I am running a HP Pentium 111 773, 384 mgs ram, a Win Tv USB and a Pyro 1394 PCI capture device, a Mitsumi Cr4804TE burner and Sound blaster Live sound card. I am using MGI Video Wave 4, Ulead Video Studio 4 for capture sofware, Easy CD and NTI CD Creator Professional for burner programs. Right now I am trying to convert my old VHS home movies to VCD using the Win Tv USB capture port. Then play them on my DVD to Tv. The result is disscusting. My Question is one of many. 1 Will firewire 1394 and digit signal make any differnce for future projects? 2 Is the USB caputer device too slow? 3 How do I do SVCD? My burner only will see MPEG 1 VideoCD (NSTC or PAL) as a legit format. 4 If fire wire will improve the quality is there an anolog to firewire adaptor so I can still get my old VHS done?

-- Donald Thompson (godlvs@telusplanet.net), April 01, 2001

Answers

Answer to Q1 and Q2: USB will give you poor quality. Firewire will definitely give you the best quality (99.9%).

Answer to Q3: Easy Adaptec does not make VCD. Use Nero 4.x/5.x.

Answer to Q4: Yes, Firewire to S-video will cause a loss of quality. But not too bad! Or you can get a VHS player with DV output. This however will cost you!!!

-- videohobby (videohobby@yahoo.com), April 02, 2001.

Easy Cd can make VCD, but only the 4.0 deluxe and the 5.0 platinum version. But 5.0 has problems with more than 4 tracks need to install a patch. Menuing is next to impossible.

-- Dwayne (ddilbeck@yahoo.com), April 02, 2001.

First, don't use USB for capturing video. The data rates it is capable of can only make you capture quarter-res (360x240 or 352x240); it can be argued that is VCD resolution, but it's infinitely better to capture full-res and let the the resolution trimming be done in and with the encoding process. Second, the built- in MPEG-1 encoders that come with Video Studio and Video Wave were designed by some whose minds were obviously far from it. That in Video Studio is by Ligos LSX; by this ULead themselves think all people ever do is output to tape. Natch. AVOID using them at all costs. If you really have to use Video Studio, for example, then create a DV type-1 AVI file, then open this up in TMPGenc (a superb freeware MPEG-1/2 encoder), then encode that to VCD MPEG-1. Lastly, if you have a DV or D8 camcorder, you can put it in analogue-in mode and DV-out such that the VHS is transcoded to DV format that can be accepted by the FireWire. The camcorder itself sits there with no tape; it's your defacto A-to-D converter. Note that this is only possible with camcorders that have analogue and DV in/out; NTSC models usually are by default, but PAL models only have analogue and DV out (because they are taxed to death, but that's another story). You are best served by sites like www.geocities.com/aussie01au, www.flexion.org, and www.vcdhelper.com.

-- Mehmet Tekdemir (turk690@yahoo.com), April 03, 2001.

What i do is record the video as an AVI at 480 x 240 resolution using ATI tv Wonder VE (value edition) 40 bucks. it's a capture card that goes inside the comp. i connect my VCR to it using composite connection (red, white and yellow). i found that gives me better resolution than a regular coaxial connection. but i still get some blurryness... then uning avi2vcd program i make it into an Mpeg and burn it with nero 5.5. If you record with AVI below 480 x 240 you get jerkiness. also if you go above that, you get lines. And don't use ATI's default VCD setting. go to custom and make one at 480 x 240. One problem i have with TMPCeg program is that it does not aline video with audio good. so use AVI2VCD instead even though it has no othe features.

-- DANIEL BONI (BONL1@CS.COM), April 21, 2002.