1) DVD recorder box - records directly to a DVD. The problem with the
concept, is you may not be happy with the results. If you need toedit
the content a bit, or re-author the DVD (improve menu structure),it'll
mean reading the DVD back into the computer.
2) USB3 capture device ($150)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815100148
The "good" interfaces, are on the back. The five RCA connectors are
for left-right audio, and YPbPr component video. That's a high bandwidth
way of recording. There is also digital recording over HDMI. Usually,
on HDMI, it's not legal for the capture device to support HDCP, so if the
source uses HDCP encryption, the capture device will see "snow". The other
limitation with the capture devices, is they cannot capture 1080p(progressive)
and are limited to things like 1080i (interleaved). By comparison, I
don't think the YPbPr is limited in that way. The hardware may even
support Macrovision, so if the content were to be protected with
some flavor of Macrovision, the captured results may be ruined.
http://images17.newegg.com/is/image/newegg/15-100-148-Z04?$S640W$
Basically, you have to look up the specifics of your hardware,
and the results of recording attempts by others, to know whether
wasting money on capture devices, is worthwhile. I can't predict
here, what's going to happen. Lots of TV channels, are going to
arbitrarily turn on the "do not copy" bit, the HD recorder is allowed
to time shift the content, but when asked to play it back, is going to
try to protect the output from copying. Which is why you'd need to know
something about the recording device. Some early devices for example,
had unprotected Firewire ports, and those are like gold. Knowing
how "armored" the box is, is half the battle.
Pulling the drive from a recorder box, is also a possibility you might
have thought of, but again, the recorded content could be encrypted
"just for fun", or, in a format that would make it difficult to
recover (foreign file system). So even it there weren't tamper-proof
screws on the chassis, you might face more of a challenge if you
cloned the hard drive inside the recorder. Again, if there's a way
to do that, typing the exact model number of the Tivo or whatever
into Google, will tell you whether anyone succeeded via hard drive cloning.
3) PCI Express capture device ($99)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815100049
Read the customer reviews on that one. Users use FRAPs, a separate program,
to record from the card, rather than the provided software.
Card has same limitation, records up to 1080i. The adapter cable appears
to have YPbPr component input as an option.
In terms of who came out with some of that stuff first, this is an example
of some original hardware. These guys did a PCI Express version and a USB3
version. I see they're offering a new box here, but haven't looked at
the details yet. For the PCI Express design, as far as I know, these
guys did the first one.
http://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/intensity/techspecs/
A weakness with those, comes in a few places.
1) Bandwidth required. The PCI Express card, if it had more lanes, might
have been able to more comfortably record uncompressed (so you can convert
to DVD format later with DVD mastering software). The cards may use MJPEG
compression, to drop the data rate to a point where it'll fit over the
interface. Getting an onboard MPEG compressor, while that would seem a
logical option, might not be as common.
2) Usually, the capture software provided with the product, sucks. But
that tends to be true, even on TV tuner cards, so this is nothingnew.
For virtually any capture cards or TV tuner cards, you always have to
read the customer reviews, to see if there is *any* software you can use.
Hardware is useless, if all the software is broken. Don't buy hardware,
without knowing what the "software success path" is.
3) On the USB3 capture box, you may need a "full bandwidth" USB3 port and
not a "half bandwidth" USB3 port. These USB3 capture boxes, are one of
the few devices that can't accept inferior implementations of USB3. The
BlackMagic USB3 capture box, actually comes with transfer rate test software,
and the capture software won't run until it's tested the port. Ifthe transfer
rate is too slow, it'll tell you, and then, won't do capture.
The latest Intel and AMD motherboards, can have native USB3. Thatstands a
good chance of running full rate. That won't be inferior. Only AMD motherboards
with A70 or other A-series chipsets, have native USB3. Many AMd motherboards
still rely on a third party USB3 chip, so AMD doesn't support it across the board.
Sticking a USB3 card in the computer, can add USB3 ports. But, the slot in
the computer, has to be PCI Express Revision 2, for the capture to be "full rate".
Lots of computers have PCI Express Revision 1 for their x1 (tiny PCI Express) slots,
and they capture at "half speed". The same thing can happen, evenfor USB3
chips soldered to the motherboard - the PCI Express lane used, can be an inferior
one, and the only time it matters (to date), is with one of theseUSB3 capture
boxes. Only the latest motherboards, have PCI Express revision 2 x1 slots.
And the documentation may make it difficult to determine what you've got.
So hardware bandwidth is an issue with either type of product. In the
case of the PCI Express, MJPEG compression attempts to get the picture
bandwidth down to the point, it'll travel over an x1 lane. In the USB3
box, you may need a good quality USB3 port, to make capture viable.
And that's when attempting to capture at the highest resolution possible.
If you capture at 720p, that may make capturing a bit easier.
Like any capture or tuner device, audio/video sync can be a problem,
which is why, again, you want to read the reviews, to see if the
two remain aligned over a two hour capture.
The DVD recorder concept, because it outputs a DVD directly, makes
a lot of these issues go away, but at the cost of the potential
quality of the output. Using capture devices, is to attempt to do
as good a job as possible. The output step (conversion to DVD format),
is childs play compared to the capture step. You can do that in
a more leisurely fashion.
Paul
