No audio capture or preview from VCR

[marty1311]

Hi all,

I am new to MF and this bulletin board, so I apologize in advance if I don't provide enough info about my problem.

I recently purchased a video capture card (KWorld PVR 833) and it came with what is I'm assumming an OEM version of MF4. The video capture card is a PCI card with only an S-Video input. But, it comes with an adapter cord with RCA Audio and Video connectors and an audio out line. I connected the RCA lines (red, white, and yellow) to my VCR and then connected the adapter cable audio line to the sound card line in. My sound card is an on board Realtek AC 97 on a Gigabyte 865G board running XP Pro SP2 w/ 768 mb ddr ram.

Video capture works fine (after changing the capture settings to reflect "composite input"). However, the audio does not capture at all. Under the capture settings, Realtek AC97 shows up as the audio device and I set the input source to "line in". I then made sure "line in" was selected as the recording option for the sound card settings. But this doesn't seem to work. There is no audio at all during the preview or capture modes. And if I open the captured file with Media Player, all there is is static.

Any thoughts, tips, or even wild goose chases? I've tried having windows update the AC97 driver, but it claims I have the newest available (which I doubt because the driver date is from 12/2005).

Thanks in advance for any help. In the meantime, I am going to continue to look for a newer AC97 driver.

marty1311

[skier-hughes]

Have you ever used the line input before?
It may be faulty.

Are you sure you used the line in and not mic in?

Are you sure the audio outputs from the vcr are ok?

Try gigabyte's site for any updates to drivers, they'll be better than MS's site.

Did you go into windows volume control and set the line in as active and adjust the volume level?
http://www.myvideoproblems.com/Tutorial ... oInput.htm

[marty1311]

I've only had the mobo for a couple of months and have never used the line-input before so I don't know if it is faulty. I will try to test that.

As for the other suggestions, I double checked to make sure the volume and selection settings for "line input" were fine. I also tried both the line input port and the mic port just incase I had mis-identified them.

I have an old Sound Blaster (probably about 6 years old) card lying around would it be worth while to install that and see if the capture works using it?

thanks
marty

[skier-hughes]

I would yes, to tell us if the line in port is faulty. Disable the on-board sound in the bios though, as it can conflict if you have both open.

[DVDDoug]

You can test your audio line-in without recording. If you just play the video tape with the audio connected, you should hear the sound without running any software. (The Windows Volume Control / Mixer is always active.)

Since you've apparently never heard anything from the video tape (via the computer) this probably has nothing to do with Movie Factory.

Do you get a "pop" or "buzz" when you first plug into line-in? If you do, then the problem is with the VCR, cable, or connection. If there is no noise when you plug-in, the problem is most-likely inside the computer (hardware, driver, Windows set-up, etc.).


Did your video capture card come with any additional software? sometimes they come with their own capture sofware, and Movie Factory is bundled so you can use it for making DVDs.

...I'm assumming an OEM version of MF4.

It will be a limited-feature SE version. It may have been tweaked to work with your hardware... Or, maybe not... (The SE version does qualify you for the upgrade price... Assuming you get it working and you want to upgrade at some point.)

Analog capture is the trickiest part of this whole tricky digitial video business. So, don't give-up too quickly...

If you can't get this card to work and you want to try something else, the ATI All-In-Wonder cards seem to be the most popular. (Probably more expensive than your Kworld card.)

I Have a Hauppauge card. It has it's own audio input, and it works great with it's own capture software. But, I can't really recommend it because it's MPEG only, and I've sometimes had trouble editing MPEGs.