Mini DV

[nvening]

I used to used to use a mini dv video camera untill it got broken, i had never put the tapes onto my pc but i would like to do it now. Is there a mini dv tape reader (usb). Or, do i have to use a mini dv camera?

[Taz]

You'll be better off buying a new camcorder - I don't know of any DV tape readers on their own. You can get DV recorders that will play back a DV tape that can be read in but these usually cost more than a new camcorder (eg. Sony Digital Video Walkman)! Just remember to get one with DV out (which they all should be).

You'll then need a Firewire card/port (IEE1394) in your PC (if it doesn't already have one) and a Firewire cable as most camcorders do not come with an IEEE1394 cable. You can usually pick these up very cheap from E-Bay.

Finally, you'll need some capture software - there are lots of options here but a good alround suite for capture and editting is Pinnacle Studio.

Your other option is to send off your tapes to a conversion studio (plenty of ads in the back of video/camcorder magazines) who will record them onto DVD for you - this will usually be much cheaper than buying all the kit to do it yourself but you do not get any privacy when using this option! You could also borrow/hire a camcorder off someone but you'll still need the rest of the kit I mentioned, plus lots of time.

By the way, USB capture cards are usually very poor quality and only suitable for 320 or 640 video that you want to display on screen and not write to DVD. Also, they usually only have analogue inputs so you would need to convert your mini-DV source to analogue first. In my opinion, these are simply not worth it if you're after high quality video.

Hope that helps.

Taz

[nvening]

well i will be getting a usb capture Pinnacle thing which is good, mabe with dv as that costs more (i want this for copying old vhs). I suppose i will borrow a camera. how much do the companys charge for say an hour, and do they do it from vhs as well?

[nvening]

and why do all cameras use firewire and not usb 2.0? firewire 400 is not as fast as usb 2.0. are all the cameras firewire 800?

[Taz]

I'm not sure of the rate per hour, I think they charge by the tape. I remember I had to get three Hi-8 tapes recovered many years for a wedding I was filming (!) - my camcorder had developed a mechanical fault during the filming. The company I sent it to charged around £80 in total to recover three 90-minute Hi-8 tapes to VHS for me. That included all postage costs as well. As I said, that was many years ago so not sure of current costs - your best bet is to pick up a video/camcorder magazine from a newsgents and check out the ads.

Firewire was around before USB 2.0. It's also the capture interface that Macs use. Macs are used for video/photo work far more than PC's so I guess all the hardware manufacturers used Firewire ports on their camcorders. You'll also find that most video capture and editting software looks for devices on the Firewire port by default and, if you're using Windows XP, then your devices will be set up automatically when you connect them via Firewire. In addition, when using Firewire, you have control over your camcorder (i.e. you can stop it, rewind it, fast forward it, etc.) using your capture software (eg. Pinnacle Studio).

My current camcorder (Canon MVX250i) actually has both Firewire and USB 2.0. The Firewire is used for the video tape transfer and the USB 2.0 is used for the still umage transfer (it can take still pictures and stores these onto an SD card). As for transferring older analogue signals, some camcorders have a built-in A-D convertor. You can 'play' an analogue signal into the camcorder and it will convert it to digital using a built-in A-D convertor and out the digital signal via the IEE1394 port. Like you, I transferred many old VHS tapes this way.

It's unlikely that many camcorders are Firewire 2 at the moment. You'll find that standard Firewire is more than enough for most purposes. There's not much of a difference between USB 2.0 and Firewire in the real world in terms of speed.

[nvening]

If i get the pinnacle moviebox, that costs abt £115, but there is also a dv version with firewire connectivity, what would that do? Just turn the dv video into mpeg2? And does that mean that it is not usb 2.0 its firewire? (im getting this from computer shopper)

[Taz]

You're right. There are now two versions of Pinnacle Moviebox: a USB version and a DV version. Both are A-D convertors and will convert an analogue signal into digital. However, you should appreciate a big difference between the two: the USB version converts your analogue source into MPEG-2 only. The DV (Firewire) version converts to MPEG-2 or DV. MPEG-2 is already compressed and of lower quality than DV. By capturing to DV you have more options to write back out to a DV tape at full quality and much better editting capabilities.

I personally would get an IEEE1394 card for your PC/laptop (shouldn't cost more than £15 inluding cables for a 2-3 port card) and capture at full DV quality. Of course, you'll need a big hard disk for full DV capture as this format is not compressed. MPEG-2 capture will be smaller and lower quality.

[nvening]

Well i will want to burn on to dvd so mpeg2 is fine for me. So if i wanted to put my old dv films onto my pc i will just need a camera and a lead? If i wanted to turn that dv film into mpeg2 after it would be done by software which would not be as good. If i wanted to plug my dv camera into the moviebox and use the hardware mpeg2 compression do i need the dv version then?

[Taz]

If you just wanted to convert a DV or analogue source into MPEG-2 then you can get the USB version of the Pinnacle Moviebox. You will obviously need a camera to supply the DV signal from your old tapes and possibly a lead but you may get one in the Moviebox kit. You wil only need the DV version if you want to capture in both MPEG-2 and DV format.

I would check the Pinnacle Systems home page for what you get with the kit and to make sure that it will do exactly what you want it to do. I use Pinnacle Studio software but not the Moviebox, I just use Firewire for transfer although I do have a third-party USB capture card which I rarely use since the camcorder does A-D anyway.

[nvening]

so is s-video best and is there an s-video to s-vedio lead then?

[Taz]

Component video or RGB is usually the best way of sending video information. S-Video is next best, followed by composite video. You're unlikely to get component video inputs/outputs on most A/V equipment unless you go mid- to high-end.

A Google search found this useful site for explaining the differences:

http://www.projectorcentral.com/component.htm