Recording Hardware

I was hoping to find some information or recommendations on some hardware for recording games. I specifically want to use component not composite video for HD recording. I know of Dazzle and some other highly expensive hardware/software but does anyone have something they use or have used that is somewhat inexpensive and user friendly?

 

Dazzle is about 30-50 greenbacks, that's considered expensive in your budget?

I think dazzle was the cheapest of this type of thing that I had found.

 

Also try S-Video unless you REALLY want the component/widescreen recordings.

I do an S-Video recording of a 16:9 (squished to 4:3) and resize with virtualDUB.

 

I cant find Dazzle with component cable support. Just Svideo. I don't want to get the Svideo cable for xbox. I did really want to record via widescreen and get that nice quality.

I dont want to drop from 720p to 480i. Ugly.


<s>I am currently considering this.
http://www.x2vga.com/product</s> Lame

What I really want is a PC card. I have found one but its not in stock anymore.

I just found this but I would rather not drop $250 but it is nice.

http://www.hauppauge.com/site/products/data_hdpvr.html


...ok this one seems really awesome, but I am unclear if it will pick up the signal from my TV. I also would need to get a 25ft component cable, which is like 50$ i think or more.

http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/videorecorder/

any input on the two listed here?

 

Make sure you have the computer to support HD capture. 720p files eat disk space and resources FAST.

If you really want the HD quality, prepare to spend some money. The cheapest solutions often bring the most headaches. Think about what you want to do with stunning quality replays. HD makes sense if you're making an art project, otherwise you just need to want it really bad. And that's totally OK, of course.

The Hauppauge box does look awesome. It should do the processing grunt work and save your PC the hassle. Also looks like you can monitor your recordings as it has video out. Make sure you can transfer compressed files off of it, though.

 

If your gonna get a good capture device, you have to be willing to spend a lot of monies.

Also you should start of small, with SD capture, get a DVD recorder or a reasonable good capture device that's not too expensive.

SD can look really good if you know how, or make the effort.

 

Right-click and save-as to see what I get from S-Video and encoding through virtualDUB.

 

That is very nice. My main concern is the fact that I run my current game on 720p (1080p maybe but i cant recall, i know ps3 supported that) on a 42inch. With S video you have to drop to 480 right?

Whats your current set up and how does it look?

 

Here (scroll down for the full size download) is what I get via S-Video. Don't forget Auvii that there is no real support for HD video on video sharing platforms (there is only one that really works: Vimeo HD).

 

Current set-up is a SONY 32 (36?) inch WEGA SDTV. Just does 480i. Someday I'll get the SONY 52w4100.

I don't see any connection with what I'm playing on vs. my saved and encoded replays, though. Once I have the 52w4100, I'll still save my replays the same way - into my DVR with S-Video (480i or maybe 480p - I forget). If I want HD replays, I'll just leave the game replay files on my 360 or PS3. Since replay management sucks for 360, I'll probably delete them anyway.

 

If my computer's HDD didn't die I'd show you want I got from 480p videos, but check my sig for Youtube videos.

All my videos except for the first 4 or 5 on my Youtube page were in 480p captured with VirtualDub. And they looked awesome.

Here's what video looked like on my SD capture card.
http://files.filefront.com/HindSightwmv/;10477022;/fileinfo.html

But because I was able to understand how to make 480p footage almost as good as HD res videos, it made my HD videos even better.

This is a 30fps highly compressed WMV
http://rapidshare.com/files/151552365/Part_of_Infinite_Undiscovery_Intro.wmv

And this is a VF5 match video at maximum quality. 60fps.
http://files.filefront.com/BK+Wolf+vs+Hatim+Lau2mp4/;12022584;/fileinfo.html

I honestly don't think you should go with HD unless your a 720p/1080p freak and have a lot of money to spend on getting a computer and the capture equipment to do it.

In my opinion, start small use SD (but get a good SD card, there are plently of good ones that'll do proper good quality 480p footage), then when you get better, move on to HD.

 

See this is where my problem is. I will be taking a native resolution at 1080p and bringing it down to 480i/p. This will look horrible on my TV /forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/frown.gif

 

I don't understand why you want to watch encoded/compressed vids on your HDTV? If you HAVE to record and watch on an HDTV, just get an HD-DVR or BluRay recorder.

Actually, why not just keep the original replays and watch them through the game? They look great and take up almost zero disk space.

 

Maybe I am misunderstanding something....I want to set up youtube replays like many have as well as you yourself do. I assumed I need to record the live video then upload the files on youtube. What am I missing here?

Am I able to use my svideo output for recording? I have assumed that if I am using the component IN then I must use the same format out, thus my reasoning for recording in HD. Originally I wanted HD quality but after seeing the vids posted I don't mind. The main goal is that I want to play using my current resolution and record. If it has to downconvert the resolution, cool, i just dont want to lose my current quality while playing.

And yeah I could get a DVR but I want to have all the files go straight to PC. I mean worst case scenario that is the route I would take.

side note: Never thought to check the Help section. Many questions i have asked are posted already. My apologies for redundancy.

 

Ahh - OK.

If you want to record matches as they are happening, you need to run video/audio cables from your 360 through a capture device and out to a TV (so you can watch/play while you record). To see a high quality picture on your HDTV, you would need a capture device with component, or HDMI, in and out. That Haupauge box looks like it will do this. I have no experience with live match recording other than to say: it could work fine or cause input and display lag.

I do not record live matches.

I play on XBL and if I like a particular fight, I'll save the replay in-game and then record to a DVR later. I have two 360 cables, one is component for output to TV (because even SDTV looks better color-wise with component), the other is S-Video/composite audio for output to my DVR. When it's time to record, I just swap the cable in the back of my 360, change the 360 output to 16:9, and record the horizontally squished picture onto the DVD-RW disc. The disc then goes into my PC for re-sizing (stretching) and encoding the vids. I did this on purpose as I don't want to carry my 360 back to the computer room and plug it in to my PC. I just want to carry a DVD-RW disc.


Pros:

The DVR that I have was $85 bucks on Ebay and it includes a digital TV tuner. I bought it to replace a broken VCR and to make VF replay creation easier (no more plugging consoles into a DV cam).

The 360 S-Video cable was around $20.

Compression on the fly could take processing power and my PC is 4 or 5 years old.

Don't have to plug a console into my PC.


Cons:

Have to use software on my old PC to compress the vids (virtualDUB does make this pretty easy, though). It's an extra step vs. using a capture device that also encodes/compresses.