A simple solution for a weak system?

[AlecWest]

I may be grasping at straws, but here goes. My system is an AMD K6-2 450mhz with 96 megs RAM running Win98SE. After experimenting with a few things, it's becoming painfully obvious that it's difficult to do what I'd like to do -- convert old analog VHS tapes into VCDs. My system, as is, does everything else I want it to do and I wouldn't want to have to upgrade to a faster system only for the ability to do this ... unless I have no other alternative. I'd like input from anyone on what I think might be such an alternative.

Is there a digital-style video recording device that would operate separate from my computer ... but could be connected to my computer (via USB) to feed video/audio to it at a speed the computer can handle it for conversion into VCD format MPGs? If so, what software/hardware would I need? Or, is there such a thing as a standalone VCD recorder?

[Greg12]

yeah, check out the Dazzle Digital Video converter.

I can make VCD MPEG 1 on it's own, using a special type of processor built to encode video.

It hooks up via the USB interface.

Your CPU is your biggest problem.

[AlecWest]

Greg12 wrote:

yeah, check out the Dazzle Digital Video converter.

I did. The minimum CPU requirement is 400mhz. I have that ... but ... I also tried a Pinnacle Linx Cable with a similar requirement. And it wasn't until after I got it that I found out it worked fine in "good" mode (lower resolution) but lousy in "best" mode (320x240).

I can make VCD MPEG 1 on it's own, using a special type of processor built to encode video. It hooks up via the USB interface.

Please tell me of this method.

Your CPU is your biggest problem.

No kidding (grin). Incidentally, I recently read a review of the Terapin TX00002 standalone VCD recorder ... on sale for $199 through Sam's Club:

http://www.scifi2k.com/misc_html/edit/edit_terapintest.html

This review was fairly recent (2/2002) and I've emailed Sam's Club to see if it's still for sale.

[Psycho_Dad_Rules]

Hi,

I own a Dazzle DVC (Stands for Digital Video Creator). It's basically a Hardware MPEG encoder. Mine connects to the Parellel port. With the software that comes with it, you can select a audio+composite video source or audio+svhs video source and record straight to a VCD complaint mpeg stream. It also supports higher bitrates (Up to 3000Kb/sec, vcd is only about 1150kb/sec, i just found out that the USB version can only go upto 2500kb/sec).
It it also possible to record straight to compressed audio.

The site contains al the right specs, coz mine hasn't been used for a while. I stopped video capturing a while ago.

Als check out :
http://www.dazzle.com/products/vidcr.html

Greetz,

pSyChO dAd

[AlecWest]

Psycho_Dad_Rules wrote:

I own a Dazzle DVC (Stands for Digital Video Creator). It's basically a Hardware MPEG encoder.

Aha! I see the difference. Someone earlier referred me to a Dazzle scenario -- but I was looking at the specs for DVC2, not DVC1 -- which is what your link mentions. This appears to be what I'm looking for. Unlike the Pinnacle Linx (which is only a "cable"), the DVC1 is an actual hardware device ... and I assume this device has it's own buffering capabilities to do what it does. And, unlike the Pinnacle Linx (which requires a 300mhz processor with 64megs RAM), DVC1 only requires 233mhz with 32megs RAM (I have 450mhz with 96megs RAM) ... probably due to the fact that the actual external hardware takes care of on-the-fly capture/conversion.

It also supports higher bitrates (Up to 3000Kb/sec, vcd is only about 1150kb/sec, i just found out that the USB version can only go upto 2500kb/sec).

FWIW, after I installed the Pinnacle software, it ran a test on my system saying it could only handle about 1200kb/sec. But, in the troubleshooting area, it suggested configuration of the hard drive for DMA (direct memory access). When I found my hard drive supported DMA, I modified Windows to allow for this ... and a second Pinnacle software test said my system could then handle upwards of 9000kb/sec. The Pinnacle captures were better after that ... but still not without artifacts (sigh).

The site contains al the right specs, coz mine hasn't been used for a while. I stopped video capturing a while ago.

Just curious ... what was the system you used DVC1 on (ie., CPU speed, memory)??? Also, if your system was similar to mine (and since you haven't used your DVC1 for a while), might you consider selling it??? I'll try to locate a new one locally and, if not, order one from Dazzle direct -- but, in case they're in the process of phasing it out and have no more on hand, I thought I'd ask.

Thanks.

[AlecWest]

Note to Psycho_Dad_Rules:

FWIW, my first reading of the webpage you mentioned implied the DVC1 was only $99.00. So, I called up a local Circuit City store to see if they had it ... and there was only one left on the shelf. However, when I went there, I found the price was $199.00. I got the store manager to browse to the Dazzle page and together we found they were "sneakily" advertising a different $99 product on that page ... and that their price was $199 when you clicked on the "buy" button. Oh, well.

Anyhoo, I bought it and will experiment on it this evening. But, before I go, I wanted to mention something that was not mentioned on the Dazzle site. Perhaps it's only a Circuit City thing but they're currently offering a $50 rebate on the product if purchased prior to 8/31/2002. That certainly takes a bit of the sting out of the price. But, I won't send off for it until I'm certain the product works. Circuit City allows me to return it within 30 days, no questions asked, for a full refund if it doesn't do what it's supposed to do.

[Psycho_Dad_Rules]

Hi, AlecWest

The config of the PC it was running on was an old P2 233Mhz with (i believe) 64Mb. I've even tried it on my very old 133Mhz pentium laptop, and this works.... The thing with the DVC1 is that ALL encoding is done within the dazzle unit. So you just need a fast parallel port. The specs that Dazzle give is only for using the advanced features of the editing program and stuff like that. Another good thing is that since the source is encoded before it is written, you don't need a fast HD or anything. You don't even have to defrag. I mean,if you capture at VCD quality, the data transfer is even slower than a 2x cd-rom drive......

I never said anything about the price of the unit. I bought mine some time back now, and it was pretty expensive here in Holland at the time (about 350 euros)

And, yes if you want i'm willing to sell you the unit. I still have the box and all cables, drivers etc. that came with it.

Greetz,

pSyChO dAd

[react010]

I have a PII-300 with 96mb ram and a cheap tv capture card (BTxxx Chip), and no extra hardware. For converting from VHS to MPG i hook my VHS to the composite video input on my tv card and use the WinVcr (2.0) software to make mpg's on the fly (no need to convert from Avi). The quality is very decent after fiddeling with the different settings in WinVcr: capture at 320x240 with the medium quality setting (Mpeg1), and choose CD-2x. The bitrate of the mpg files is about 3000Kb/sec and looks great on my Daewoo (DVG5000D) Dvd-player.
This player plays mpg's from cd-r without having to convert to VCD first. For me a great solution on a weak system....

[AlecWest]

Testing is complete. The Dazzle DVC1 works "better" than a Swiss watch. Wow!!! I've downloaded VCD-ready MPGs off the net before and watched them in full-screen mode with Windows Media Player. And, they all looked grainy. But my test VCD captured with the DVC1 is near flawless in full-screen mode. Not as good as a DVD, mind you, but damn close. And, when I burned the MPG to a VCD, it looked phenomenal on my TV (played on my Apex 1100w DVD player).

One note ... and I kind-of expected this. While capturing, the "preview" monitor of Dazzle's MovieStar software shows the video jumping. But, the end product is perfect. And, since I don't have to worry about post-capture conversion from AVI to MPG, my capture-time is limited only by the 4-gig barrier of FAT32 -- giving me a capture-time of 3-hours-51-minutes (longer than any motion picture I can think of offhand).

Thanks to you, Psycho_Dad_Rules! You've saved me from shelling out money for a system upgrade I didn't need. FWIW, if I ever get to a point where I want to burn DVDs, I'll just buy one of those standalone Phillips DVD burner/players. But for VCDs, Dazzle's DVC1 does the job ... and then some (grin).

[Psycho_Dad_Rules]

AlecWest,

Your very welcome. I hope have as much pleasur from the DVC1 as i have.

As for the DVD burn-thingie.... there's also a DVC2 (MPEG2) version 8)

Greetz,

pSyChO dAd

[Beavis]

I have a PII-300 with 96mb ram and a cheap tv capture card (BTxxx Chip), and no extra hardware. For converting from VHS to MPG i hook my VHS to the composite video input on my tv card and use the WinVcr (2.0) software to make mpg's on the fly (no need to convert from Avi). The quality is very decent after fiddeling with the different settings in WinVcr: capture at 320x240 with the medium quality setting (Mpeg1), and choose CD-2x. The bitrate of the mpg files is about 3000Kb/sec and looks great on my Daewoo (DVG5000D) Dvd-player.
This player plays mpg's from cd-r without having to convert to VCD first. For me a great solution on a weak system....

This is very interesting... I've tried low-res realtime MPEG capture on a K6-2 400 MHz (shouldn't be that different than your system) and it couldn't keep up. I never tried WinVCR 2.0, though... did you ever make it work with any other capture software or is there something about this one?

[react010]

Well, i did try other software solutions (U-Lead Moviefactory and Cinax-Cineplayer) but they could not keep up. After that i found WinVcr 2.0 + crack (this software was the early version of Cinax-Cineplayer), and on my Windows 95 system (with nothing else running in the background) it makes perfect mpg's on the fly. Maybe it works ok for me because i use W95 and that uses far less system recourses then W98 or W2K.
After about 30 minutes of vhs-mpg converting i do have to reboot sometimes (memory-related prob i think), but that is nothing compared to capturing in Avi and then converting to mpg.
I can mail you the WinVcr (+crack) software if you cannot find it.
Let me know.
rvasen@chello.nl

[AlecWest]

To Psycho_Dad_Rules:

FWIW, the "test movie" I used for capture purposes was the 175 minute "Godfather" (from my DVD). Video/audio sync was as crisp at the end of the 1.8 gig MPG file as it was at the beginning. I used TMPGEnc to split out the last 75 minutes for the test VCD-burn and it retained both the sync and quality. Bravo, DVC1 (and TMPGEnc 2.5)!!!

To Beavis:

Is your system optimized to use DMA (Direct Memory Access)? When I optimized my system, it increased my capture-speed capabilities 7-fold. I'm fairly certain that was a factor in my recent success using the Dazzle Digital Video Creator I software/hardware ... and my AMD K6-2 system (450mhz) is only 50mhz faster than yours.

[Beavis]

I've got the demo now of the early VCR software so I'll give it a shot when I have a chance. I usually capture AVI and process it a bunch before encoding for the stuff I really want to keep, but a quick MPEG capture for routine stuff would be cool if it's watchable. Sooner or later I'll probably just break down and get a faster CPU.

[react010]

The mpg's made with WinVcr are very watchable. Did some mpg-quality testing first, and the mpg's made with WinVcr don't look any worse then the Vhs->Avi->Mpg ones. In fact they look even better with the 320x240 Mpeg1 2xCd (medium quality) setting in WinVcr.
And when you have about 200 Vhs tapes with music-vids, it's a great timesaver...

[Greg12]

USB doesn't have enough bandwith to devliver high quality AVI.

THe USB deivce has to compress the AVI heavily which means you use quality.

The best option for USB is a hardware MPEG encoder.

[AlecWest]

Greg12,

I think you're right. My Pinnacle Linx is a USB device. Capturing low-res uncompressed AVI files (160x120) was easy ... but attempting to capture uncompressed AVIs with a 320x240 resolution (the max for the Linx) was a dismal failure. Still, even if it had succeeded, I'd be facing the 4-gig barrier of FAT32 on my Win98SE system. If a given program was 2 hours long, I'd have been forced to convert a number of time-wise smaller files into MPGs after-the-fact -- and then merge them. But with the Dazzle DVC, the device already handles the conversion prior to sending the signal over the USB -- and, on my system, it made all the difference in the world. One note of correction, though. I'd earlier said that FAT32 limited my capture ability to 3-hours-51-minutes. Actually, that's 3-hours-31 minutes ... which is still 11 minutes more than the longest movie I own ("Godfather Part II").

FWIW, I remember my reason for entering this forum months ago -- before I'd purchased the Linx. I'd called the nationally syndicated radio talk show of (ahem) computer expert, Kim Komando. I told her about my 450mhz 96meg RAM Win98SE system, saying that all I wanted to do was convert my older VHS tapes into VCDs, and asking her to recommend a utility/device that could do the job. She told me, point-blank, that my system was too slow and used the word "impossible" to describe my dilemma -- recommending I bite the bullet and upgrade to a P4. But now, in light of my own Dazzle DVC success and the success others with slower systems have found using it or other hardware/software scenarios, I will listen to her future broadcasts with a very critical (if not disbelieving) ear. Either she's not the expert she claims to be -- or is an industry "toady," parroting their incessant call to "upgrade, upgrade, upgrade" and "buy, buy, buy."

With my success using Dazzle DVC, my system as-is now does "everything" I wanted it to do. And, the $149 (after rebate) I paid for the Dazzle DVC was a small price to pay in comparison to the price I'd have paid if I'd followed her advice. My thanks go out to all in this forum who saved me from making a costly error (especially Psycho_Dad). I'll eventually upgrade to a faster system ... but only because my current system will deteriorate with age, not because I'm left wanting for it to do something.

P.S. Speaking of "upgrading," just an aside. Everyone here knows that the Pentium 4 is obsolete ... right (grin)??? Intel has released the Itanium chip, 64-bit environment, and I'm certain Microsoft and others are quickly trying to create an OS to use the environment to it's max. I'm also certain that somewhere, deep in the bowels of the Intel research & development department (and AMD's counterpart), they're just as quickly attempting to develop a 128-bit chip ... with plans on the drawing board to develop 256-bit, 512-bit, 1024-bit (etc., etc.) chips when they feel the consuming public is ready to shell out money for the next better mousetrap. But, I don't feel so badly hanging with my 450mhz dinosaur. I wonder, deep down, if technology will ever reach a point where the public just says, "Hey, enough is enough."

[AlecWest]

P.P.S. -- Actually, there is another possibility regarding Kim Komando's poor diagnosis of my problem (snicker). She could have been having a "blonde moment," hehehe. See for yourself:

http://www.komando.com

She's not bad to look at ... but perhaps dangerous to listen to.