I have an ATI Raedon 64MB DDR w/ ViVo. My comp is very fast (1GHz AMD, 256MB DDR, 10K HD) and it still drops frames while capturing in any avi format (compressed or uncompressed) at 720x480 or 640x480. The reason I want to capture in AVI is because I can capture directly to a DV Compressor with the Raedon capture software and this would greatly reduce the rendering time on my computer.

Also, how can I edit my original MPEG 1/2 captures in Premiere 6.0 without worrying about quality loss through recompression? How long should it take to export on Premiere 6.0? And how do I reduce rendering time in Premiere?

Thanks

-- emcee_one (emceeONE@hotmail.com), June 24, 2001

Answers

Even the fastest computer will still need its settings adjusted so that it's optimized for a certain task, and in our case video capture will be one of the more important ones. For a start you can look at one way to do so in www.videoguys.com. Premiere6 still resolutely clings to VfW architecture (to set itself rigorously apart from, say, MSPro6), and this means that it will only accept amicably AVI files thus prepared. For example, if you MUST do MPEG-2 editing, then you have to use an I-frame MPEG-2 codec specifically designed to be used in VfW situations such as Premiere. An example of such a codec can be found in http://dvdsoft.hotmail.ru/main.html. Rendering times you have to find out for yourself because they vary all over the dock. If the prospect of rendering really piques you, you might want to consider pricey solutions like Matrox RT2000/2500, or Canopus DV Storm, who pride themselves in realtime editing for the most part.

-- Mehmet Tekdemir (turk690@yahoo.com), June 25, 2001.

I would add, that large frame AVI capture is extremely hard drive intensive. For example, 720x480 uncompressed is going to require around 30 Mb per second I/O through put. When I do AVI capture in full frame uncompressed it generally eats up about 1.5 Gigabyte per MINUTE. And I have to use a 4 Drive Raid array to get reliable thru put across 80 or so Gigabyte.

AVI capture is Hard drive intensive with little load on CPU. Mpeg capture (with the ATI) is CPU intensive with less demand for hard drive speed.

-- Rich (rich@pcphotovideo.com), June 27, 2001.

I had the similar problem with capturing. My problem was with IDE HD card was sharing IRW with video and capture card. -> Read manual to your capture card and/or motherboard and/or manual to your capture card.

-- Steve (kissste@hotmail.com), June 28, 2001.

I have an Ultra160 HD, 10K rpm. The scsi controller and hard drive say that it can have sustained transfer rates up to 160 MB/sec or something like that. Am I just not utilizing the full capabilities of my system? I have Win2K running.

-- emcee_one (emceeONE@hotmail.com), June 29, 2001.

You in fact have a system to die for. Type 1 DV is just 3.5MB/s which is well under what your system is capable of. Something is not tweaked right. You visit videoguys.com and see.

-- Mehmet Tekdemir (turk690@yahoo.com), June 30, 2001.