I need a good cheap Capture Card

Duderdude2 wrote on 6/13/2005, 3:19 PM

Right now, I have an ADVC 1394. It can capture both analog and digital video. It costs about $160

Anyways, I need a second capture card, but it only needs analog (no digital). I don't want to spend a whole lot for one, but I'm hoping it will be similar in quality to the ADVC. It needs to capture at least at 640x480, and in the AVI format. Oh, and it needs to work with Windows XP, and Vegas 4.0.

Any suggestions? Thanks!

Comments

Chienworks wrote on 6/13/2005, 4:13 PM

Cheap? How about this? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=3761&item=5207095667&rd=1
It's a Hauppauge WinTV Plus capture card for $18.00. It's not great. I've used a nearly identical card and i can tell you it works. It uses the same digitizing chip as ATI's RAGE series. The picture is slightly rough and you may have some audio sync problems, but you can fix it up in Vegas. Using it with VidCap is rather hit-or-miss, but you can use the included software to get AVI captures if you need to. It supports up to 720x480 at 30fps.

If you want something better then another ADVC 1394 is probably your most reasonable option.

Duderdude2 wrote on 6/13/2005, 4:25 PM

Thanks for that, but it sounds a bit iffy.

I'm comfortable with paying as much as $60, is there a better capture card than that for that price?

Chienworks wrote on 6/13/2005, 4:33 PM

That card lists for $80 or so. Maybe you can browse ebay for a (lightly) used ADVC card.

Duderdude2 wrote on 6/13/2005, 4:48 PM

Holy crap, I just looked, and the ADVC 1394 is going for $218 on Ebay. I don't think I even paid that much for it. Thanks for the suggestion anyway.

$80 is doable, but it doesn't sound too reliable (unless I mistook what you said).

Does anyone have any other suggestions for a video card in that price range?

JohnnyRoy wrote on 6/13/2005, 5:51 PM

I don’t think you’re going to find anything new in the sub-$150 that isn’t iffy or proprietary. It’s all mostly garbage or MPEG capture at its worst.

If you want something that works with Vegas then it has to look like a DV device. I use an ADS Tech A/V Link that I got on sale for $120 but they are usually around $150 new. There are some on eBay for around $80 so that might be the perfect device for your price range. This is a lot like the ADVC 1394 that you have.

~jr

TheHappyFriar wrote on 6/13/2005, 8:15 PM

you can get an ATI AIW car for ~80 I bet on e-bay. The ATI AIW 7200 would be just fine for you. It will capture mpeg, WMV (I think), and AVI to a codec of your choice. However, not all codecs compress fast enough for RT capture... using huffy you'll need 2-2.5x as much HD space to capture an AVI as compared to DV.

riredale wrote on 6/13/2005, 9:58 PM

This might be a bit roundabout, but the analog ports on your DV camcorder might be a very clean way of taking analog video into the system.

rmack350 wrote on 6/13/2005, 10:11 PM

Better yet, if you transfer it to a DV tape then you'll be able to go back and recapture if you need to. The tape will have timecode on it.

Rob Mack

niki_niki wrote on 6/13/2005, 11:46 PM

i have pinnacle dc10 .. the card is good for a price.. i take it for 60EUR before 2 years from germany

http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=79452&item=5207715216&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW

this card work good on win2000 i dont tray it az XP ...

Chienworks wrote on 6/14/2005, 3:41 AM

What i was pointing out was that $80 (new) gets you a cruddy card like the WinTV or ATI VIVO (nearly identical in capabilities and quality). So, if you want something better you'll either have to pay a lot more or look for used stuff.

craftech wrote on 6/14/2005, 11:36 AM

Many of us have used the ADS Pyro and have had absolutely no problem with it.

John

BrianStanding wrote on 6/14/2005, 12:31 PM

I'm with Riredale: convert it to DV through a camera or external converter and capture through firewire. An OHCI firewire card is less than $20.

I do all my analog captures either through the ports on my Panasonic AG-DV1000 VCR or through my little Sony 1-chip TRV-18. Excellent quality, and it shows up as DV, which Vegas handles best.

Duderdude2 wrote on 6/16/2005, 12:00 PM

Thanks, but it doesn't look like that supports the Yellow, Red and White video cables I need it to.

BrianStanding wrote on 6/16/2005, 1:27 PM

Many DV cameras these days come with a triple 1/8" mini-jack input/output. If you don't have the cord that came with the camera, Best Buy, Radio Shack or any place you can buy camcorders will likely have a Y-cable adaptor that will let you plug into the Yellow, Red & White RCA component jacks that are on your deck.

Should cost less than $20.

DavidMcKnight wrote on 6/16/2005, 1:44 PM

exactly - red and white are audio, yellow is video. If the audio source is mono, you only need either red or white - whichever one works.