*QUESTION ON TV TUNER LEADTEK WINFAST??

I just purchased a WinFast TV 2000 XP TV TUNER from Leadtek. I wanted to know what people have thought about using it and how easy it is to use to get home movies on DVD? Thanks alot

 

I haven"t personally used this card But I know that the "Expert" Model uses the new 10 Bit Decoder chips (the Deluxe Might also) which are supposed to produce very High quality Captures....One thing I have learned about Capture cards is to never use the software that comes with the card to Capture Video and make VCD/SVCD/DVD"s with because most Proprietary Software sucks...I would sugest you read some of the Guides here on video capture try a bunch of different methods, I have a Few Fool Proof methods for captureing Video and Makeing it into DVD"s so if you ever get stuck just message me and I"ll try to help out...Cheers_X_X_X_X_X_[small]It"s better to be Pissed Off than Pissed On!!![/small]

 

Yo Minion, Normally I'll use my DV camcorder as a bridge in converting VHS tapes into AVI which will be burn in DVDs but recently I have problems with NTSC tapes as my DV camcorder is in PAL system. Well, looks like I will have to buy a video capture card and would like to seek your opinion on which are the better and economical ones?

 

Well for TV Tuners the One Mentioned in the above Post (Leadtech WinFastTV 2000)is Fairly good and Should be less than $100, There are Of cource Cheaper ones but they are also crappyer ones...Whatever you do try to get one of the ones with a 10 bit decoder chip...Cheers

 

Hi xxnonamex, you might want to give me the longest stretch of munbers stated on the Chip of your TV 2000 XP Deluxe and I could let you know if yours is running with 10 bit or not. Honestly, I'm curious too whether is your a 10 bit decoder? I do have a Leadtek WinFast TV 2000 XP Deluxe and thought of buying one which apparently yours have pretty good feedback. Well, if you don't mind please check the number on the chip to comfirm whether is yours a 10 bit decoder because I'm comparing yours and the WinFast TV 2000 XP Expert. Note: Fusion 878A = 8 bit, CX23880, CX23881 = 10 bit

 

Hello guys, Just for your info that Leadtek has only 1 card that is 10 bit decoder and that is the WinFast TV2000 XP Expert. I bought it yesterday and the performance is really superb but the only inconvenience is the downloading of latest driver and PVC software inorder to work perfectly because I heard that the supplied CD software has quite afew problems. Anyway, I did not use the CD at all so I'm not too sure.

 

minion and onestop-
you guys seem to have the most info for my setup.

i have the leadtek tv2000 deluxe and used it to capture some vhs. i just used Uncompressed Avi as the format (had about 80 gb free on a hard drive).

i now want to edit the clips a bit (trim some from the start/end) and put them into dvd chapters, create a simple dvd menu and (of course) burn them to a dvd.

i had a copy of pinnacle studio quickstart 8 and tried using that. when i tried to render, i keep getting the error message:
"The selected clip has a nonstandard Video Frame Rate thus cannot be encoded to MPEG"

so either my capture is invalid or that software is goofy. the .avis play fine in windows media player, so i am assuming its the pinnacle software.

1. is my method of capturing a good approach? should i use a different codec?

2. what software should i use to make the actual dvd? does the ulead stuff that comes with the leadtek card work ok?


*i did just read some of your other posts that promote VirtualDub to edit the .avi and TMPEnc to encode to mpeg. is that better/easier than an 'all in one' dvd making software?

 

It seems that you have captured your AVI file useing a Non-Standard Frame rate which means the Captured file is Basicly useless...You should capture to either 29.976fps if you live in NTSC Land and capture to 25fps if you Live in Pal Land...and yes you will get Better Quality useing a Real Encoder Like tmpgenc and then authoring the DVD than if you use a All in one Package...Cheers

 

Yo Sigpop, Does your Leadtek comes with the Ulead DVD Factory software? My TV2000 XP Expert comes with it and it allows chapter or without chapter burning. As for the non-standard format, it happens to all the MPEG-2 selection in the PVR except the 'DVD NTSC' or 'DVD PAL' even if your frame size and bitrate is correct, it will still prompt you that GOP is too long. Well of course you could ignore error and burn DVD or correct it using TMPGEnc Plus (support MPEG-2) before burning. Hey, try the 'DVD NTSC' method and see whether is the result as good as the 'AVI convert method' but one thing for sure is you will difinitely save a lot of time.

 

thx for the replies.

vdub said my frame rate was 29.973 instead. i tried to force it to 29.970 but that didnt work. i'll try 29.976 just for kicks.

and i have not installed the tmpenc software yet. i'll give it a whirl.

yes, my leadtek tv2000 deluxe came with some ulead software. i installed that but just havent booted it. i assumed the pinnacle 8 studio was the same/better, but i'll give that a try as well.

 

You can change the Frame rate with a Little Tool Called "AVI Frame Rate Changer" it takes like 1 second to do But then your Audio will be a Little Out of Sync but if you have an audio editor like "GoldWave" you can use it"s "Time Warp" effect to stretch the audio so that it is the exact length of the Video which should Fix any sync Problems....

 

Why capture in AVI and convert? In the Winfast PVR settings set a new profile. Start by selecting DVD PAL (DVD NTSC if you are in the USA), then select 'Capture Profile Setting'. Move the 'Video Quality' slider to the maxiumu and set the 'Target Data Rate' to 6000. Click on Add and give the profile a name. This will then capture you very high quality Mpeg2 files to load straight into TMPGEnc DVD Author to edit and output to DVD files. If needed then use DVD Shrink 3 to reduce them to fit on a DVD. I have made over 100 DVDs from VHS in the past month and they are fantastic!

 

I forget to say:
TMPGEnc DVD Author always says the GOP is too long. Click Ignore and continue. There is no problem with playing the files on a DVD player.

 

Well Because Mpeg Capture Program Like the One that Comes with your Capture Card Suck when it comes to Quality Compared to if you capture to Low compression AVI and then use a High Quality Software encoder to Encode the file to Mpeg2/DVD...Mpeg Capture Programs have to Capture the Mpeg file in Real time so they have no Time to analize the Frames for complexity and alocate the right amount of Bits to encode each Frame so they Just throw as Many Bits you set up in your Setting at the Video hopeing it is enough to achieve some Quality which it Rarely ever does..Plus Mpeg is an extremely Lossy Compressionmethod which means you Loose most of the Video Information Through Compression so all Compression should be done with the Highest Quality encoder Possible which can not be easilly implemented in a Mpeg Capture program...Most poeple who aren"t that Video Savy Can live with the Quality of Mpeg capture programs But being a Profecinal In the Video field I am a Stickler for Quality...As for the error about the GOP being too long that means exactly what it says...The DVD standard has a Max Gop Size which I believe is 18 frames for NTSC and 21 for Pal ,The Smaller your GOP the better the Quality so I allways use a 12 Frame Gop...Cheers

 

Yo Garrys,

Could you elaborate more of "If needed then use DVD Shrink 3 to reduce them to fit on a DVD"? To what I know, DVD Shrink does not recognise Mpeg 1 & 2 files....

 

Yo Minion,

I would really appreciate if you could list down the software involved right from the beginning of capturing Videos with WinFast TV2000XP Expert, editing & trimming and lastly burning into DVDs.

 

You should never have to useing DVD shrink when authoring Movies that were Captured with a Capture device...For Mpeg Capture there is only one Program that produces High enough quality for me and that is "WinDVR 3.0", For captureing to AVI you will need to have a seperate dedicated Fast Hard drive of at least 80gb because Captureing to a Low Compression AVI format Like useing the HuffyUV Codec takes Up a Lot of Disk Space ,Like about 500mb per minute of Video captured ,There are a Lot of Capture programs you can use to Capture to AVI Like "Virtual Dub" which you can also use for editing ,Or "Virtual-VCR" or "IU_VCR" and a Lot of Others as Long as they allow you to Choose the Codec you capture to...You should also install the HuffYUV Codec because it is the Only Lossless AVI codec that you can use for Capture...
After captureing to AVI at 720+480/576-Pal Useing the HuffYUV Codec you can use something like Virtual-Dub to edit out commercials or whatever, Then you would just encode the File to Mpeg2/DVD useing something like the "MainConcept Encoder" or "Tmpgenc" or "CinemaCraft Encoder" and after encodeing you just have to author to DVD useing any DVD Authoring Program ,Even Tmpgenc DVD author would work fine...This is a Lot of Trouble compared to captureing directly to Mpeg but the Quality should be a Lot better ,Or if you didn"t want to go through all of this but still wanted better Quality then you would use "Intervideo WinDVR 3.0" cuz it is the Best Mpeg2 capture Program I have used and it also has the Option to capture your Audio to Dolby digital AC3...Cheers

 

This would take for-ever to copy a few hundred tapes!
With Winfast 2000 & PVR software I get results that cannot be distingushed from the original VHS tapes.
For those interested, this is how I do it:
Start Winfast PVR, check that your line in connection (for recording) is switched on in your volume control (on my computer PVR changes it to aux when it is started). I use my audio program , Cool Edit 2, to set the volume to the perfect level as if I were recording a CD (with the VU meters in the program).
Select the settings button on PVR (the spanner), Click on the 'Capture format profile' and select DVD PAL (of NTSC) then click on 'Capture profile setting' The Video Codec will be set to 'MPEG 2 codec', leave it at that.
The capture resolution should be for the maximum for your system (720x576 for PAL), Move the video quality slider to maximum (1000), Set the target data rate to 6000. Now click Add and give the new profile a name. I call mine VHS High Quality. Click OK.
Move the settings window down or to the side a bit so you can see a fair bit of the preview window, then start your tape.
If your colour is not what you want, click on 'Video Setting' button (middle one at the top) and adjust the Saturation, contrast etc till you have it just right. Move the time shifting quality setting to 'Optimal Quality', type in a name for this setting, like 'Star Wars Faded Colour' then click on the big blue tick button to save these settings. You are now ready to record.
When you have recorded the tape the file will be in the Winfast folder that you set up when installing the program. I rename the file with the name of the tape (with Windors Explorer).

I use TMPGEnc DVD Author to trim and edit out commercials, and produce the DVD files. When you open each file in TMPGenc Author it will complain that the GOP is too long. Click 'Ignore' and continue. It does not seem to matter. If the outputed files are too large to fit on a DVD (TMPGenc will tell you this when you output them), again click on 'Ignore' use DVD Shrink 3 to shrink them to the correct size. This is what DVD Shrink is for and it does a brilliant job, and is FREE!
I tell DVD Shrink to save the files in a folder called 'Shrink'.
I then use Nero express to make the DVD. Just start Nero, select 'DVD Video Files', then click 'Add' and go to the shrink folder, select all the files and click 'Add' Click 'Finish' and Hey Presto! you are ready to burn. Nero puts the files in the correct folder format for a DVD Video. Be sure 'Finalize the Disk' is selected before burning. I use DVD-R disks as they are cheaper than DVD+R and it does not make any difference on my Panasonic DVD player.

If you use Winfast 2000 to capture direct from TV you will get brilliant DVDs.
Remember, every time you recode a file you are degrading it!

 

I disagree when you say every time you recode you degrade. It is not true. If you re-encode and have a good encoder, It should normalize the bad pixels and make them less pronounced. Soem encoders actaully make files larger.

Anyway, Good tutorial, but when I try to save my VHS tape in mpeg2 my xp2100 CPU processor can not keep up and I lose lots of frames.

 

A bit more info: (excuse the typos in the previous item).
When you import the video files into DVD Shrink, you open the Video_TS folder and click on the Video_TS.ifo file. This is the information file for the DVD that allows DVD Shrink to pick up all the files.
Do not use Ulead DVD Movie Factory (if it came with your DVD burner) to edit and output the DVD files, it is almost useless and it does not tell you correctly the size of the files.
The only problem with Winfast PVR recording software is that the only audio it records is MPEG (nor option for PCM). This is not a problem with PAL but I believe some NTSC DVD players cannot play this format.
If you want to record a music DVD (in high quality sound) from a VHS Hi Fi tape, use the capture part of Ulead DVD Movie Factory. Set the MPEG 2 settings to 6000 VBR and the audio to PCM. This will give you uncompressed, high quality audio. Simply use the Ulead software to capture and do the rest as before.
You can fit about 28 - 30 songs (video clips) on a DVD.
To record directly to Mpeg2 you will need a Pentium 4 2Gb at least (I have a 2.6Gb).