Hello all , i have a Video cassatee with one hour of video in it . i have no idea how to store the same to cd in any video format avi or mpeg . Further for your information i have a Pentium 800 Mhz pc with windows xp Professional , a video recorder , cd drive , cd writer . 1. What more pci cards i need for this process ? 2. Do i require some software for encoding and decoding the same . 3. Do i require any cables connecting video Recorder and pc and how will be the connections can i get the steps to be followed somewhere. Thanks in anticipation for any response. Shaju Devassy
Alright, let me jump in to this here. You can go either of two ways: 1. You could capture the video using a video capture card. This option is cheap but not the best quality. If you go this route, make sure you get a card that supports analog composite inputs (those used by your camera, the yellow, red, and white) This type of card will run you at least $50, but expsensive capture cards are over a hundred dollars. If you can afford it and you choose to go this route, get one that supports hardware MPEG-1 & MPEG-2 encoding, as this will save you much time if you plan to capture video frequently. Otherwise, you have to do this conversion in your computer, which requires much HDD space and just as much patience. 2. You could also do this by purchasing a FireWire card (or if you are lucky, your computer has a FireWire IEEE 1394 input) and an analog to DV converter, called a "breakout box." Hey, your camera might even have a FireWire output, in which case just plug it in directly and forget the box! If not though, be forewarned that this is by far the more costly of the two, since a breakout box will run $250 or more. As for software, you will need a capture tool, maybe an encoding tool, and an authoring and burning tool. Again you have two choices. You could try to piece a setup together like most of the people here use, or you could find a professional setup that includes capture card, software, and a nice thick guidebook if you get lost...these run upwards of $100. If you go the freeware route: Capture Tool: Depends on your card, but some excellent capture programs can be found in AfterDawn's download secion. A program called VirtualDub can also do capture if you go the PCI capture card route, and this would be my choice. Compression: There's no better program for compressing and playing with AVI files than VirtualDub. If you plan to output your video to CDs to give to people, you need an AVI to MPEG converter. TMPGEnc is the choice program here. It is shareware...the MPEG-2 features expire in 30 days "unless you live in the future." Authoring tool: If you plan to make CDs to give to people, you will want an (S)VCD authoring tool, such as VCDEasy. Get version 1.1.4, because this is the last "free" version. The others do nasty things to you if you don't register them (if you want to pay for this, go for the latest) such as restrict your burning speed to 2x. Nero Burning ROM will also make decent (S)VCDs and will burn data CDs for you. If your computer came with Roxio, it will burn data CDs and perhaps, if you have the Platinum, VCDs as well. Just a quick primer on formats: AVI: This compressed format is used for storing files on hard disks. If you never plan to give CDs to anyone, keep your movies in DivX AVI. VCD: VideoCDs use MPEG-1 as the compression. A 700MB CD-R hold about 70 minutes of video. However, you pay for this space in quality...dearly. VCD video has pretty bad resolution, and the video appears choppy. SVCD: Super VCDs are much better. Resolution is much better, and a properly authored SVCD is sometimes hard to tell apart from a DVD containing the same video. SVCDs (and DVDs) use MPEG-2 for compression. As far as cables go, for the capture card you use the camera's included cable. For the breakout box you will need a FireWire cable. To confuse you more, the industry has decreed that FireWire ports be either six pin or four pin. The six pin ports look like the oversized USB ports. Four pin ports look like smaller versions of the other side of a USB connector. Just do a google images search for 6 pin and 4 pin FireWire ports if you have trouble. Then buy a cable matching your configuration (which will most likely be 6 pin to 6 pin). Cables will run $40. Whew! I have to go now but I will post more about how to actually do all of this stuff in software, but for now I leave you with software URLs: VirtualDub: http://www.virtualdub.org TMPGEnc: http://www.tmpgenc.com //edit (whoops, wrong URL) VCDEasy: http://www.vcdeasy.org If you need some place to dowload the old VCDEasy just ask me and I'll dig it up from somewhere here! Good luck!
Hey .. alx .. you are too good in this .. Thanks very much for your infomation . i need to understand this concept slowly .. Thanks again
shaju--no problem! What you are essentially doing is converting the video from analog format (VHS) to digital (AVI/MPEG). There are two main ways of doing this, depending really on how much quality you can afford. The quick and dirty solution is the capture card. This is a PCI card that fits in your computer. Just as you'd plug red, white, and yellow connectors into the back of your TV or VCR to play or record video, you plug the camera into the same connectors on the card. The card will then convert your analog video signal into digital format. All cards can store the information as uncompressed AVI files. These files are huge, taking up multiple gigabytes per hour of video. The majority of cards (and all expensive ones) support hardware MPEg encoding. MPEG is not an AVI format...it's a different compressed format. MPEG files are never as large as uncompressed AVIs. There are two types of MPEG...1 and 2. MPEG-1 is used in VCDs. MPEG-2 is used in SVCDs. If you can afford to in HD space terms, capture in uncompressed AVI because it preserves quality. If you capture in MPEG, you can't increase the quality later. If you capture in AVI, you can get excellent quality while still using a video codec (coder decoder i think) to compress the AVI to something more reasonable in disk space terms.
The other option you have is more costly but gives greater quality. Rather than inputting the video to the computer as an analog signal to the capture card, you convert the video to digital outside of the computer. This is done with an analog to dv converter, also known as a breakout box. Breakout boxes range from $200-$400, but you might be able to pick one up cheaper than that. The breakout box, because it is a dedicated hardware converter and involves no software, gives higher quality than the capture card. My next post will cover how the breakout box is connected to the computer.
Thanks alx .. This two posts of your's cleared my doubts very greatful for this.Expecting your post on how to connect breakout box. Warm Regards.
The breakout box converts the analog signal to a digital one. This digital video signal is then transmitted to the computer through something with the memorable name of IEEE 1394. No wonder people just call it FireWire. If your computer isn't new enough to have a firewire port: then you need to buy a PCI card that adds the proper port to your computer. This card will be cheap (around $30-$40) Here's a promising candidate: http://shop.pcconnection.com/web/Sh...BF12FCEA4E}&NRQUERYTERMINATOR=1&cookie_test=1 Now, as if the name IEEE 1394 weren't confusing enough, there are 2 flavors of FireWire ports. Devices such as the desktop computer and those PCI cards have six-pin ports, while many mobile devices (laptops, digital cameras) have four-pin ports. The port should say IEEE1394 or just 1394 beside it. A six pin ports is bigger than the big end of a USB cable, the four pin port is smaller than the other end of the USB cable. Your computer's PCI card will most likely include six-pin ports. The breakout box I'm not so sure of. The good thing about this is that you don't have to worry about having matching ports. You can buy three types of FireWire cables: four pin to four pin, four pin to six pin, and six pin to six pin. If the breakout box comes with a cable, it's most likely the one you need. If it doesn't, get the one that matches your ports. I will probably post something about software next, but I will soon need to know which way you plan to go. By the way, http://www.froogle.com is an excellent search engine for products at cheap prices. I've also heard good things about the Dazzle breakout boxes, if that's the way you choose.
Hi , alx as my computer is P-800 an old one it does not include firewire port so i need to go for an pci card and break out box. " If your computer isn't new enough to have a firewire port: Then you need to buy a PCI card that adds the proper port to your computer .Your computer's PCI card will most likely include six-pin ports. The breakout box I'm not so sure of. The good thing about this is that you don't have to worry about having matching ports. You can buy three types of FireWire cables: four pin to four pin, four pin to six pin, and six pin to six pin." Regards ********
Just been AfterDawn surfing...one of the best analog-to-digital converters to get is this 1 here: http://www.canopus.com/US/products/advc-100/pt_advc-100.asp My advice is: 1) Firewire card for PC 2) Breakout box, preferrably the one above 3) Firewire hard drive with at least 40GB of free space for storing movies (or tons of free space on your current HD)
I have a question also about transfering VHS to CD-R. I have a lot of home movies and regular movies on VHS tapes. How can I convert them without a camera but just my VCR becasue I do not have a camera anymore. Is this possible. Would I just hook the red and yellow wires to the capture card from my VCR? Any help would be great. Thx.
