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Introduction to Video Capture for Dummies
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* This page lists an overview of information to get video into your Windows computer.
* What this page is NOT about: ScreenCasting, and Watching/pausing digital TV shows on your computer.
* Similar pages on this website: Video Cables.
* At the moment I'm focusing on Windows7, but I have a feeling Ubuntu Linux would be better suited for this process.
* Ensure the survival of this page by leaving feedback!
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Tools People Use To Capture Video
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* Common video sources to record from: DVD Player, BluRay Player, VHS Player, Camcorder, Security Camera, Web Cam, PS3 Eye Web Cam, Cable TV, Satellite TV.
* Security Camera Capture Card.
* Internal TV Tuner Card.
* External TV Tuner Card.
* Information Transfer Accessories: Memory Card such as MicroSD, USB2 ThumbDrive.
* Common cables: DVI, HDMI, USB2, Firewire, Composite, Component, S-Video.
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Terms/Lingo
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* FPS: Frames Per Second. Video is made of lots of still images, called frames. Like ancient projectors.
* GB & MB: GB is Gigabyte. It's a size standard. A new computer holds about 200GB to 500GB. A movie DVD is about 4 to 8 GB. An MP3 song, is about 2MB which means 2 Megabytes. There are about 1000 Megabytes in a Gigabyte. So 2GB = 2000MB. 500MB = 1000GB.
* MP: MP is MegaPixel. A good digital camera photo ranges from 7 to 12 megapixels. A cell phone camera is often half a megapixel. Video recordings are often far lower quality than camera photos.
* The “i” and “p” in 1080i or 1080p:
* 16:9: “Sixteen by Nine” means the image is very wide, as in WideScreen tv's.
* SD/SDHC: SD is a memory card. SDHC means it stores far more information.
* HDMI/AV: HDMI is a high quality video cable. AV means AudioVideo, referring to low quality cables.
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Free Video Capture Software
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* Thanks to thefreecountry.com for this listing: Virtualdub, VirtualVCR, CaptureFlux, Debut Video Capture Software, Broadcaster StudioPRO, Video Caster, Video DVD Maker, Exsate DV Capture Live, and quite possibly more.
* WinDV (simple tiny capture tool).
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Cautions, Problems and Error Messages
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My Personal Frustrations
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* “The current video capture format is not compatible with avi files.” - VirtualDub 1.9.8
* My ATI video card came with Video-In, but the video-in drivers seem quite unstable. My next card will not be ATI.
* All your devices are detected as PAL instead of NTSC. This is my current problem. Turned out that my Hauppauge USB Gadget was not meant to be used with Skype.
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Internet Resources
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(To view the site address, hover your mouse over the link, and look at your browser's status bar.)
* thefreecountry.com graciously lists free video capture software.
* thefreecountry.com lists free video editing software.
* Wikipedia on Video Capture.
* moviecodec.com Codec Downloads & Forum.
* Unrelated, Microsoft talks about watching live tv on your pc.
* Wikipedia List of Video Playing Software aka Media Players.
* Wikipedia List of Video Codecs!
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Manufacturers of Video Capture Devices
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* Hauppauge.com:
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