Sony Hi8 to Movie Maker via Canopus ADVC 110 Video Converter

[Guest]

I have a Dell Dimension XPS with a Pentium 4, 3.20 GHz cpu with HT dual
processors. I have 1.5 GB of RAM and am running Windows Professional XP,
Service Pack 2. I have a dedicated 120 GB hard drive for storing/editing
video. I just hooked up my new Canopus ADVC 110 digital video converter box
to my PC via 6-pin firewire and to my Sony Hi8 camcorder using analog RCA
audio/video inputs and I am having very disappointing results. When I import
using "Best quality for playback on my computer", I don't have any trouble,
but the quality of the video is not what I had hoped. When I selected "Other
settings" and opted for "high quality video (NTSC)", I had no import
problems, but the video quality was still not there, even when I burned it to
DVD and viewed it on my Sony Trinitron 27" TV. So today I tried importing
video using the "Digital device format (DV-AVI)" and my preview video was
good for awhile, but started to drop frames and just about freeze after 2
minutes. When I played it back, the first few seconds, which seemed to
import flawlessly on preview, played back with regular intervals of frame &
audio dropouts. PLEASE HELP. I want to achieve the same "quality"/look of
full-motion, crisp "live" video burned to a DVD that I achieve when I dub my
movies from Hi8 to VHS. I have increased my RAM and purchased this Canopus
ADVC 110 to do this, but the video I am seeing is most disappointing even
when there are no frame drops - staggered/sluggish/uncrisp/"film look"
instead of a live "video" look. Do I need and internal analog converter card
instead of this Canopus external analog to digital (& vice-versa) converter
box? It seems I read a post where someone was getting the quality results I
wanted from a Hi8 to Movie Maker import/edit/export to DVD.

 

[George Ellis]

Find and try VirtualDub for creating your DV-AVI files. That application
may resolve these issues.

 

[Guest]

Ok, thanks for the tip.

I have discovered part of the problem - when I switched over to recording on
to my "C" drive instead of my dedicated video drive ("E"), all the dropped
frames went away when using "Digital device format" - smooth as silk. So,
the next question is, what do I have set incorrectly that I can't capture
video to my video drive (E) without getting tons of dropouts??? Is it the
drive, drive speed, buffer, connection, setting . . . what???

 

[George Ellis]

That sounds like it has some connection issue. Being a 120GB drive, it
should be fast enough, especially on your machine. The only thing I can
think of is that you have Compression enabled on that drive. NTFS file
compression will use a lot of CPU cycles and can cause dropouts. I have
seen it on 1.6GHz machines, but I would think a 3+GHz would not. But you
never know. In the Properties of your E: drive on the General page, uncheck
Compression and see if that makes a difference.

I would still get Virtual Dub. It allows other plugins such as Deshaker and
filters that are not available in WMM. It also fixes about any issue I have
seen with AVIs. http://biphome.spray.se/gunnart/video/

 

[Guest]

Chris,

Did you install the 2nd drive yourself? If so are the master/slave settings
correct. I have a Dell 8300 3.0 GHz machine about 2 years old. The manual
recommends cable select and not master/slave. Plus after installing the 2nd
drive I had to go into the BIOS and toggle the setting on the primary IDE
channel-Drive 1 (second drive, as C: drive is drive 0) from OFF to AUTO.
Changing to AUTO lets the BIOS auto detect the drive on boot up. If it cant
auto detect it sets the transfer mode to PIO which is the slowest. It may
also drop your C:drive transfer mode down to Ultra DMA 2. Toggling to auto
would bring both up to Ultra 5. If your second drive is at PIO mode (check in
the disk management) than this is most likely your problem. Another poster
seems to have this issue as their videos look terrible after backing up to
2nd drive not capturing to the second drive. That was my problem as well.

Good luck,
Steve

 

[Guest]

Hey George,

I checked the General Page under "Properties" of my E: drive, and
Compression was already unchecked. I will definitely check out Virtual Dub.
Thank you for your help.

 

[Guest]

Hey Steve,

Yes, I did install the 2nd drive myself - sort of. My engineer friend
at my previous employer did it for me (oddly enough my machine is also
approaching 2 yrs. old!) He said I didn't need the software that came with
the drive, that XP would take care of it. I think you may have hit the nail
on the head. If I remember correctly, I am using the master/slave method on
the hard drives. This is what I have currently:

Primary IDE Channel - Device 0: DMA If Available, Current Mode: Ultra
DMA Mode 5
- Device 1: DMA If Available, Current
Mode: PIO Mode

Secondary IDE Channel - Device 0: DMA If Available, Current Mode:
Ultra DMA Mode 2

 

[Guest]

Sorry Steve, I accidentally posted this before I was done -

Secondary IDE Channel - Device 1: DMA If Available, Current Transfer
Mode: PIO Mode

Could you explain in detail how I should go about setting this
correctly? I know I will probably have to open the tower up and reset the
switch(es) on the back of the hard drive(s) to Cable Select on both??? Then
I have to go and change the BIOS on primary IDE channel-Drive 1 from OFF to
AUTO??? How??

I believe my primary hard drive C: is set to Master and the video hard
drive E: drive is set to Slave.

I think I am almost home - help me get there!

Thank you very much.
Chris S.

 

[Guest]

Chris,

It looks like its what I thought. Your video drive is set to PIO mode. When
I installed my western digital drive, my DELL users guide said to use the
disk that came with the drive. The problem with not using the disk that came
with it, is that XP might not give you full use of the entire space on the
drive. But since you are already formatted not much you can do now. Check
your manual and see what it says. It will tell you what the pin settings
should be. Your 8400 might be master/slave or cable select, I just don't
know.

If it should be cable select then you will have to open the tower. It is so
easy though so don't sweat it. You should be able to access the back of the
drive or you may have to release the clips and back the drive out. If you
still have the info that came with the drive it should show you how to set
the pins to what you need. It should even be labeled on the back of the drive.

Once you get the pins set correctly reboot and hit the appropriate function
(F1 or F2, etc) key upon start up to get into the BIOS. Look for your primary
IDE channel settings and toggle drive 1 (second drive) to AUTO it most likely
says OFF. It might say something like Unkown as the details but that will
change once you reboot again. Exit and save changes. This should set your
DMA settings on both to at least DMA 5. You should be able to go into BIOS
next time you boot up and it should read the details of your drive.

IT looks like you have the same issue with your disk drives as well. the
second one is PIO mode. I think both of mine are DMA 2. You might need to do
the same with these 2 drives, if you put in a post purchase burner or
something.

Keep us posted
Steve

 

[George S. Ellis]

Thanks Steve. I keep forgetting that not everyone has figured out CS yet.
Dell has been using it for at least 8 years that I remember.

 

[Guest]

George,

I just wish Dell was smart enough to put in the manual that you HAD to go in
to the BIOS and make the change for drive 2. They tell you in detail how to
install, how to set the pins, how to use the manufacturer's disk to format
the drive, yet they don't tell you how to set it up to be auto detected. For
a mid level user like myself, not a cut and dry thing. Took awhile to find
the solution.

 

[Guest]

Steve,

Thanks a million!!! Here's what I did: I did what you said, I went in
to the BIOS setup page on reboot and set "Device 1" on the Primary Channel to
"Auto" (was set to "Off) and "Device 1" on the Secondary channel to "Auto"
(was set to "Off" as well). System rebooted, and now I have a Current
Transfer Mode of "Ultra DMA Mode 5" on Primary Device 1 (hard drive E: - was
set to PIO previously) and a Current Transfer Mode of "Ultra DMA Mode 2" on
Secondary Device 1 (DVD/CD burner - was set to PIO previously). I captured
10 minutes of video from my Hi8 through the Canopus converter on to the E:
drive and it was "as smooth as silk" - problem solved!

I did NOT open up the tower and change the master/slave setting - I
left that alone. My Dell Dimension XPS manual gave no advice one way or the
other on this seting. My Seagate Ultra ATA/100 7200 rpm hard drive manual
did recommend, however, using the master/slave method: master for the boot
drive (C and slave for the secondary drive (E.

One added thing I learned from my buddy at my former job which I will
do because I am an anal retentive perfectionist: He said to check and see if
I was still using my old hard drive cable, because some older cables can NOT
support a new drive's high data transfer rates. I found the Seagate box in
my attic and discovered that there was a hard drive cable still in its sealed
factory bag that we did not change out when we installed the Seagate drive.
I read the instruction manual and it basically said verbatim what my friend
said to check/do: replace the old hard drive cable with the new one to
support the drive's high data transfer rates. Though I am having no more
problems at the moment, I will change it out just the same to make sure I am
"squeezing every last drop of blood out of that turnip"!

Thanks again Steve and everyone else for your input.

Next question: Can I reformat my video hard drive (E, since I have
no projects saved there yet, with the Seagate setup disk and recover some of
that 9 gigabytes of memory I lost with Windows XP formatting the drive??? I
swear, its read "111 Gigabytes free" this whole time I have had it installed
and I never put anything onit until yesterday. I think it is what you
referred to Steve, losing a lot of memoy space by letting XP format it? Can
I reformat it with the Seagate disk and regain a chunk of that wasted memory
space???

 

[George S. Ellis]

That missing 9GB is never going to be found. One, it is 1000 vs 1024 being
1k and two, they round up in a big way. XP will also leave a small area
unformatted and unallocated on disk creation. This is for dynamic disk
usage. That area is used when two (or more) drives are combined into one
drive combined as a dynamic disk volume.

 

[Guest]

sounds like your drive was formatted fine. I put in a 200GB drive and was
told that if I let XP format it would only give me some 134GB or something
like that. My 200GB drive when formatted via the vanguard tools that came
with it, only gives me some 186 free GB of space. I don't know about you
George, but the 8400 is a recent model. Shouldn't have to swap out the cable.
I didn't, but I guess it couldn't hurt.

 

[Guest]

oops, I saw that Chris really had the XPS, not the 8400. Thats the high end
so I would think the cable would be able to handle DMA 5 without a hitch!