Need Capture card recommendation....pls read.

[erickpan]

I want to capture my old videos in Hi8, 8mm and VHS tapes and convert it for archiving to VCD, SVCD and later to DVD.

I have a VCR, and Hi8 camera.
Computer runs XP Home, and I have Ulead Media Studio.
I have enough hard disk space and can always buy more.
1 gig ram, cpu is P4 2.4Gz.

I have a old Pinnacle DC30plus...but it doesnt like XP.

Need a new capture card and the budget is $300 or less. I havent kept up with the technology, so here I am back to you guys...asking for advice.

What would be the cheapest, least painful, and easiest way to achieve my objectives.

Are IDE drives fast enough these days for this kind of stuff? Or do I need to buy a SCSI setup or a Firewire harddrive? Or do you suggest I buy a dedicated IDE card and a dedicated fast IDE drive just for video?

Thanks in advance.

[NightWing]

It is possible to use W2k driver on XP since it almost the same. It may work and may not work but worth a shot and cheep.

Note: Use at your own risk.

Here is the pinnacle link to their Windows drives for DC30 that has 2000 as one of the driver. Rember to undo any current drivers before having fun with these.

http://www.pinnaclesys.com/support/display.asp?ProductID=315&DocTypesID=14

HD are pritty fast right now.

Good Luck!

[erickpan]

thanks....Im through working on this old DC30plus card....Im ready to move on.

Ive decided to buy the canopus ADVC-100 and I think it will do a good job based on the comments and specs.

I tried for the first time last night to capture DV from my sony camcorder using my existing firewire port that came with my computer.... my question is, is this firewire port "good enough" or do I need a dedicated firewire card to install in a pci slot that has some hardware encoder or somthing that will speed up the playback or editing process..... If there is, what is the leading brands I can buy?
Im just noticing a bunch of firewire cards being sold out there...is this for older computers that dont have it built in? are these cards suppose to do a better job than the existing firewire port you have?

Thanks!

[NightWing]

Good luck with the new card!

Do not have that much info on Firewire. But there is a ton of info on this site about firewire! Had a friend a few months ago almost went mad on trying to get a camera -> firewire -> capture software running. He finaly went with a Pinnacle Studio 8 with Firewire card.