Your hardware is fine for both
-
Huffyuv lossless capturing via
VirtualDub
- MPEG-2 DVD-spec capturing via ATI MMC
IDE is not really that slow. The bigger issue is having an IDE drive dedicated to capture. You cannot share the IDE drive with the OS, as there is too much activity. That will cause dropped frames. (SATA-I is also not good for sharing OS, which is what you'll find with most SATA AGP systems.)
At this late date, you need to keep that box offline permanently. So uninstall any unnecessary startup programs, anti-virus, etc. Those old system are just good for offline specialty tasks like video capture.
512mb is a bit small. I'd feel more comfortable if it had 1gb minimum. However, 512mb can suffice.
The bigger issue is you need a quality VCR and TBC. Note that I have some available, so PM me if interested.
The dropped frames were likely due to:
- sharing HDD with OS
- no TBC
- not a good capture codec