Using a Extron 300A with a HDMI capture device

[32768]

Hi,

I have an Extron 300-A analogue video -> HDMI scalar device. I'm looking to capture VGA video which is 640x480 from some old computer. I have the analogue component/composite video cable as well but that's not relevant here.

Originally I was going to buy a Startech USB3HDCAP which can, from what I can tell, capture pretty much everything. But it also is expensive and I can't really make much else use of it. Anytime one shows up on eBay for a reasonable price it is always missing the A/V cables.

Thus I thought I am doing it wrong and should instead just use the Extron to perform the digital conversion and get a decent HDMI inexpensive capture dongle thingy with an HDMI passthrough.

The problem I'm worried about is scaling 640x480 to 16:9 1920x1080: I'd rather just deal with black bars and work with pixel-correct source where the aspect ratio isn't all messed up and stretched.

What do you all suggest?

[Cornucopia]

If the input resolution is standard VGA 640x480, you should be able to adjust the image in the Extron, or even rely on "Auto-Image" to properly scale that to HD size. I have similar Extron scalars, and I have NEVER had an issue with inappropriate aspect ratio change.


Scott

[32768]

It scales it to 1920x1080p properly, mostly, but I'm not sure how good it is/isn't because I have a 1440p display and it would be introducing its own scaling.

I guess my question boils down to, would such a set up be "Pretty decent"? I'm not looking for pixel perfect artifact free studio ++ quality, but "Pretty good for sure" is good enough for me.

[Cornucopia]

I think its resize algorithm is certainly "pro" quality. It is not the best that offline, software-based resizers could do, but it well above average in resize quality, especially for realtime hardware-based.
Yes, because your own display is larger than its max supported rez, you WOULD be resizing twice, and that is to be avoided in general. But perhaps it can't be avoided here unless/until you get a higher rez (4k-ish) replacement.

But if you are capturing, my guess is you are using some sort of HDMI capture device, and software. So you should be able to capture in a window (not fullscreen) and avoid scaling altogether (or relegate scaling to a post capture process, where you can use fancier software options). HDMI *DOES* support 640x480 and similar resolutions, so with proper capture software you shouldn't really need to rescale.


Scott