Capture help

[DarthDennis]

I have a project that I'm working on and need some help. I have VS10 and the trial of x2 currently. My boss gave me his Sony Digital Handycam mini DV model DCR-TRV19 with a one hour presentation he filmed that he wants on DVD. I have the camera connected via firewire to the pc. I tried capturing in DV-1 format. the resulting file starts "stuttering" (like freezing up then starting and freezing again) near the end. So, I tried to capture in MPEG format (clicked the options button>video properties>and selected the profile " DVD NTSC LPCM HQ). That capture had the audio go out of sync. What am I doing wrong? I need this done ASAP!!! Would I be better to capture 15min segments in the DV format and put together later in the editor? I cannot do the DV > DVD program option because I need to do a small bit of editing. Is my PC the issue?

My PC specs are:
XP
1.7GHz Pentium M (laptop)
2GB Ram

[Black Lab]

I would recommend capturing via the DV route. Do you have the drop frame counter turned on (it's in Preferences)? My guess is the "stuttering" you are experiencing is dropped frames. That can be caused by many things, usually a process running in the background (virus scanner, program updates, etc.).

With that said, you mention that the presentation is an hour long, and this problem happens near the end. If the problem persists at the same place it could be that you have a bad tape. If that is the case there is not much you can do.

If you still have the captured DV footage I would keep that, and just try recapturing at a point before the problem started. If it captures fine you can just edit them together.

[DarthDennis]

would my pc be an issue? I tried turning off most things I could.

[DarthDennis]

forgot to say thanks for the input Black Lab

[DVDDoug]

I don't think you're doing anything wrong, but I don't know what the problem is...

Would I be better to capture 15min segments in the DV format and put together later in the editor?

If that works, go for it!

You can also try using WinDV (FREE!!!) for capture.

The file starts "stuttering" (like freezing up then starting and freezing again) near the end.

There might be something wrong with the tape. (?) Sometimes a video file will play-back fine, but have some slight data corruption that causes the computer to choke. (This is more common with more-compressed files, and less common with DV/AVI from a MiniDV camera.)

I tried to capture in MPEG format

MPEG encoding on-the-fly requires more "computing", and you are actually more likely to have trouble. And, MPEG files are more "difficult" to edit, and "lip sync" problems are also more common with MPEG than with DV/AVI. (It was MPEG-2 files that inspired my signature/tag-line below! )

Is my PC the issue?

Since the problems don't show-up 'till the end of the tape, I don't think your computer is the problem... But, maybe you've got programs running in the background and hogging the CPU. (?)

[DarthDennis]

After trying to capture even just a 15min block at a time, I was getting bad captures. I cannot turn off all background processes as this is a work laptop and I don't have the passwords to stop them all.

So, I switched to my dual core home pc. First capture worked great. Must have been the laptop not having enough power.

Thanks for the help!

[Black Lab]

[randazzo]

Most laptop hard disks are to slow for capturing the huge amount of data for video capture. You need at least a 7200 rpm disk.

[DarthDennis]

Good point. Didn't even think of that. It is a 5400 RPM...

Most laptop hard disks are to slow for capturing the huge amount of data for video capture. You need at least a 7200 rpm disk.