The First 100 Years Are The Hardest

Homebrew PVR - Intermediate Progress With the birth of my daughter Ava last week time is running short... so I've taken the dreaded Windows shortcut till I can get the remaining parts ordered. I purchased a V-Stream USB2800 Xpert DVD Maker video capture card from newegg for $50. It was cheap enough and supported MPEG 2 video with stereo audio encoding (44.1 or 48Khz). I didn't think it would work on Linux (it didn't) but I figured it would be ok on WinXP for capturing some VCDs (320x240) of Ava for the grand parents (it did). Even though the USB2800 technically supports 720x480 mpeg capture, the encoding is done all in software and the USB 2.0 interface significantly restricts the video capture bandwidth (6-8 mb/s variable bitrate (VBR) is required for DVD quality captures). I believe a hardware encoder simliar to the ones used in the Haupguage WinTV 250 PVR cards would produce better quality videos. After several test runs I've determined I'm better ...