Capture card suggestion needed

[jfcguy40]

Good morning:

I find myself in the painful action of having to replace a 2 year old ATI TV Wonder Elite card. The card has performed great until a few months when it began to change some colors and not receive things properly.

I do NOT need HD or digital capture - everything I do is analog - I have like 400 vhs tapes that need converting and I use a few different pieces of software to edit as I need and want.

I own Videostudio 11 and enjoy capturing with it greatly. I have also used Vegas and even Virtualdub to capture at times with the same card. I'm looking to buy something that will give me the same flexibility as I've enjoyed.

I purchased a Hauppauge 1600 card but unfortunately it won't allow you to capture unless you use its software and I dislike that very much.

I do video capture from my vhs tapes almost every other week so a card that is somewhat fast and trouble free would be very beneficial.

Any and all suggestions and comments will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you

[Devil]

The most hassle-free method I know of capturing from VHS is one of the Canopus ADVC series. These convert the analogue to a DV stream which goes into your 'puter via an IEEE-1348 (I-Link or Firewire) port. If some of your tapes are giving reading problems, then the ADVC-300 will often restore them via the in-built time-base correction and noise reduction features, but it is expensive. Otherwise the -110 or even the -55 give good bang for your buck. I have used this method for years and I would not think of any other. If my ADVC-100 packed up, I would not hesitate to replace it with another. One of the best buys I ever made and almost anything will capture from it, with excellent quality (better than that of any VHS tape!)

[jfcguy40]

Devil:

Thank you so much - the product sounds terrific.

Unfortunately, I'm doing all this work 'cause I'm unemployed - so spending close to $300 with shipping isn't something I'm ready to do right now.

1/2 of that I can do and is what I'm hoping for. Trust me - from all the positive reviews on that product, I wish I had a way of buying it but I can't.

I hope you or another of your knowledgeable friends here can give me a less expensive option.