capture card considerations

[stormsewer]

Now, I know this is not an unusual topic around here- I have looked around- but I wanted to get some input related to my situation.

See, I'm trying to get a capture card, not only for making AMVs, but also for transferring my tape collection to DVD. I use a laptop at the moment, and thus need something external.

I bought a Pinnacle MovieBox DV, but took it back. The loss of quality in the capture was just unacceptable, not to mention I always got a band of "noise" at the bottom of the captured video, and that's just not acceptable. I emailed Pinnacle technical support about this and other issues with the software, but never heard anything (it's been about three weeks now), so I'm not too impressed with Pinnacle.

Also, I was curious about opinions on USB versus Fireware cards. I notice that VirtualDub only recognizes USB capture cards...

Oh- my budget for this thing is $300 max, preferably around $200.

Thanks!

-stormsewer

[narcted]

Hmm, something I would like to post in suggestion would be to consider that laptops are not as ideal as desktop models. Mainly in the areas of processors and hard drives. Yes the speed and memory may be equivalent, but the overall speed isn't. For example a Celeron processor in a laptop has only 16 bit pathways as oppossed to 32 bit pathways on a Pentium IV in a desktop.

Also, you could have plently of harddrive space, but laptop harddrives due to size and power constraints can be slower. Today your standard desktop HD is an ATA 100 7200 rpm drive. Most laptop harddrives only run around 4700 rpm. So you could have plenty of space, but due to the speed limitation, laptop drives tend to drop frames or come out of sync if you aren't careful.

Firewire is preffered for video. USB 2.0 and Firewire seem to be about even, IMHO. Personally I prefer the USBs. I seem to have less connection problems with USb than firewire.

I'm pretty happy with my ADS Instant DVD 2.0 for a USB. ($150) However, the Video Studio 7.0 it comes with doesn't work so well on laptops because of the harddrive limitations. For nearly the same quality, for less than $100, and with little difference in quality, you can get the Instant DVD 1.0 with Video Studio 6.0, that has a better chance of running on a laptop. Either of the ADS products contain software to burn DVDs too.

[Dannywilson]

not to mention I always got a band of "noise" at the bottom of the captured video, and that's just not acceptable.

That's called overscan data noise, and certain data on the tape is stored there. It's on every tape you are going to be dealing with in the VHS world. You normally don't see it on your TV, because the lower edging around the tube sits over it, but believe me, it's there.

[stormsewer]

I appreciate your input. Thanks!

-ss