Analog video capture

[JD]

On 05/20/11 18:11, Kevin J. Cummings wrote:
> On 05/20/2011 07:56 PM, JD wrote:
>> On 05/20/11 16:43, Dennis Kaptain wrote:
>>> I want to convert my analog VCR tapes and analog Camcorder video to digital
>>> I plan on purchasing a BT878 card as below.
>>> http://cgi.ebay.com/PixelView-PV-BT878P-REV-10B-TV-TUNER-/260776721005?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3cb780fa6d
>> I do not have experience with this card.
>> I do have experience with an ATI Radeon PCI card
>> which had a TV tuner. The input to the card was via
>> a little box you could hold in the palm of your hand,
>> and it converted the coax cable signal to an audio/video
>> composite, which I plugged into the card's  composite
>> input port.
>> But I can tell you it is a CPU killer to do conversion
>> to digital on demand, and will quickly fill up many
>> gigabytes per movie - like 8 to 12 GB.
> You are looking at the wrong thing.  Look for a Hauppague PVR-350 (or a
> 150, 250, or 500).  They have hardware MPEG (MP2) encoders on them and
> produce .mpg files for you.  They support input from both f-connector
> (via the analog tuner) and composite video (yellow RCA plug).  Your CPU
> spends little time on the encoding because the board is doing all the
> work.  The problem here is you won't find them retail anymore because of
> the big Digital conversion that just happened.  You might be able to
> find them on E-Bay though.  I have one in my server.  They use the IVTV
> driver in the Linux Kernel so they are supported natively.  They used to
> be the cards of choice in the US of A for MythTV back in the days before
> ATSC.  There are also a slew of ATSC capture cards that also do analog
> capture (but you need to read the fine print for their Linux support).
>
>
What do you think of this hauppague gizmo?

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=4146200

I have lot's of 8mm video tapes (which I can still play through the camera),
and old fashioned VHS tapes which I can play through the VCR tape player.
These I have relegated to the bin because we have a digital pvr hooked 
to the
TV set and is built-in to the Uverse service.