On Thu, 23 Sep 2004, Roberto Salles wrote:
> It's quite a while I don't write anything on the mjpeg list and I
> remember there was a person that would really make good coments
> about the Canopus capture devices. After years, now I'm working and
I think there are several of us who have good things to say about
the Canopus devices.
> I plan to buy one. I FINALLY found a place here that sells these
> two: ADVC-100 and ADVC-300. I remember something about ADVC-50 and
> ADVC-100 only on this list.
Ah, so if you have found a _local_ place that will sell the Canopus
device then that means they should work with PAL-M.
The ADVC-50 is an (internal) PCI card and is uni-directional I believe
(analog->digital but not digital->analog which is useful if you
want to send DV data out to a monitor).
> Well, now my tragic story and why I'm asking this. I've bought an
> ATI All-in-Wonder 9700 one year ago... But no capture in the whole one
> year I have it. Fine, I can use windows to capture. But then, when I
That is very bad news - I am sorry to hear that you have had a year
without a capture (except on windows) ;(
> try any tape that is not very good, the result shows scrambled
> images, really unusable. So I have spent quite some money last year,
Yes, if the video sync signal is noisy (or drops out) some cards
do not handle the situation well at all.
> Now comes the first point. The Canopus products don't support
> pal-m. I would have to use a converter between the video and the
Hmmm, the Canopus website and manuals say they support PAL.
I am curious - where did you read (or who mentioned) that the ADVC
devices do not support PAL-M?
Why would a dealer sell you a ADVC-100 or -300 when it will not work
in Brazil?
> device. Do I lose something with that conversion? I've found
> converters that claim "240 lines of resolution" - is that "normal"?
For NTSC broadcast TV it is about right for most TV sets or VHS. But
it is quite low compared to a miniDV camcorder (the better camcorders
can get 530 lines of resolution).
> http://www.transcortec.com.br/vp10000.htm
> is such an example. Page in portuguese, but I think the technical
If I read the page correctly that device is a PAL-M to NTSC conversion
unit - and I think that is a lossy conversion (not sure what they
do about converting PAL's 50 fields/sec to NTSC's 59.94 fields/sec) .
You would end up doing a NTSC capture. Eventutally I think that
means you'd end up creating NTSC DVDs which might not work well in
PAL DVD players (might work, might not work - I think it depends on
the player, TVset, and so on).
> And now the second. If the above is ok, as I want to capture tapes
> of a lot of dubious quality, I want to know if I really have to go
> for ADVC-300. I just ask because the ADVC-100 is much cheaper. But I
If the tapes are in poor condition then the ADVC-300 will be worth
the extra money because the -300 has a built-in TBC (Time Base
Corrector) which will produce a stead signal. Also the -300 has
some denoising circuits which will help clean up the picture.
I have a -100 BUT I used one of those "Image Stabilizer" units
from Sima Corporation (http://www.simacorp.com/). At the time
(a couple years ago) I bought the SCC-1 but I see that the SCC-2
is available now. At the time the ADVC-300 was not available but
if I had VHS tapes to convert today I would get the -300 instead of
the -100
On the other hand a ADVC-100 would probably work fine. Before I
used the "image stabilizer" I attached the VCR directly to the ADVC-100
and didn't have problems. using the stabilizer did give me better
picture quality (less shaking/jittering) though.
> don't know if it will be able to do the job. I've read things about
> both and I wanted to hear an opinion of someone that uses the device.
I've converted literally hundreds of tapes and laser discs using the
ADVC-100 - flawless operation and very good picture quality. One of
the best expenditures of money I have ever made.
> I'm almost another convert, just by reading what other people said
> about them on the internet. :-)
Are there any resources (mailinglists, forums, etc) in Brazil that
can be used to see if the Canopus ADVC-300 (or -100) will work without
a conversion device? If the units are for sale in .BR then I would
think that they would work without having to use a PAL->NTSC conversion
unit. There must be other people who do analog->digital conversion
in .BR that could offer some advice or information.
What do folks use in Brazil for (miniDV) camcorders? Are there
special PAL-M camcorders made specifically for PAL-M? What I am
wondering about is the possibility of using a miniDV camcorder to
do the analog->digital conversion. Most of the miniDV camcorders
today (at least the ones I have seen in the US) can convert analog
to digital (it's called the "pass thru" or "pass thru conversion"
capability). You don't even need to have a tape in the camcorder (so
there is no mechanical wear on the unit). Perhaps one of the Sima
image stabilizers (if they will work with PAL-M - support is claimed
for PAL but not specifically PAL-M).
Good Luck!
Cheers,
Steven Schultz
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