Video capature card TV LEADTEK WINFAST "DELUXE" TV2000XP TV/FM

[UnrealCpu]

THinking about buying this card and would like to know some facts before buying it.

Does it record at higher resoulutions than regular cable from your monitor

Do you need a cable box to change the channels?

What is your recommendation on a capture card

[kiljaden5]

I have this card, its considered to be the best one for the PC.. no you don't need a cable box, it has a built in tuner to change the channels for you.

I'm not 100% sure what resolution is the max it records in, but its something like 720 x 480 (??)

I guess the best quality you can get recording is pretty good, but it takes up a lot of space, and of course the quality is limited by the signal that is coming into the card

it'll look really good if you have a high quality signal coming IN to the card

[Smirabi]

ok, i've purchased 2 of these cards, one for home and one for work/school and how much you;re gonna like it really depends on what you need it for. i needed the home one for TV and FM, for which it serves its purpose marvelously. ^however^ if you are looking to capture video from something like a vcr or camcorder (not using DV) then you need to know that the best it can capture at is 720x576, and that is at the DVD PAL setting. so, because i needed a video capture card at work, and this one can only capture in such small sizes, i would not necessarily reccommend it for that purpose. i mean, heck, if you wanna record tv shows, it captures those fine, it just left me disappointed when it comes to other kinds of capturing.

[cursor]

Do a search for this card and you'll find tons of threads that mention it positively. I've got one and I love it. My first card was a Compro TVmate gold+, and I sent it back to newegg because the software was sub-par, live image quality when recording was terrible, and other weird problems. The Leadtek card is cheaper and better for my purposes. The only card to seriously consider as an alternative is the Hauppauge PVR 350, and it's $190. It's a card for different uses, but in some respects is not as good as the Leadtek (from what I've heard). You may want to check out the reviews in the forums at www.tv-cards.com.

[UnrealCpu]

Is there anything better that will add alot better visual quality through coaxle cable for cable tv?

[idioteQnology]

i have this card and for the price it cant be beat. it isnt the 'best' per say. the upper end hauppages have hardware mpeg encoding/decoding on them and higher resolutions but cost tons more. to watch tv on your pc the leadtek is all u need IMO though.

[UnrealCpu]

I would like to record at higher resoulutions than the incomming signal which is cable. Is this possible? Also if i spend alittle more would i get a much better picture quality and record quality if i went with a card that cost about 140 bucks??

[cursor]

If you want the BEST quality, what you have to do is record in uncompressed AVI and do your compression later "non-real time." The Leadtek comes with all that software.

One thing you may be interested in is that Leadtek is supposed to be coming out with an "expert" version of this card soon based on the phillips 713x chipset. It's got a bit better visual quality (10 bit vs 8 bit).

I have no idea what the release date for this card is. I looked at Leadtek's website a couple of weeks ago and it was listed--but nobody had it then. I don't know if it will still have the same great functionality that the Leadtek card has though.

[Smirabi]

cursor, nothing against your word or anything, but it looks to me like even the uncompressed AVI capture format captures at only 320x240. that just is not good. is there a way to up that to near 720x480?

[cursor]

whelp, last time I captured an uncompressed avi, one hour was 17 gb. The quality is pretty much identical to what you get when it comes across the air. I had an All-in-wonder Pro that captured at 320x240 and the image quality of this card is FAR superior. If I'm not mistaken the NTSC capture does 640x480. But, of course, I could be wrong.

[Smirabi]

yeah, you are correct about how damn big those AVIs are and what the NTSC capture res is, but this is not the card for serious video capturing. that's not to say it isnt a great card, i have 2, so i obviously think highly of it, but its greatness does have some limits. in the spirit of the original questions from the thread starter, i have heard that the happauge wintv pvr 250 is a good capture card, but i'm still trying to locate someone who has actually used one and wants to tell me about it, so that is only a provisional recommendation

[cursor]

I was wrong. Just checked my file properties, and it is indeed 320x240. That's pretty misleading IMHO, as I thought that resolution would look like utter crap and this AVI looks pretty good.

Perhaps someone who knows more about .avi's than I do can glean some info from this:

Image
Width: 320 pixels
Height: 240 pixels

Audio
Duration: 1:01:00
Bit Rate: 1411 kbps
Audio sample size: 16 bit
Audio format: PCM

Video
Frame Rate: 29 frames/second
Data rate: 99 kbps
Video sample size: 16 bit
Video compression: MS-YUV

File size:
16.4 GB (17,550,965,760 bytes)

I don't know if this is the best card around or not, however I do know that it's the only card everyone seems to agree does pretty much whatever they want outside of hardware MPEG encoding.

BTW, here is an thread that has extensive links to reviews of tv cards including the hauppauge and leadtek: http://www.tv-cards.com/messageboard/viewtopic.php?t=1938

[UnrealCpu]

Smirabi is right on the money what i am asking. I would like to buy a capture card that will kick TIVO ass and capture at the same picture quality or better that is coming from my coaxale cable tv.
Thanks
I will read the reviews

[Smirabi]

well, unreal, you and i are in this together, except i dont watch tv, but i think we still have very similar needs for the card. i'm gonna keep doing my research and i'll post here if i find anything interesting

[cursor]

Originally posted by UnrealCpu
Smirabi is right on the money what i am asking. I would like to buy a capture card that will kick TIVO ass and capture at the same picture quality or better that is coming from my coaxale cable tv.
Thanks
I will read the reviews

Here's something to think about:

One of TiVo's major problems is that it does the hardware compression in a $200 box that people buy. The satellite companies have hundreds of thousands of dollars in equipment that they use to compress video streams. Their DBS PVR's record that stream 1:1 so you get identical playback from what you receive over the dish. With the TiVo or any receiver you use for your PC you're going to have some loss in quality. With that in mind, there are supposedly a couple of DBS receiver cards, but I don't know anything about them.

Have you looked into Digital TV tuners? There are a few of them about, however I have seen mixed reviews on them.

I hope you succeed. I look forward to reading about your setup. I'm a bit dubious though--I don't think there's a TiVo killer (or even a peer) out there on the TV to PC market. But there for sure WILL be! :cool: (just a question of WHEN)

:beer:

[UnrealCpu]

I might just go for the Leadtech card

[OC Noob]

To answer your question, there is no card that is going to improve visual quality from what is coming out of your coaxial cable. You need to get a digital reciever or an HDTV reciever to do that and then you're probably going to need a much better capture card to capture it.

Capturing to uncompressed AVI is the only way to go to get decent quality, because (like has been said) real time compression sucks nuts. It may not be great resolution, but its not like you can increase the quality from the original output. Recoring in AVI then compressing atleast helps preserve the quality that is there.

The Winfast TV2000 Deluxe didn't used to come with the uncompressed AVI recording software, but it does now for just that reason.

[TruckyJ]

Just a quick question to those of you who have Leadtek TV cards here (I just ordered one and am excited to see if it's all its cracked up to be)...

How good does the picture look on your monitor compared a "normal" TV?

I'm hoping its pretty close. Most people seem pretty happy with the image quality of their Leadtek's from what I've read. I have a friend who has a junk ATI TV tuner (the VE I think) and the picture quality is VERY poor. I hope I'm not headed down that same road...Thanks

[OC Noob]

Its not as good as regular TV IMO because forcing the low res into higher res requires the use of techniques that make the picture look blurry.

Its not bad, but don't expect the clearity of a decent TV.

[Smirabi]

ok, truckyj, how good it looks is just a function of what you are displaying to. if youve got a 17" monitor running 1024x768, it's gonna look better than a tv, imo. but if you've got something along the lines of a 19" running upwards of 1280x1024 and you try to do full screen, you may want to sit a little further back than normal because as OC noob said, it may look kinda blurry. but if it looks too blurry, then shrink the window or something. you wont be disappointed by the leadtek.

[TruckyJ]

Thanks for the prompt responses. I am running a 15" Sony Trinitron, and I doubt there will be any issues with picture if monitor size is a factor. I run the desktop at 1152x768.

I think part of the issue with people's perception of TV picture quality in relation to TV cards is how close they are too the screen (as was mentioned). Nobody sits 2.5-3 feet away from a TV, why should we expect the signal to be any different on a source that can reveal even more of the picture flaws?

I am truly excited to get the card based upon what everyone has said about it. I honestly doubt it will put the Sony WEGA that I had to shame, but I hope it isn't too far away in terms of quality. I should be getting it this week (Newegg is usually pretty quick). I'll keep you posted.

:cool:

[Onizuka]

I have a Winfast Deluxe TV2000XP card and I love it. I dont have a high end comp or monitor and I get really good picture. Sometimes it can be a lil snowy though, but Im almost certain its because our cable lines out here are of poor quality. If you want a capture card Id go with it, works great.

[ge0rge]

I have a question that pretains to this...
I'm trying to put together a multimedia pc for TV, DVD watching/recording, etc.
I currently have a AGP 4x mobo.
Would you rather:
1. Keep my GeForce 4 MX and purchase another tv tuner/capture card (Possibly the ones that you've listed above)

2. Or purchase something like an ATI radeon 9600 AIW pro

??

[Smirabi]

well curious g, i haven't used an AIW card since the first edition... it's sitting not 3 feet from me, and it was great then. but i dont know how great it is compared to the leadtek, i've never seen them compared head to head. but, one thing you may want to consider, if you ever decide to upgrade the computer, your choices are limited if you get the aiw, but if you use the leadtek and an independent graphics card then you can upgrade each individually. some people talk about conflicts between cards and how you wont experience that kind of thing with an aiw, maybe it's worth it. but my advice is stick with the old mx and get the leadtek.

[TruckyJ]

Originally posted by ge0rge
I have a question that pretains to this...
I'm trying to put together a multimedia pc for TV, DVD watching/recording, etc.
I currently have a AGP 4x mobo.
Would you rather:
1. Keep my GeForce 4 MX and purchase another tv tuner/capture card (Possibly the ones that you've listed above)

2. Or purchase something like an ATI radeon 9600 AIW pro

??

If you are going to be doing any real gaming on it you'll want to upgrade the vid. card to something beyond that GF4mx. However, I personally have read that the AIW cards are a little comprimising when it comes to recording video. If this is correct, there are not as many recording format options with the AIW cards...furthermore, the picture quality isn't as good.

With that in mind, I personally would go with the stand alone TV/recording card and buy a better video card. I think the premium charged for AIW cards would easily allow you to do this. This is assuming that your going to use the PC for some gaming.

If you just want to get a "better" vid. card to boost performance when running video on that PC (but don't care about gaming so much), get a ATI 8500/9100 or a 64 mb GF4TI 4200 (both can be obtained for around $70). Either of these cards has enough power to handle running video pretty easily.

(To anyone) If I am incorrect about quality w/ the AIW vs a standalone TV card, please let me know. I'm not saying that they are bad, per say, just not AS good.

[smish]

Well, I got that Leadtek Deluxe card a few days ago. (waiting for Fedex to bring it to me :)) I am going to use this card majorly for recording home videos off of VHS, S-VHS tapes and some footage directly from a DV camcorder. I assume this card will be *good enough* to capture that video in a smooth/high quality fashion that can be transferred back onto DVD-R without any problems. Am I right? Or am I so wrong it's going to kick me in the nuts down the road? I already have a pretty decent dvd-+rw burner I got about a month ago, so I'm not going to be using it to capture tv shows/movies @ high quality. (That's what Netflix and the dvd burner are for :D) hehe....

[Smirabi]

it will be good enough, its capture resolutions are really equivalent to the 200+ dollar cards. the only real limitation is the lack of a hardware encoder on the card, but with your processor (nice rig btw) you will be fine.

i use my 2 cards for similar purposes and i have not been disappointed. but you can't use this card to capute DV... you need firewire for that.

btw, your 9700 doesnt support dual display?

[smish]

it will be good enough, its capture resolutions are really equivalent to the 200+ dollar cards. the only real limitation is the lack of a hardware encoder on the card, but with your processor (nice rig btw) you will be fine.

yeah, i guess this card should suit me just fine
thanks for the 'spect on my rig, yours aint bad either man! :)

i use my 2 cards for similar purposes and i have not been disappointed. but you can't use this card to capute DV... you need firewire for that.

yeah, i got like 4 firewire ports on my system, i just need the wire that goes from the camcorder that allows firewire transfer. i assume sony wants like $400 bucks for that, so i might stick with direct rca capture, no big deal.


btw, your 9700 doesnt support dual display?
heh...i guess i'm too lazy to take out my old geforce card and start up using the dual on the 9700 pro. i think the reason i didnt use dual was so i could let another card take all the workload of my 2nd monitor to leave the 9700 free. :P

[Smirabi]

i understand about not stressing the card, i dont know if it's actually reasonable, but i'd prolly do the same. about the DV capture, you are gonna want to pay the money for the cord. connecting your camcorder by DV and working with a program like Pinnacle Pro ( i think it's called "pro" anyway) is the best way to use your DV. i've done both ways before and RCA capture leaves a lot to be desired copmpared to DV cap. the cord is expensive, yes, but i think it's worth it, and my friend who is a video edit guru also thinks it is worth it.

[Captain Slug]

Originally posted by Smirabi
^however^ if you are looking to capture video from something like a vcr or camcorder (not using DV) then you need to know that the best it can capture at is 720x576, and that is at the DVD PAL setting. so, because i needed a video capture card at work, and this one can only capture in such small sizes, i would not necessarily reccommend it for that purpose.

This is not entirely true. If you upgrade the drivers and software you can configure your own compression/resolution presets. I love my TV2000XP since I can preconfigure a bunch of software presets which allow me to record directly to DivX5 thus saving me the hassle of reencoding all of my videos after I capture them.

GET THE LATEST DRIVERS!!! The ones provided in the package work, but are prone to crashing.

[Smirabi]

awesome, captain slug! i'll give that a try. i hope it didnt come off too much like i was ragging on the card, cause it really is awesome, but like everything, it does have limits.