Newbie Adventures Update

[MrHawhn]

Well well well, it's been a while so I thought i get an update in. First of all, they say you should not look a gift horse in the mouth... but it never hurts to check it's knees.

The freebie vid capture was technically a good card but the card itself had some stealth defects that made things rather interesting on my recording attempts. I think I may have invented some new cuss words.

Thing was intermittent so doing the same thing could yield different results each time and it was many software changes re recordings, cable changes and system overhauls later when a friend pointed out that the card had circuit damage.

Any who, it was interesting none the less, I've learned much from the few successful attempts I had with the card. It's really not as hard as you think. Getting good results is pretty easy once you adjust expectations. Your VHS cap is never going to look as good as a DVD in most cases. It's a limitation of the medium, not unlike trying to scant a magazine print of a photo. No matter how high you set the resolution, in the end you're still capping a high res copy of a low res image.

Oh there's ways to get it close but the cost and effort vs Quality curve gets really steep the higher you go.

Just a tip for fellow newbies out there. Adjust your expectations properly.

Now I'm finding myself in look for a new card and it seems like the

Hauppauge WinTV PVR-150

is once again I high rank for my budget range.

Question though... there seem to be lots and lots of these USB ones...how do those compare really to the internal PCI's in turms of perfomance and output quality?

Anyone had any comparative experience with both?

[edDV]

I am exhausted. Read the tale but never caught the hardware card ID. No idea.

Reads like "I bought this old truck in Uzbeck and it went 20 miles and quit"

[MrHawhn]

Ah my bad the card was a:
LifeView Flyvideo 98

I'm actually still using it, the damage doesn't prevent the card's function, it just makes it a little glichy and inconsistend from time to time, particularly when it gets 'hot'. My mystery anomalies seem to go down if I give it a 1 hour break every 10-20 mins of capturing. If I don't well you read the post...things get un predictable (artifacts out of no where, audio desynch, frame drops, etc)