For people in the know, is the Canopus ADVC-300 worth the extra cost/performance ratio as opposed to the ADVC-100? If I had the money to spend on a 300 would it be worth it or would I be better off spending my money elsewhere and buying the 100? Thank you Michelle
you should ask everglade what he thinks of his ADVC-300... personally i don't think the difference between the two models is worth the price difference. but it all depends on what you are going to use it for.
Hi, I suppose if you were useing the ADVC-300 for Business then it might be worth the extra $300 to have the Built in Hardware Image Stabilizer and Noise Filter because in Buisiness Time is Money but if useing it for Personal use then you can do the Noise Filtering useing software but then again the Software Might cost you $300 and it takes time... So I guess you weigh the Pros and Cons and go from there..... Cheers
I think I'll go with the 300 then. I've got a few hundred video tapes to convert and the savings in time would probably be worth it. Thank you for the input. Michelle
Have not bought it yet. Had to buy windows xp first to get rid of the whole fat32 thing. It will be the Christmas bonus time of the year before I can afford it now. I will post if/when I've worked with it and let you know.
The ADVC-300 works really well for me. One of the biggest "+" factors is the control software can all be run from the PC, and you can set up a preview window to see what the effects are before even going near the NLE. It saves so much time being able to do all that stuff on the way in - no rendering after every change, so much time is saved.
After you capture a VHS tape about how long does it take to render it? Also, does any software come with it? I know Canopus makes encoders, do any of these come with it? Finally, someone who actually owns one!
How long the tape takes to render once captured depends on how long the capture is! It's around 1/3 to 1/2 realtime on my system using Premiere Pro 1.5. The only software that comes with it is the control software, and it is not compulsory to install this. It does help though, otherwise you have to control all the noise reduction & cleanup functions from the box itself, which can get fiddly. It does not install any drivers or anything to run whatsoever - it gets "seen" as a camera by the NLE software. Totally seamless. There are demo versions of the Canopus Encoders included on the CD, but these either encode a minute section or else are watermarked - so not much point installing them really. I can definitely tell you that ProCoder 2 was one of the best £500 spends have made in a long time. The quality of the encoding is superb. Another benefit of the ADVC is that it works as a bridge - you can output from your NLE to it, and show that on a camera/screen/drop to VHS. It also imports from anything - using either composite or S-Video. PAL/NTSC/SECAM, everything!
Sounds good! Am I right in thinking that it acts as a stabalizer in the event of macrovision also? This is the impression I got from their web site... Youve got some pretty fancy software there...Premiere Pro, Procoder2... I don't think that's quite in my realm. I do have cce basic though, which I think will work well enough, yes? No? Maybe?
CCE is supposed to be very good indeed. I wanted to get that one, but at $1500 it was out of my pocket for the moment. One day. No, Macrovision is not really a problem. I have had no trouble so far.
wilkes ... actually, CCE Basic is $58. It has the same encoding engine that the high-end $2000 CCE SP has. 'Just doesn't have the flexibilty. I've been using CCE Basic with DVD Rebuilder for DVD backups, and the quality is supurb. I have been wondering about about Procoder2, though, and if you ever get around to comparing the two encoders I would sure like to know your opinion. http://www.visiblelight.com/mall/productview.aspx?cat=201&pid=7
I won't get the basic one I'm afraid, as we really need the flexibility. CCE is on the list though, as I am told it's quality is up there with the 10-20,000 dollar hardware. But, to get that quality, you must have access to all the settings, as a preset just won't ever give what is needed. To get premium quality, it is often done in big studios that the movie is split into chapters, each one it's own timeline, and these are encoded separately on almost a scene by scene basis. Then everything is stitched back together again for authoring. It's the only way to get the encoding quality right up there without using the megabuck hardware. I ain't got the dosh right now though, so it's going to be a year or two before I upgrade again - unless a wothwhile job comes in. Procoder 2 will be doing me for the time being.
Actually CCE Basic is More Flexable than CCE SP because At least CCE Basic has a resize filter and Features that Most other mpeg encoders have were CCE SP has none of those Features so you allmost allways have to use a frameserver with it to do any resizeing and Filtering because CCE SP has none of those Basic Features.... The Only features that CCE SP has that CCE basic Doesn"t have are 9 Pass encodeing and Multipass CBR and features were you can adjust the Bitrate on a Gop level but these Features aren"t really usefull for the average person..... I use CCE SP 2.67 but I have to use it in Cunjunction with AVISynth which is the only way i can get the results I want were with CCE Basic you don"t have to use a frameserver.... CCE Basic uses a reworked encodeing engine from the CCE lite version that was out a couple years ago but the Encodeing is Compareable to the CCE SP Quality and the encodeing speed is about the same.... So unless you know how to use AVISynth then I suggest that CCE basic will be a Much easier encoder to use than CCE SP and produce simular Quality..... Cheers
After getting Basic for DVD-RB, I began hearing different things about the differences between the versions, and so I contacted Cinema Craft support a month ago to ask about the differences. This is the reply I got: Basically, Basic and SP have the same encoder engine (if the version is the same). The difference is SP has more encoder parameters that you can change. For example, you can do multipass VBR encoding with SP version, while you can do only 2-pass VBR encoding with Basic. You can also do manual I-frame insertion, frame-wise filter setting and GOP-wise bitrate setting with SP, which gives you more chance to improve picture quality. Best Regards, Shunichi Takeuchi
