Thanks for the information. I was pretty sure that the resulting mpeg file would be smaller, but I had no idea that there would be that much difference. BTW, what would happen if the resulting mpeg DID come out to be over 2 gig? (Just curious!)

Bob

Well, first off i'm confused about the 2GB limit. Is your drive formatted for FAT32? If so, the limit should be 4GB. There might be some programs that still have trouble with 2GB though. Hauppauge's WinCap couldn't capture more than 2GB even under FAT32.

But, anyway ... what happened to me when i tried to render an MPEG file that would have been more than 4GB was that the render completed, and 9GB of disk space disappeared, but the file size showed 4GB in the directory, and only the first 44% of it would play. After i deleted the file i had to run scandisk to get the other 5GB of space back.

Yes, my drive is FAT32. The 2 gig file limit is referred to in all of the capture software that came either pre-loaded on the computer or was installed with the camera software. Specifically, it was DVgate (V.2.1) by Sony and Premere 5.1LE (which used the DVgate plugin to capture). I thought that it was a standard limit not an arbitrary amount of space. Do you mean that I could capture a 4 gig avi file with the VV3 capture program?

Bob

Welcome to the World of NLE. Fat32 FORMAT is limited to 4GB file size. Depending on the application, and which type of AVI's they use, they can be limited to either 2GB, 4GB, or unlimited. AVI 1.0 (older format) were limited to 2GB, the newer AVI 2.0 DML do not have a file size limitation. FAT32 would limit it to 4GB, but if you are using NTFS, you could easily capture your whole DV tape in one file.

This is only a suggestion. If you plan on sticking to FAT32, I would encourage you to at least try SCENALYZER LIVE. (www.scenalyzer.com) Free Demo, Small fully functional download (except random nagscreen on output), if suits your needs, you can register it for $33.00 The Best $33.00 I ever spent.

It has many features, including DV type 1&2 capture formats, Scene detection, FastScan index capture (5 minutes to capture whole dv tape index) and BEST OF ALL, the ability to do seemless captures and break them up over 2GB files without stoping. I'm not sure, but I think that VVCapture does this, but I may be mistaken. I use only NTFS w/ Win2k, so I don't worry about filesize.

GoodLuck.
Jeffy82

Thanks, Jeffy82. I will check it out.

Bob

Absolutely vv3 will do seamless captures (in 4 gb chunks).

And, vv3 will let you put multiple 4gb files together on the timeline and render them as one mpeg (it's how I do hour long vcd's daily).

I have seen posts over on the cow that specifically state you should lose the Sony DVgate. VV3 capture will do everything about which you've inquired.

I plan to use VV3 solely as a capture method. However, prior to installing VV3, I captured quite a lot of video through DVgate. I did this due to the fact that when I installed VV3, it also updated DirectX to version 8.X. This effectively disabled the version of DVgate that I have. I was concerned that I might not be able to get the captured video on the computer. I should have waited, but that is history now.

Thanks for the information on the file size. It has really concerned me. You mentioned that you HAVE put multiple "large" files together to burn one mpeg, are you using Win98se by any chance?

Bob

yes...win98se

I use Nero for all burning. It can add menu's to vcd's, and can burn svcd's.
VV3 can make mpeg2 compliant svcd files, but can't burn 'em.

The only problem I ever have, occurs occaisionally when capturing vhs video from my vhs player thru the analog/dv conversion of my sony and on in thru the ieee1394. Occasionally I get an abrupt termination of the capture, and a cryptic error message about an invalid argument being specified. Would LOVE for someone at sf to explain what that message means, and what causes it. {end of rant}