video capture

Rleibold wrote on 4/2/2001, 10:59 AM

I am trying to capture from a Cannon GL1 to my P-II 400 mh
computer. I have an adaptec firewire card. Everytime I try
to do it, it says no capture device. I have been working on
this for a while and have upgraded 98 to 98 second edition.
Still nothing. I know the computer is reading the firewire
card is, at least according to my device manager settings.
I have also reinserted the card to make sure it is in the
slot properly. I only have a integrated 4 MB video card. Do
I need a video capture card? I thought the firewire card
would allow me to capture the video and save it to my hard
drive. Anybody have any thoughts on what I need to do?
Thanks in advance for any help you might be able to provide

Comments

Art wrote on 4/2/2001, 2:44 PM

First of all, please be aware that Video Capturing requires
far more than the specs you have already mentioned. Even if
we resolved issue of why card is not seen by the program,
you still have to work on your hardware. First of all, you
must have at least a 32 MB video card so it frees up your
processor from doing all the work. Second, your hard drive
must al least be 5400 RPM but I strongly suggest the faster
7200 rpm / Ultra 100 hard drives. Third, your processor
must be at least have a clock speed of 500 and above and
memory should be at least 128 MB (I suggest at least 256
MB). Anything less than this would give you a lot of "frame
drops" because your system may not be fast enough to
capture all those frames (30 frames per second! - that is
about 32MB of files every second!) So you see, your
hardware must be above par since the program requires a lot
for you to be able to capture effectively. Also, get at
least a 40 Gig HD totally dedicated to the capture. I did a
project over the weekend and it reqiured almost 15 gig for
a 45 minutes worth of video capture from my digital
camcorder (Panasonic DV200),

Hope this helps.

Rleibold wrote on 4/2/2001, 5:09 PM

Thanks that is somewhat of a help. I only have a 4mg
integrated video card, and a 400 mh processor. I do have
something like 384 megs of ram. I think my hard drive is
5400 rpm. Do you think I would at least be able to capture
video if I have at least a 32 mb video card, and do I need
to get a video capture card? Thanks for you help.

JSKibs wrote on 4/3/2001, 11:47 PM

You mention an Adaptec Firewire card. Is it OHCI
compliant? I have a Compaq Presario with a built in
Adaptec 1394 chipset that much to my dismay is not OHCI
compliant and thus would not recognize my camcorder. As
luck would have it, the PC shipped with Adaptec's DVDeck
program which although isn't the greatest video capture
program, works well enough. Adaptec's website has this
available for download. Its main limitation is that you
cannot edit a DVDeck captured file then record it back to
your camcorder. For me, since I only burn my movies to CD-
R, it's no big deal.

I have a 500mhz P-III, 256mg RAM, ATI Rage Fury 32Mg
Graphics, dedicated 40Gb 5400 RPM hard drive and even with
the DVDeck as capture, VF works fine.