Problem with Canopus ADVC100 capture
Tony
video plays fine in the vcr and looks fine while capturing. However, when I play back, there are
missing sections of video and plenty of dropped frames. Why? It isnt my system (Quad Core, 4GB Ram,
SATA striped drives, etc. Also, fiewire out of any digital camcorder is perfect. Something is
happening during the A-D conversion. The only way around it is to capture the uncompressed video to
my Newtek T4 system through the analog mixer. While this works, 2 hours of video uses 130GB of
space.
Does anyone else have this problem with the Canopus?
Tony
Richard Crowley
> For some reason, my Canopus ADVC100 drops a lot of frames
> when I capture analog video to my pc.
Unless your ADVC-100 is broken, this is so unlikely that I would
dismiss it as a real-world possibility and focus my attention on
other possible causes of your symptoms.
> The video plays fine in the vcr
That.s good.
> and looks fine while capturing.
What does that mean? "looks fine" WHERE?
On a TV screen connected to the camcorder?
In a window on your computer screen?
You didn't mention:
What software are you using to capture?
What operating system? Version? SP?
What file format you are saving? AVI?
Whether this EVER worked?
Or if this is a new development?
> However, when I play back, there are
> missing sections of video and plenty of dropped frames.
You didn't mention:
What software are you using to play back?
How long your tests are?
How many are "plenty"?
> Why? It isnt my system (Quad Core, 4GB Ram, SATA striped drives, etc.
Yes, Nice system.
I agree that it seems unlikely that your symptoms are caused
by your computer HARDWARE.
OTOH, I'd bet a nice dinner that the problems are caused
by your computer configuration, software, etc.
You didn't mention:
Anything at all about the software?
What other apps do you have runing at the time?
Networking? (particually wireless networking)
Is this a new problem or did it ever work before?
> Also, fiewire out of any digital camcorder is perfect.
Not sure exactly what that means, or how it relates to your
resenting symptoms? Are you saying that if you capture
by playing back a tape on your camcorder, it captures OK?
What happens if you put the analog video into your cam-
corder, used as a digitizing "pass-through" device?
> Something is happening during the A-D conversion.
You have not presented enough information to convince me
that you can make that statement conclusively.
> The only way around it is to capture the uncompressed video to
> my Newtek T4 system through the analog mixer. While this works,
> 2 hours of video uses 130GB of space.
>
> Does anyone else have this problem with the Canopus?
I don't recall ever seeing a credible complaint about a Canopus
box (including yours, IMHO). It seems likely that Canopus can
ship a faulty unit from time to time, and that may be what your
problem is. But to categorically state that any of the Canopus
boxes is capable of the problems you cite is highly unlikely.
Note that the Canopus boxes use the same chips for D/A and
A/D that are used in many camcorders (perhaps including your
own.)
Smarty
news:sZCdnSAIbslKoz_V...@posted.pcez...
I agree with Richard since I have never seen a Canopus problem in capture
from their ADVC products which ultimately arose from a fault in the
hardware. I've been interacting in these newwsgroups since long before
Canopus brought out any of these products. It is indeed possibly but not at
all likely.
1. You may have a copy-protected analog tape which your VCR properly plays
yet the Canopus rejects due to improperly formed sync pulses, blanking
intervals, or color burst distortions deliberately added to prevent analog
capture.
2. You may have a background program which demands a high priority execution
during the capture, forcing the Canopus to delay and then drop some frames.
3. You may have a bad cable connecting your Canopus, giving it a weak signal
which it can't reliably use for capture.
Smarty
Tony
>"Richard Crowley" <rcro...@xp7rt.net> wrote in message
>news:sZCdnSAIbslKoz_V...@posted.pcez...
>> "Tony" wrote ...
>>> For some reason, my Canopus ADVC100 drops a lot of frames
>>> when I capture analog video to my pc.
>>
>> Unless your ADVC-100 is broken, this is so unlikely that I would
>> dismiss it as a real-world possibility and focus my attention on
>> other possible causes of your symptoms.
>>
>>> The video plays fine in the vcr
>>
>> That.s good.
>>
>>> and looks fine while capturing
>>
>> What does that mean? "looks fine" WHERE?
>> On a TV screen connected to the camcorder?
>> In a window on your computer screen?
I take that back. It freezes on the computer screen. Then it picks up again.
>>
>> You didn't mention:
>> What software are you using to capture?
Speed Edit. Also Win DV
>> What operating system? Version? SP?
XP SP2 ( with tons of services disabled to eliminate overhead.
>> What file format you are saving? AVI?
DV AVI
>> Whether this EVER worked?
It worked sporadically since I have used the ADVC100
>> Or if this is a new development?
Always was a problem
>>
>>> However, when I play back, there are
>>> missing sections of video and plenty of dropped frames.
>>
>> You didn't mention:
>> What software are you using to play back?
Speed Edit. WMP. Anything. Dropped frames are dropped frames.
>> How long your tests are?
Anywhere from 5 minutes to 90 minutes
>> How many are "plenty"?
>>
>>> Why? It isnt my system (Quad Core, 4GB Ram, SATA striped drives, etc.
>>
>> Yes, Nice system.
>> I agree that it seems unlikely that your symptoms are caused
>> by your computer HARDWARE.
>>
>> OTOH, I'd bet a nice dinner that the problems are caused
>> by your computer configuration, software, etc.
Nope. I have my own business that designs and builds workstations for nonlinear editing. Never had a
problem with anyone's computer giving them problems and my firewire video (mini dv and D8) are
always perfect. The only problems are capturing analog video through the ADVC-100.
>>
>> You didn't mention:
>> Anything at all about the software?
What do you want to know? Speed Edit is a great editing program. Runs flawlessly
>> What other apps do you have runing at the time?
Nothing.
>> Networking? (particually wireless networking)
Nope. I even disable the dhcp client by using static ip addresses. No wireless on this machine.
>> Is this a new problem or did it ever work before?
Always was intermittant
>>
>>> Also, fiewire out of any digital camcorder is perfect.
>>
>> Not sure exactly what that means, or how it relates to your
>> resenting symptoms? Are you saying that if you capture
>> by playing back a tape on your camcorder, it captures OK?
Yes
>> What happens if you put the analog video into your cam-
>> corder, used as a digitizing "pass-through" device?
Didnt try that yet.
>>> Something is happening during the A-D conversion.
>>
>> You have not presented enough information to convince me
>> that you can make that statement conclusively.
>>
>>> The only way around it is to capture the uncompressed video to
>>> my Newtek T4 system through the analog mixer. While this works,
>>> 2 hours of video uses 130GB of space.
>>>
>>> Does anyone else have this problem with the Canopus?
>>
>> I don't recall ever seeing a credible complaint about a Canopus
>> box (including yours, IMHO). It seems likely that Canopus can
>> ship a faulty unit from time to time, and that may be what your
>> problem is. But to categorically state that any of the Canopus
>> boxes is capable of the problems you cite is highly unlikely.
>> Note that the Canopus boxes use the same chips for D/A and
>> A/D that are used in many camcorders (perhaps including your
>> own.)
>>
What do you, work for Canopus or something? Why cant it be a Canopus problem? I can tell you this.
Nearly every single analog video I played through this unit has dropped a lot of frames. This past
weekend, I can say that it captured an analog SVHS wedding tape from 1988 without dropped frames.
So, the problem may be that certain tapes can give it a problem. BUT, those same tapes that have
drop out through the canopus play fine when playing on a vcr and watching on a tv. I know that
because I checked a section of the dropped frames by seeing if it was that way on the tape and it
plays fine from vcr to monitor. Something causes it to drop frames through the Canopus while using
the same vcr and cables.
>
>I agree with Richard since I have never seen a Canopus problem in capture
>from their ADVC products which ultimately arose from a fault in the
>hardware. I've been interacting in these newwsgroups since long before
>Canopus brought out any of these products. It is indeed possibly but not at
>all likely.
>
>1. You may have a copy-protected analog tape which your VCR properly plays
>yet the Canopus rejects due to improperly formed sync pulses, blanking
>intervals, or color burst distortions deliberately added to prevent analog
>capture.
All tapes are home videos that have no protection on them. I produced 90% of them.
>
>2. You may have a background program which demands a high priority execution
>during the capture, forcing the Canopus to delay and then drop some frames.
None
>
>3. You may have a bad cable connecting your Canopus, giving it a weak signal
>which it can't reliably use for capture.
I have tons of cables and tried many with similar results.
Richard Crowley
> I take that back. It freezes on the computer screen.
> Then it picks up again.
So using that same (unidentified) software, does it work OK
with other Firewire sources? Does it have the same symptoms
with other Firewire DV capture applications?
You're building a big pile of differential diagnosis experiments
to run here.
> It worked sporadically since I have used the ADVC100
So does the working vs. failing reveal any sort of discernable
pattern? Do certain tapes always work, and others are
problematic?
> Nope. I have my own business that designs and builds
> workstations for nonlinear editing. Never had a problem
> with anyone's computer giving them problems
So what capture hardware have you used successfully on
those other NLE workstations your business has built?
If you had some other product that was working OK,
why did you switch to Canopus ADVC?
> and my firewire video (mini dv and D8) are always
> perfect. The only problems are capturing analog
> video through the ADVC-100.
Differential diagnosis time again. What happens if you
feed known good video into the ADVC box (as from
your miniDV and/or D8 camcorder).
>>> What happens if you put the analog video into your cam-
>>> corder, used as a digitizing "pass-through" device?
>
> Didnt try that yet.
Only you can do the differential diagnosis experiments to
isolate exactly where the problem is.
> What do you, work for Canopus or something?
No. I own a ADVC-100 and have an ADVC-300 at the office.
I paid for mine and my employer paid for theirs. Canopus (or
whoever owns them now) doesn't know I exist.
> Why cant it be a Canopus problem?
Because the Canopus is a very simple piece of hardware.
There is no normal cause of action for it to "drop frames".
It isn't doing anything except taking analog video in and
digitizing it, compressing to DV and shoving the data stream
out the Firewire port. In fact, I think this might all be done
with a single chip.
> I can tell you this. Nearly every single analog video I
> played through this unit has dropped a lot of frames.
By "played through this unit" I am assuming that you mean
through a path that includes the computer hardware and
software. IMHO, you need to do some differential diagnosis
to determine whether you are correct that the ADVC is
really at fault, or whether something is happening in your PC.
In addition to feeding known pristine (digital) video into the
ADVC box, I would try playing your problematic video into
the Canopus and then feed the output into some other device
that accepts Firewire (like perhaps a camcorder, etc.) That
would separate any effect that might be caused by your
computer H/W or S/W.
> This past weekend, I can say that it captured an analog
> SVHS wedding tape from 1988 without dropped frames.
> So, the problem may be that certain tapes can give it a
> problem.
We are assuming that you can tell the difference between
feeding flaky video into the ADVC box (where it can't
get enough good video to digitize) vs. just "dropping frames"
which sounds more like the destination computer "dropping
the ball".
> BUT, those same tapes that have drop out through the
> canopus play fine when playing on a vcr and watching
> on a tv. I know that because I checked a section of the
> dropped frames by seeing if it was that way on the tape
> and it plays fine from vcr to monitor. Something causes
> it to drop frames through the Canopus while using the
> same vcr and cables.
If you have as much experience with NLE as you claim,
then you should know that this is a notoriously misleading
way to judge the integrity of the video. TV screens are
VERY forgiving of timebase errors, dropouts, etc. You
must look at the video signal on an oscilloscope or wave-
form monitor to see how "flaky" it is.
Lacking that, you can do some of the differential diagnosis
experiments to determine exactly where the problem is.
Just because so many people have old flaky tapes to digitize,
Canopus produced a version (ADVC-300) with a time-
base correction (TBC) and dropout compensation (DOC)
functionality built in.
Now that we have a few more details, it is begining to sound
like you are trying to digitize some rather flaky video.
You have a whole bunch of differential diagnosis experiments
to run. I didn't mention them all, but if you build NLE systems,
then you should have this debugging technique as part of your
toolkit already.
Noob
> like you are trying to digitize some rather flaky video.
>
> You have a whole bunch of differential diagnosis experiments
> to run. I didn't mention them all, but if you build NLE systems,
> then you should have this debugging technique as part of your
> toolkit already.
>
As I may have already stated, I share Richard's skepticism regarding the
Canopus being at fault, although it is certainly possible. My suggestion
would be to find another VHS playback deck and repeat your tests, since the
player you are using may have some systemic problem which impacts all the
tapes, causing marginal compliance with NTSC, thus resulting in dropped
frames. If you have another deck to try, this may help you further isolate
the problem.
Smarty