Can someone outline my choices for capturing video in MPEG format? I have a Sony digital 8 with firewire port, and I also have wintv that can capture in .avi format, but I want to be able to make VCDs of a full hour of tape. This is impossible with AVI's. I need to capture directly to MPEG. I would like to convert all my tapes to VCD. Is there capture software that can utilize my wintv card and capture in MPEG instead of .avi? Do I have to buy a firewire card? What format is the DV on the tape in? Is is MPEG or something else? What about MPEG capture cards? Sorry for the stupid questions. I'm still learning. Reg.

-- Reginald Craig (rgc101@hotmail.com), June 12, 2000

Answers

You can use CyberLink(?) PowerVCR or Cinax(?) WinVCR to turn your AVI capture card into an MPEG1 encoder card. They require a 300MHz processor and I think 64MB RAM. I just bought a new processor and more RAM so that I can use the software. The WinVCR makers are in the process of making WinVCR-II which will let you capture MPEG1 and MPEG2 in real time through your AVI card. WinVCR-II requires a 600MHz processor. And it is possible to capture a full hour in AVI, you just have to use a program like AVI_IO that splits the AVIs into more files after one reaches 2GB. After you capture your AVIs, use Panasonic Encoder or TMPEG Encoder to encode the AVIs to MPEG1. I find that going from AVI to MPEG is your best bet for quality, as I also have MPEG encoding hardware, and it is not as good as my WinTV.

-- Mr.Ian Roswell (cyberlien51@juno.com), June 12, 2000.

I use CinePlayer DVR to capture right to mpeg -1 VCD, then I Burn them using Nero Burning Rom or Adaptec Easy Cd Creator 5.0 Platinum after your done burning you can Play them In your DVD player (if your DVD Player can Play VCD Format) I have A phillips DVD Player, I Have a ATI TV wonder Card That I use To Capture Right to MPeg-1 My Video Card is A GeForce 256 32M, My Procesor is a AMD 1000 MGZ.T-Bird I Have 512 Ram. The Program works Great, I transfered all my home Movies on VCD.

-- Martin Eaton (woodbury11@home.com), May 16, 2001.

favor cotizar software vcd creator

-- ENERSOLUAP (ENERSOLUAP@YAHOO.COM), August 09, 2001.

i have a athlon 800 mhz and 128 ram win tv pvr i capture in divx format then convert using tmpg encoder and burn to vcd using nero perfact results even from an old video if u have pentuim 4 i could guess u could convert and cature sound in mp3 format hope this helps out best program to use for capture ive found is win vdr (y)

-- colin campbell (djcolz01@aol.com), February 29, 2004.