdecided]

Eventually, no matter how I approach the conversion, I would manually have to sync the A/D converted video with the digitally recorded audio, wouldn't I?

Yes, and don't assume that will be easy. It might be, but it might be a real pain.

Cheers,
David.

[fellowweb]

Thank you, David. Although it sounded pretty simple as mentioned by Slayer666, I have already expected this to be pretty complicated. In addition, if it really requires two separate steps which is time-consuming.

Is someone aware of a capturing device which could grab the analog composite video signal as well as the digital audio signal at the same time? Digitalizing the video signal and directly merging it with the digital audio?

This would not only leave aside the sync problem. But then the whole process would only take half the time.

[Slayer666]

...So for high-quality audio (only digital, no A/D conversion), the best option remains to grab the digital audio out's output:

LD -> optical out/in -> PC (WAV 16bit/44.1khz)

(I am pretty sure that we don't have any AC3 or DTS LDs. Therefore the way recommended by Slayer666 seems perfect to me.)

yep, best way to go! and you also can burn the 16bit/44.1khz to standard Audio CDRs which is the cool thing when being some audiophile!

regarding the capturing ways:
if you really would want the best video quality then you need to do ALL the 3 seperate video capturing (even doing some more, testing other cables, settings etc.), comparing them on computer exactly before deciding which is the best one qualitywise. at points some cables or out/inputs from equipment or settings (etc.) are not the best so the supposely more bad capture turns out looking better in the end. but keep in mind this takes time, time, time and lots of harddisc space (1 hour DV AVI = 12-13gb).
from my experience, cause of the time issues, the reason that the video quality isnt "that" important for you and the fact i had bad quality experience with composite....i'd go the first way with a GOOD(!) stand alone DVD recorder:

1) via DVD recorder
Step 1: Record LD to DVD via SCART/EURO-AV (RGB deactivated)
Step 2: Rip DVD to PC
Step 3: Sync ripped DVD video with digitally recorded audio

Step 3 indeed can take some time as different devices give different speed/times even on pure digital ways. so the synching can be really ugly.

DV AVI = thats the format from a Mini-DV or Digital-8 camera or some A/D converter (like Canopus ADVC-110) and can easily be handled frame by frame from most of the video tools floating around. you can use such camera IF they allow you to do so (if they allow you to do the A/D video converting, the cheaper ones mostly dont)!! and yes, that pic is a svhs output i'd normally use when going the DV AVI way.

Because I don't want to convert to DVDs, I would prefer to keep the PC-type video container file using some moderate compression video codec and trying to combine it with the uncompressed LPCM audio.

hmmm....you'd only watch the DV AVI on computer? or encode to Blu-Ray? keep in mind the A/D gives you the standard PAL 720x576 resolution and any upscaling doesnt improve anything qualitywise, i'd stay in that resolution making DVDs with bitrates described above!

Eventually, no matter how I approach the conversion, I would manually have to sync the A/D converted video with the digitally recorded audio, wouldn't I?

only if you "really" want the best audio quality. going the LD -> D/A -> A/D - way is not the best but the quality difference might not be that significant.....in the end its your decision if you want to spend all the time and effort!

and no, i dont think there are consumer price friendly devices capturing video and optical audio together.

hope this helps!!

[fellowweb]

Thank you again! And sorry for the late reply. I just wanted to take a look at the LDs first:

Yesterday, I could do this and verify that all our music LDs are definitely stereo only - so I don't have to worry about DTS, AC3 or similar.

if you really would want the best video quality then you need to do ALL the 3 seperate video capturing (even doing some more, testing other cables, settings etc.), comparing them on computer exactly before deciding which is the best one qualitywise. at points some cables or out/inputs from equipment or settings (etc.) are not the best so the supposely more bad capture turns out looking better in the end. but keep in mind this takes time, time, time and lots of harddisc space (1 hour DV AVI = 12-13gb).

We'll see how devoted I will be. Could still be that I end up with the DVD recorder option which you recommended.

Step 3 indeed can take some time as different devices give different speed/times even on pure digital ways. so the synching can be really ugly.

Do you mean that even if I can match the video and audio in e.g. iMovie's timeline (in the beginning of the movie), could it still be that video and sound are not in sync (towards the end of the movie)? I.e. the length of the entire video signal does not match the length of the entire audio signal? This would definitely be ugly.
(My father mentioned that even with some LD sources video and audio are not even in sync originally. This may put the sync problem into perspective.)

hmmm....you'd only watch the DV AVI on computer?

No, no. This couldn't justify the extra effort for archiving the digital audio signal. Most probably we would eventually convert each LD's video/audio to a good container file with good video compression (i.e. H.264) and little to none audio compression (if possible). Then these files would be played on the TV/Hifi through something like a WD TV. - Therefore I can mitigate the possibility of my father asking me to do some further conversion to a new medium in a couple of years.

and no, i dont think there are consumer price friendly devices capturing video and optical audio together.

Are you aware of a device even if it was out of the pro range?
Today, I could talk to a very helpful Grass Valley/Canopus technician. Their devices don't support this. Neither do Terratec, Pinnacle or Hauppage.
If I could buy it used on eBay and sell it after use (or rent it), it might not be that expensive overall.

hope this helps!!

It definitley does! Thank you very much!

[Nelson37]

The Creative Labs X-Fi cards will capture optical audio digitally, bit-perfect.

They will pass audio internally to ATI AIW cards, 9000-series and before, not sure of newer cards.

There is an option to record as LPCM, but I never tested it, I used either DVD-mpg audio or converted AC3. The audio was passed to the ATI card internally, with no connection between the two cards, meaning the Creative card did most of the audio handling.

[jagabo]

The Hauppauge HD PVR can capture digital audio and video at the same time without any sync problems. It's a hardware h.264 encoder.

[dphirschler]

From what I learned about LD, very few of them are in PAL format. Make sure about that before you shell out $$ on a PAL player that you might not need. Along the same lines, 5.1 ac3 is also rare (only found on later LDs). So make sure of that. Most of them are digital, but not ac3 5.1. Also rare is anamorphic widescreen.

From my experience capturing LD...

- Spend the time setting your video capture levels (brightness, contrast, gamma, saturation, sharpness). Once you set it once for your player, you shouldn't need to set it again. But certain discs might call for some tweaking.

- You can capture using composite. The data is actually written to the disc in composite. So spending extra money on a player that outputs s-video is unnecessary.

- Get an audio card that supports digital audio input. Doesn't matter if it is coax (RCA) or optical. The quality is the same. Just make sure your player outputs the same.

- Record audio at 44.1KHz. You'll have to resample it to 48KHz in software.


Darryl

[fellowweb]

Thank you both for your extremely helpful remarks. I am answering so late because I wanted to do some research on these products first. And both suggestions are very helpful.

The Creative Labs X-Fi cards will capture optical audio digitally, bit-perfect.

They will pass audio internally to ATI AIW cards, 9000-series and before, not sure of newer cards.

There is an option to record as LPCM, but I never tested it, I used either DVD-mpg audio or converted AC3. The audio was passed to the ATI card internally, with no connection between the two cards, meaning the Creative card did most of the audio handling.

This does really sound great! Are you aware of comparable external solutions using the same chips? If I chose Windows XP as the platform to do this, it would be a notebook where this internal cards couldn't be used. If I chose Mac OS X, it would be a Mac mini which couldn't be upgraded with a different video card, however, it does have an internal digital audio-in. Whatsoever, using a seperate desktop PC for this could be an option.

What software do you use to record the video signals then?

The Hauppauge HD PVR can capture digital audio and video at the same time without any sync problems. It's a hardware h.264 encoder.

This is a really fascinating product! Using Elgato's EyeTV 3 or HDPVR-Capture, a piece of software by a Hauppauge engineer, one could even use it on a Mac if one wanted to.
However, does it support LPCM-audio-encoding via the SPDIF? I have the impression that it doesn't.

Hauppauge states in the HD PVR's FAQ:

What type of audio encoding is made with the HD PVR?

The HD PVR supports AC-3 (5.1) or 2 channel AAC audio capture. AAC 2 channel is received using RCA audio inputs, or SPDIF when set to PCM. If using SPDIF with bit stream audio, you will get 5.1 AC-3 Dolby Digital. DTS audio is currently not supported.

Currently, the Arcsoft TME application will only support editing from the beginning or the end of a clip to preserve 5.1 audio. Any editing or cuts made in the middle segments of a clip will result in the audio being transcoded back to 2.0

Isn't AAC a lossy codec so that the LPCM signal wouldn't be saved lossless (like ripping a CD to MP3 instead of FLAC)?

[fellowweb]

@Darryl: Thank you for the remarks. I am in Europe. Therefore all LDs are PAL, none is NTSC. As it is only classical music, everything is stereo only.

[SHS]

HD PVR supports both Dolby Digital (AC-3) and PCM (aka LPCM) bitstream
The only thing it dosen't support is DTS

[fellowweb]

HD PVR supports both Dolby Digital (AC-3) and PCM (aka LPCM) bitstream
The only thing it dosen't support is DTS

Maybe I misunderstand you but don't you only refer to the sources' audio outputs supported by the HD PVR?

As far as I could see in the Hauppauge manuals/FAQs/..., the HD PVR indeed can capture LPCM via the SPDIF in. However, the LPCM is directly converted into compressed lossy AAC.
In other words, yes, the HD PVR supports recording LPCM. But it cannot save an recorded LPCM stream to uncompressed lossless LPCM again.

Am I wrong? (I would really hope that I am wrong. )

[SHS]

I see then yes in that case the Audio Codec on Rec side is directly converted in to AAC or Dolby Digital (AC3) depend on the option you want.

[Nelson37]

Not sure about the Hauppage options, though their products have often had such limitations.

I Think their is a USB version of the X-Fi, though not sure of it's inputs and capabilities. The 24-bit accuracy of the card makes it possible to record directly an AC-3 stream, though it sounds like you may not need to do this. The Mac Mini is apparently also capable of this type of recording.

For the ATI AIW card, no USB equivalent available, SFAIK. Would not recommend USB capture in general and any video capture on a notebook.

For the video, I use the MMC software that comes with the ATI. There is an option in later versions to capture uncompressed LPCM, which I tested briefly but not extensively. This option did not work for AC-3 capture, for which only a few softwares do.

I do know that the Creative card will pass the audio along from either optical or Coax SPDIF to the ATI card with no physical connection at all. No mini plug, no stereo to the ATI dongle, no internal cable. The sound card can capture a seperate file in designated format while passing audio to the ATI card to process into a different format. For a straight digital LPCM capture, these files should be identical when using the LPCM otpion in MMC software, but this is not something I have tested.

Not sure of video options for the Mac Mini, but this may be your best avenue as it is already SPDIF-capable, and as you already have one. The ATI cards I have used are all older, AGP models, have not tested and have seen few reports on their newer, PCI models. What little I have read was not promising.