Newbie - Difference between Soft and Hardware MPG encoding?

[mrspangle]

Hi,

I am a noob in hardware encoding as ive been doing much MPEG encoding using software. I dont have the beastiest computer in the world and was wondering would a hardware MPEG encoder really be worth it? Can anyone give me any examples of how much time it would be reduced by, say a 700mb MPEG file?

Thanks

John

[basss]

You should expect a hardware encoder to encode real time or faster. It has a built in processor/chip that is built for/dedicated to MPEG-2 encoding.
E.g. a DV camera has an built in DV-encoder that records real-time to DV format on the tape. The quality ranges from poorer than than the software encoders to better than the software encoders.

[BJ_M]

the price can also range from a 100$ to 10's of thousands .

[Dragonsf]

Additional Question: can I do this with a HW mpeg encoder:
Capture and edit in DV quality and then convert thru the HW to mpeg-2 (DVD quality)? Does such HW really exist or must I export my DV to DV tape and then import thru mpeg encoder back?

[D_Knife]

Most HW mpeg encoders that can pick up any file and encode it real-time are hideously expensive - the "affordable" models - i.e. under $3000 are capture cards