Audio sync problems, about to give up capturing video!
 

I am still having audio sync issues. So far, I have spent my money on a capture card, a VCR combo and an HDMI splitter to avoid HDCP. The capture worked very well, but the quality wasn't good because a lot of the tapes I have needed cleaning up. So I came here and spent money to become a premium member to get some good advice on what I can do better. I was told to get a better VCR with TBC and downgrade my computer to Windows XP if I could and use another capture card. Building an old PC was not really realistic for me, so I took a capture card from my parents old computer in which I built them another one to replace. More money. So, now I have a really expensive VCR and a capture card. I see that I not only need a VCR with tbc, but I also need an external tbc for the full monty in video capture. So, I get an external tbc. So, here I sit trying everything under the sun to just get the audio to match the video to no avail.

I am ready to send the whole lot back at this point and just use the $30 capture device that I bought 4 years ago to do this project. I don't understand why it is so difficult to simply encode what I am seeing on the preview to file. Perhaps I should just capture my desktop while the video is playing.

:hmm:

No, don't give up yet. :eek:

Alright, have you gone down this list yet? - http://www.digitalfaq.com/guides/vid...ped-frames.htm
Are you using VirtualDub to capture? If so, is audio preview disabled?

Those are the most common issues.

Let me go through the list and let you know what I have done.

1. Multi-tasking: Is a non-issue on the machine I am running, but I have closed all unnecessary windows and any non-essential programs. The audio issue does not live here.

2. Program Settings: I would imagine it is not set up properly which is why I am having these issues. I have a feeling it is because I have tweaked too much and don't know what I have done wrong now. I still have not been able to fix the preview in the corner issue from another post.

3. Anti-Virus and other Background Software: My CPU doesn't even reach 20% during capture, but I have closed all background programs and anti-virus.

4. Heat / Overheating: Again, CPU is not even breaking a sweat and is cooled by a Corsair H80. Doubtful.

5. Reboot! Shutdown!: Not the issue. It doesn't stay on at night.

6. LAN and Internet: Tried this, is not the culprit.

7. Use the Best Drivers: I am using the only driver I can find for this card. You are welcome to suggest another one. I am using a WinTV 1600.

8. Software vs. Hardware Encoding: From what I understand, this card is hardware encoding. Although I wonder if I would do better with software encoding.

9. Slow or Old Computers: i7-2660k CPU. Not an issue.

10. CPU Usage: Not maxing out with one exception. Last night I captured a 4 hour long special taped from TV in the 80's. CPU was fine for the first hour and a half, then hit its ceiling and maxed out for seemingly no reason. VT adjust was in the billions and audio lost sync in the preview where it normally does not. Every other capture I have done the CPU never hits 20% however, this was the only case.

11. VHS and other Analog Videotape Source: VDub reported no dropped frames for the first thing I recorded last night which was about an hour long.

12. Hard Drive Fragmentation: It's got nothing on it. Solely used for capture.

13. Separate Hard Drives Suggested: It is separate and it is on part of the system I am using to capture, not the NAS.

14. Check Your Hard Drive Settings: I'd check it if I could find it on Windows 8.1

15. Capture Software and Codecs: Have only used VDub with both Lagarith and Huffy codecs which both produce the same result. Audio is not synced.

16. Preview Window: Tried it both on and off. Same result.

17. Sound Cards: Don't have one. Uses on-board.

18. Desktop Graphics Settings: Capture card is not running my display graphics, my GTX 780 is.

19. Memory / RAM: 8 GB of RAM and works fine.

20. Hard Drive Cache: Enabled

21. BIOS Settings: Checked, nothing seems like it would interfere.

I have tried everything I can think of. I have read not only this forum, but others as well. One thing that seemed to work was to correct the audio length after capture in VDub, and I had thought maybe that I could fix each video after the fact, but I did the same method on the capture I had made of the 4 hour special and it didn't even get close. The math said to delay it 82000ms which means it got pretty bad.

I'm frustrated at this point and running out of time to return the equipment to get my money back and Just forget the whole thing. I have until the end of the day to get an RMA from tGrant for the VCR so if you can think of any other things I can try to get this working by then, I'm all ears.

Windows 8.1? :eek:

That alone strikes fear into my heart, but people make it work. Doesn't that use Windows Defender? Turn it off. It's useless anyway.

Audio preview should be off. Now, some cards like my 9600XT are weird, I have to enable Capture Audio and Audio Preview at the same time to hear anything, then turn Audio Preview off and it's all OK.

Turn off video preview. Use Overlay. Don't use filters except those in the VirtualDub "Levels" menu. No denoisers, ever.

Start the capture by using the F6 key. Don't click "Start capture", and don't hit F5.

I assume you're capturing audio at PCM uncompressed, 48KHz, 16-bit.

I don't know anything about winTV 1600, but what I've heard elsewhere isn't so good.

Integrated sound cards often a problem and always sound freaked out. I use a $35 Audigy PCI sound card, 8 years old.

So, out of sheer curiosity, I went to the local big box store and grabbed the only two capture devices they seem to sell. I got an Honestech Video Conversion Suite 2.0 and a Hauppauge 955Q. I hooked up the 955Q, installed the drivers and immediately the sound issue appears to be gone. The downside is that the picture looks like garbage now. I have tried using both WinTV8 and VDub and the picture is the same. But, at the very least, we're getting somewhere now and know that the video capture on the 1600 is problematic.

I got two ways to go about this now. The first is to try another capture card. The second is to use the capture card I got and run the audio through a sound card. Would the second option work?

I guess everyone realizes you're having problems, but why go through that last piece of business rather than get something that actually works? We have a big forum with all kinds of recommendations, but Honestech and the Hauppauge card mentioned are nowhere in the long list of recommended stuff that really works.

A good audio card could well solve some problems, as it did for me a while back. You can always return it if nothing new happens. Why use a card that outputs garbage?

I don't know what you can do with Windows 8 and VHS capture. Win10 is worse.

The Honestech works surprisingly well, but the quality isn't quite as good as the Hauppauge 1600 I was using. Some videos, usually the professionally produced ones, played back very well while others got pretty gnarly. But, the 955Q was just garbage.

I could try a separate sound card, but don't know if that will work and everyone seems to be skirting that question. Do I run the audio into the sound card and will it alleviate the audio issues I am having?

In the meantime, I have since ordered a Diamond 650 internal card which has been recommended. It will be here sometime next year though as they didn't have any speedy shipping options :(

Onboard sound may be the entire issue. That's a red flag right there. As sanlyn says, try a dedicated audio card.