TV Capture: How to get Best Quality from the Best hardware
 

Hey, I really want to be able to capture high quality capures and have tried screwing around with it but havent had much luck. My first TV card purchase was a Happauge Win-TV PVR 250, and as stubborn as I was i didn't see the quality in it and decided that it was the card. So I found a sale on a new graphics card (Originally $300 but it was $150) and it was an ATI Radeon All-In-Wonder 8500 128MB. This had a built in analog to capture video with.

With his new card I saw slight improvement. But then I started wondering, "Well since I have regular cable, maybe that's the quality problem..." If some one could answer me this question telling me whether or not the cable type is what the quality is based on. Like if I were to get Digital Cable would the quality be any better?

Also I would like to know what programs you use. (Since I hear the ATI software sucks, and that I should use VirtualDubMod) I also need to know what settings to make the BEST possible quality with the least mmount of space. I am an encoder and have done many encodes that are 640x480, super high quality (i can swear their better than dvd [with the smooth filter of course]), and a 24 minutes file is only about 190MB. If there is some way to capture anything near this please tell me. Actually the big issue is capture "quality" no matter how big it is because I can just re-encode it the way i like it.

So the big question is:
Is Digital Cable going to capture better quality than regular cable? Or is it the type of card I use that makes the quality difference? (If this is the problem please tell me the best card to use that's on the market)

And another thing. Both of my cards say they can take up to 125 channels, but if I get Digital cable with say 300 channels and hook the analog source to the digital cable box, and then from the digital cable box to my computer, will that give me all the channels? And can I even do this? (Hooking the cable box to it)

Re: TV Capture: How to get Best Quality and Best hardware...
 

hmm,
you bring up some good questions.
im testing digital cable caps soon.
some channels, or when starting up, seem a bit more pixelated, or pixely (?) than before. I did purchase a 10db signal booster for the cable, havent tried that yet either.
The ati software is decent. sometimes the drivers suk. After much tweakin' i can capture pretty close to dvd-like quality, @ 15 video 48 audio, and 352x480, or 480x480. Usually tend to stick to 352x480 for kvcd's. and 720x480 for kdvd'ing, though, at most times its wiser to spread the bitrate around at 352x480/576. the GuidePlus is handy to Tivo-Like capture a quick sitcom and deleter after.
For your card though, kwag's posted links to other drivers.
try 'em and with either virtualdubmod or virtualvcr and an mjpeg or huffyuv codec your caps may improve.

ztr

Well the first to do as already said is to try a tv-signal booster.

But the main difference between tv-capture cards and video capture cards is that the tv capture cards have an tv tuner onboard. These onboard tv tuners do not output that good quality as the oboard-digitizer is able to scan.
So my recomendation is to use a VCR with s-video output using a s-video cable to your s-video input of your card and try again.

You'll see the difference when using a good VCR as a tuner device!

And the advantage of an s-video cable is that the luminance and color components are served seperately, a standard yellow cinch f-bas cable just handles both signals using one wire ... by using this the videoquality will suffer.

IS there a standard guide for capturing stuff from vhs to vcd? without loss in quality?

There's always a quality loss whenever lossy compression is used.

I recommend checking out the capture guide at doom9.org.

head over to dvdrhelp.com and search the guides section, a guy who calls himself "Lord Smurf" has a couple of good guides there.

And after you read that guide, apply the "For VHS and captures" script here: http://www.kvcd.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3483 and compare the results :)

-kwag