Micomsoft SC-500N1 RGB Capture Card

[TechReverso]

Links not working.

http://support.advantech.com.tw/Support ... e=Download
Forgot html for a second, lol.

What you need to do is download the software, then take out your internet so micr o soft's propriety driver seeker can't get to your card, go to uninstall software programs, then uninstall both or if there's just one of sa7160 microsoft and-or startech driver seekers or driver managers, then go to device manager, make sure your internet is disconnected again, go to games music multimedia category, uninstall the previous sa7160 drivers in their entirety by right clicking uninstall drivers on the device, and then restart your pc.

Upon restarting your pc, install the new avantech drivers, then wait for it to tell you to restart, you should click restart. it'll take you back to the software installer, click ok, then manually restart your pc, and visit gamekeeper and task manager, cpu-z, gpu-z, and msi afterburner to see what's up.

You will be really happy, I just turned on the gamecube with my s-video (yes I've got it working via hd game box).

I'm on windows 8.1 pro 64bit btw.

For more specific info, I'm running video keeper 1.1.0.108.0 which is odd, as its pack-in driver was the one causing problems, eh?

Could be the combination of that version, plus the avantech drivers, video game keeper is hovering around 0.5-0.6% usage, so is 'system'.

I can confirm for me, exiting drops cpu usage from 1% to 0.

I'm going to test OBS, will report in a few minutes --- OBS WORKS LIKE A CHAMP! 26% TO 31% CPU USAGE.

Welp, congrats people, it seems I joined this website to solved this problem as if it was an act of the heavens.

[blizzz]

Which driver version is this? Should be shown in the driver settings or the Windows device manager.

[TechReverso]

Which driver version is this? Should be shown in the driver settings or the Windows device manager.

Driver 1.1.0.127 Advantech Cl., LTD., otherwise known as SA7160-DriverInstall_v3.3.1.7.exe.

Driver Release Date: 2014-03-05 WAY (VERY NEW, MORE NEW for you folks using google translate) NEWER THAN MICOMSOFT'S DRIVERS, by like two years, just follow the method i described, to the last drop.

Located here:

What you need to do is download the software, then take out your internet so micr o soft's propriety driver seeker can't get to your card, go to uninstall software programs, then uninstall both or if there's just one of sa7160 microsoft and-or startech driver seekers or driver managers, then go to device manager, make sure your internet is disconnected again, go to games music multimedia category, uninstall the previous sa7160 drivers in their entirety by right clicking uninstall drivers on the device, and then restart your pc.

Upon restarting your pc, install the new avantech drivers, then wait for it to tell you to restart, you should click restart. it'll take you back to the software installer, click ok, then manually restart your pc, and visit gamekeeper and task manager, cpu-z, gpu-z, and msi afterburner to see what's up.

You will be really happy, I just turned on the gamecube with my s-video (yes I've got it working via hd game box).

I'm on windows 8.1 pro 64bit btw.

For more specific info, I'm running video keeper 1.1.0.108.0 which is odd, as its pack-in driver was the one causing problems, eh?

Could be the combination of that version, plus the avantech drivers, video game keeper is hovering around 0.5-0.6% usage, so is 'system'.

I can confirm for me, exiting drops cpu usage from 1% to 0.

I'm going to test OBS, will report in a few minutes --- OBS WORKS LIKE A CHAMP! 26% TO 31% CPU USAGE.

Welp, congrats people, it seems I joined this website to solved this problem as if it was an act of the heavens.

http://support.advantech.com.tw/Support ... e=Download

Gotta love Taiwan, quality pcbs, decent software, quality programming, and relief.

I'll make a clearer guide later today.

FIX FOR CPU 100% LOAD PEXHDCAP Micomsoft SC-500N1 Capture Card x64 64bit architechture PCs

You can try 32-bit users, and report back 'PLS'

1. Download SA7160-DriverInstall_v3.3.1.7.exe from here: http://support.advantech.com.tw/Support ... e=Download

2. Disconnect internet cable or turn off wifi, just disconnect your computer from the internet to block Mikrosoft's WIN 8 automatic driver seeker.

3. Go to control panel, click 'add remove programs' or 'Uninstall a program', then look for Startech, SA7160, Microsoft Driver Seeker and Driver Manager, PEXHDCAP Driver Seeker and Driver Manager, as well as Yuan SC-500N1, uninstall any of these because they are synomymous. You can keep Gamekeeper, but make sure it's version 1.1.0.108.0 as this is the one I tested my method with.

4. Next, go to Hardware and Sound in the control panel, then go to Device manager there, in the column you will find the category of ''Sound, Video and Game controllers'', there you will see either SA7160, Startech, PEXHDCAP, YUAN SA7160 or SC-500N1, MICOMSOFT SC-500N1 or any of the variation... You will have to right-click the device and 'uninstall drivers', then you will be given a prompt to delete drivers, select 'YES'. right-click 'delete drivers'.

5. Once you have uninstalled the bad drivers, you willl have to RESTART THE PC for the changes to take full-effect.

6. Upon rebooting Windows 8.1 , you will take the driver from instruction 1. ( SA7160-DriverInstall_v3.3.1.7.exe ), and subsequently assure the function of the new driver by opening up the properties of the exe, then clicking the box for Windows 7 compatibility, and administrator mode.

7. After you have sucessfully installed SA7160-DriverInstall_v3.3.1.7.exe, RESTART THE DAMN PC, I can't stress this enough as too many people are tempted to play around with the drivers before a reboot, DON'T!

8. Upon rebooting the PC, right-click gamekeeper.exe, modify its properties click compatibility mode and check WINDOWS XP SERVICE PACK 3, and administrator mode.

9. You should now take a look at the task manager, problem solved. You will also be able to cast flawlessly on OBS as an added bonus, and capture offline as well, it's a better Amarec to be honest (they're very similar, too similar), but OBS works on 64-bit. It still need a lot of work though. XSplit I've never tried.

In conclusion, this looks like it was another case of shoddy programming, and not the hardware's fault, it's amazing how much we're seeing this now, before it used to be the reverse!

Aside: The Black Magic Intensity Pro also has this issue: http://forums.creativecow.net/thread/124/877594 http://forum.blackmagicdesign.com/viewt ... 12&t=14476 Good thing I never got that product, as it seems its consumers still lack a fix.


Notes: Upon further research of this International Taiwanese company 'Advantech' I noticed that it was international technology firm with over 5000 employees worldwide, and that the founder was world famous physicist T. Brody, the inventor of Active Matrix Thin-Film Transistor display technology, having produced the world's first Active Matrix Liquid Crystal Display (AM-LCD) in 1972 and the first functional AM-EL (electroluminescent display) in 1973 while employed by Westinghouse Electric Corporation in Pittsburgh. Brody coined the term "active matrix" and first used it in a published journal article in 1975.

It's no surprise his employees are so efficient as he used to preach accountability for his works, and that ethic has translated well to his employees, this is not a simple little company like Micomsoft, or Startech. They also look after their customer, and I think they decided it was high-time someone added their last bit of code to make this product suitable for release.

Advantech Corporation, or Advantech Co., Ltd, is a Taiwanese company with direct operations in 23 different countries and employs over 5,000 employees. Wikipedia
Stock price: 2395 (TPE) NT$233.00 -8.00 (-3.32%)
Sep 12, 1:30 PM GMT+8 - Disclaimer
Headquarters: Taipei, Taiwan
Founder: T. Peter Brody
Founded: 1983

[blizzz]

*sigh* I wish I had found this out earlier...

The way I took HD screenshots was:
1. Connect console into SC-500N1 in 720p
2. Capture as Lagarith video
3. Open in VirtualDub, use 'alias format' filter to force Rec. 709 colors
4. Pick a frame that looks good and copy it to Photoshop and save it (or perform a batch task on all screenshots)

Turns out that the 'alias format' filter in vdub doesn't do its job. When you open a HD video and force 709 colors it messes up the bright greens. To open HD Lagarith videos in vdub you have to use the ColorMatrix plugin in AviSynth and use 'ColorMatrix(mode="Rec.709->Rec.601")'.

RGB test pattern: https://blz.la/rgb/img/2014/range_testpattern.png
Captured with the SC-500N1 and open in vdub with alias filter, ColorMatrix (source was a PC with Radeon GPU in 4:4:4 full range RGB mode)

I had noticed this with other cards as well, but until now I thought that it's just a capture problem with bright greens. Might have to redo some screenshots now :/

[BuckoA51]

2. Disconnect internet cable or turn off wifi, just disconnect your computer from the internet to block Mikrosoft's WIN 8 automatic driver seeker.

Somehow I doubt this card is in Microsoft's driver database

Okay just tried this and it seems to work well. Step 2 is not needed as I suspected, also when you come to remove the card in step 4, you need to uninstall it and make sure you select "delete drivers".

On a related note, has anyone got X264 capture to work in Amarec? No matter what I install it always says I don't have X264 codecs installed when I come to choose codecs in Amarec itself.

[Thrill]

That fix must be Windows 8 only (or W8 handles CPU settings differently to W7 which is why it appears to work).

Does this only work for OBS and 108 VideoKeeper? If it does it's pretty useless. In no way is OBS "a better Amarec". OBS is for streaming and nothing else and thus falls far behind Amarec.

[BuckoA51]

You've tried it on Windows 7 and it doesn't work?!

I only use Amarec, it works just fine here, though I've only tried HDMI/720p captures so far as my direct 240p capture isn't hooked up at the moment

[TechReverso]

2. Disconnect internet cable or turn off wifi, just disconnect your computer from the internet to block Mikrosoft's WIN 8 automatic driver seeker.

Somehow I doubt this card is in Microsoft's driver database

Okay just tried this and it seems to work well. Step 2 is not needed as I suspected, also when you come to remove the card in step 4, you need to uninstall it and make sure you select "delete drivers".

On a related note, has anyone got X264 capture to work in Amarec? No matter what I install it always says I don't have X264 codecs installed when I come to choose codecs in Amarec itself.

Glad I could help you Buckeh!
Windows 8 Driver seekers works for my setup, when it seeks, it renames the card to PEXHDCAP, and uses the lastest Startech drivers, creepy.

Yep, you're right, I somehow remembered it as right-click 'uninstall drivers' instead of 'delete drivers', also don't 'remove device', just uninstall drivers, and you will be given a prompt to delete drivers, select 'YES'.

That fix must be Windows 8 only (or W8 handles CPU settings differently to W7 which is why it appears to work).

Does this only work for OBS and 108 VideoKeeper? If it does it's pretty useless. In no way is OBS "a better Amarec". OBS is for streaming and nothing else and thus falls far behind Amarec.

Have you tried it on Windows 7? If so please state your architecture and your win7 version, as well as the CPU pls.

For me, amarec appears to be good, but I like OBS more, probably because I used it as my first platform, and it's really straightforward.

Also, you can now capture uncompressed offline now, similar to amarec, but instead of having two seperate programs a + aLive, OBS is an all-in-one that is getting better as the months pass.

You can chose, as Bucko said, Amarec works fine, but I just let you know my setup, and what programs I use prominently, it's up to you guys to experiment and report back.

I'm not an advocate of upgrading OSes, but Win8.1 has proven good for my i7-975, after hearing the doom of 8 though, I was scared. So I said, because I stream, and capture, I'm going to need every frame I can get, and supposedly win 8.1 gives you 2-3 extra frames, but this is still in the margin of error 2%.

I wonder what open-source OSes hold.

[BuckoA51]

Windows 8 Driver seekers works for my setup, when it seeks, it renames the card to PEXHDCAP, and uses the lastest Startech drivers, creepy.

I've known Windows do that if there are some leftover drivers from another installation, though in that case disconnecting from the internet would not have cured that, so, strange!

I'm not an advocate of upgrading OSes, but Win8.1 has proven good for my i7-975, after hearing the doom of 8 though, I was scared. So I said, because I stream, and capture, I'm going to need every frame I can get, and supposedly win 8.1 gives you 2-3 extra frames, but this is still in the margin of error 2%.

Windows 8 is perfectly fine, the only real disadvantage is they removed the "disable desktop composition" option which can help to keep input lag down if you play on the same machine you record/stream with.

[TechReverso]

Windows 8 Driver seekers works for my setup, when it seeks, it renames the card to PEXHDCAP, and uses the lastest Startech drivers, creepy.

I've known Windows do that if there are some leftover drivers from another installation, though in that case disconnecting from the internet would not have cured that, so, strange!

Yeah, Star tech's drivers are out to get me.

I'm not an advocate of upgrading OSes, but Win8.1 has proven good for my i7-975, after hearing the doom of 8 though, I was scared. So I said, because I stream, and capture, I'm going to need every frame I can get, and supposedly win 8.1 gives you 2-3 extra frames, but this is still in the margin of error 2%.

Windows 8 is perfectly fine, the only real disadvantage is they removed the "disable desktop composition" option which can help to keep input lag down if you play on the same machine you record/stream with.

Some people around the interwebs decide to just kill explorer.exe and restart it.

[BuckoA51]

Yes I believe there is a workaround not sure if it is as simple as just killing Explorer.exe.

[blizzz]

Tried it on Win 7 Pro x64 on a H67 chipset. I still get 100% load when I activate the card with the Advantech driver. Also Amarec crashed when I tried to close it the first time I used the new driver. I'll stick with the old 108 driver.

[BuckoA51]

Did you remember to completely reset the power saving settings after you installed the new driver?

[blizzz]

Yes, I did everything. But I'll stay with the old driver anyway, because I find that it has slightly better picture quality.

Captured from the Framemeister.
Old driver: 800% zoom
New driver: 800% zoom

[BuckoA51]

I will boot into 7 sometime over the next few days and see if it works for me.

What I don't understand about the old driver is that it sometimes just activates the 100% CPU thing even when I've not been using Amarec. This definitely wastes power, plus if our breakers go the UPS can't hold the PC on since it's draining so much electricity.

[TechReverso]

I will boot into 7 sometime over the next few days and see if it works for me.

What I don't understand about the old driver is that it sometimes just activates the 100% CPU thing even when I've not been using Amarec. This definitely wastes power, plus if our breakers go the UPS can't hold the PC on since it's draining so much electricity.

Cool, looking forward to your experience, if it is solely a W8.1 fix, that's good for those who upgraded.

The thing is, the consumer build of this product, I wonder what OS they were using when they slapped it together, and probably not extensive testing outside of their hardware.

Tried it on Win 7 Pro x64 on a H67 chipset. I still get 100% load when I activate the card with the Advantech driver. Also Amarec crashed when I tried to close it the first time I used the new driver. I'll stick with the old 108 driver.

Yes, I did everything. But I'll stay with the old driver anyway, because I find that it has slightly better picture quality.

Captured from the Framemeister.
Old driver: 800% zoom
New driver: 800% zoom

Nothing is unsurmountable with optimization my boy, yours could be due to incompatibility, or you need to try different settings because this is an update from another company, so settings should be optimized differently! Could be a Win 8-8.1 fix, I like this update better, no stress on pc, does what I want to, and I never had settings that I would swear to, I can changed them at the drop of the hat to suit the update.

[Thrill]

Have you tried it on Windows 7? If so please state your architecture and your win7 version, as well as the CPU pls.

Same as blizzz really but P67. I've tried to look at a permanent fix for over a year now and tried virtually everything you could think of. It just doesn't work with W7.

Also how are you getting uncompressed 4:2:2 from OBS? I guess you just use custom x264 encoding settings with --crf 0 and --output-csp-i422?

[TechReverso]

Have you tried it on Windows 7? If so please state your architecture and your win7 version, as well as the CPU pls.

Same as blizzz really but P67. I've tried to look at a permanent fix for over a year now and tried virtually everything you could think of. It just doesn't work with W7.

Also how are you getting uncompressed 4:2:2 from OBS? I guess you just use custom x264 encoding settings with --crf 0 and --output-csp-i422?

Darn, hopefully the Linux users start getting a move on. http://www.spinics.net/lists/linux-media/msg68054.html

For the time being, you can use it as a cam source: http://m.blog.csdn.net/blog/hjwang1/18362267

Yes, I meant 'lossless' x264, select the lossless option when going into the right-click video game capture properties. But more and more people are demanding 'local uncompressed' instead of x264, however OBS was at first stating it would require a more demanding IO specs.

But it's coming, many people are asking.

https://obsproject.com/forum/threads/ou ... ord.13536/

Some people have a slider to 10 for lossless x264, for me I just select lossless x264.

Found another two versions of our beloved card

【Xengda | 勝吉達】XH4001-HDMI高清影像擷取卡(SA7160) : http://www.pcstore.com.tw/xengda/M17823488.htm
http://translate.google.ca/translate?hl ... 26hs%3Dh2q

1080p PCIe Video Grabber Video Capture Card : http://katocctv.en.alibaba.com/product/ ... _Card.html

Will look around for more drivers!

They seem to be based off the 'M' chip on the PCB, some have RF, some have x4 HDMI, but they all remain SA7160.

To be clear, this card is a *raw* capture card. It does not have any
hardware compression for H.264. It's done entirely in software.

Aside from the mstar video decoder (for which there is no public
documentation), you would also need a driver for the saa7160 chip,
which there have been various half-baked drivers floating around but
nothing upstream, and none of them currently support HD capture
(AFAIK).

As always, a driver *can* be written, but it would be a rather large
project (probably several weeks of an engineer working full time on
it, assuming the engineer has experience in this area). In this case
it's worse because a significant amount of reverse engineering would
be required.

Too true.

[Thrill]

Don't get your hopes up. The Kato vision drivers are from 2011 when I contacted them some months ago asking for drivers.

[TechReverso]

Don't get your hopes up. The Kato vision drivers are from 2011 when I contacted them some months ago asking for drivers.

Ahh so basically inadequate, have you tried using the card as a camera source on linux? http://m.blog.csdn.net/blog/hjwang1/18362267

OMG http://www.xengda.com.tw/Download.html OFFERS FREEE CAPTURE SOFTWARES!! FREEEEEEEEE!

http://www.xengda.com.tw/MCS.html

Does not European languages however.

[Thrill]

I have no interest in Linux, sorry.

I do wonder if it's worth posting on the MS forums as this guy had the issue: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/wind ... 80e?page=1

[TechReverso]

I have no interest in Linux, sorry.

I do wonder if it's worth posting on the MS forums as this guy had the issue: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/wind ... 80e?page=1

In the conclusion, the guy with the Japanese characters as his userid suspected that it was his capture card, and did not develop his topic further. He may have quickly traded his capture card for for the latest version of the frame meister, just like many have done as they were fed up tinkering about with this card.

This 100% CPU usage is also present with the Black Magic Intensity Pro on certain mobo chipsets, and cpus. It has yet to be cured, luckily for us there is a workaround.

In this thread, some people, to discover what was causing their 100% CPU usage, suggested Process Explorer, some just used the Task Manager, all conclusions lead to the card, most likely than not, now that we know... It's the programming of the firmware.

If enough people skilled in programming can pool together, and code a firmware for the SA7160 which permits it to run on a positive note with win7 eliminating the 100% usage, it would be great.


For now, the new solution being Windows 8.1 and the advant firmware update submitted a few posts ago.

[BuckoA51]

had another instance of the PC go to 100% CPU usage until I went in and changed the power settings again. So either this fix isn't 100% under Windows 8 or there's something else on my rig that's also causing this issue.

[TechReverso]

had another instance of the PC go to 100% CPU usage until I went in and changed the power settings again. So either this fix isn't 100% under Windows 8 or there's something else on my rig that's also causing this issue.

Hello BuckoA51, I've yet to encounter any 100% after doing this fix, which I am grateful for, as such it could be either the motherboard, or the cpu for your case, unfortunately. Are you on the 8.1 update? I am.

I haven't had the need to go into the power settings at all, it just runs perfect, when you wrote to our colleague on here, you spoke of power settings, I found it odd, but passed over it as you were enjoying the no 100%.

What program were you using during this 100% increase?


Bucko these are your specs: ??
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 950 @ 3.07GHz (8 CPUs), ~3.1GHz
12 GB RAM

[BuckoA51]

Those are my specs and yes I'm on 8.1 (not much point staying on 8 when it's a free update). I wasn't using anything in particular, I just noticed it while running regular desktop apps. Firefox, Thunderbird, Notepad ++, uTorrent, day to day stuff. I have been periodically loading task manager to keep an eye on it and just noticed it then. Soon as I reset the power saving options back to normal the 100% was gone, just as before with the old drivers.

Certainly possible there's something else on here that causes it as I have a lot of programs and things installed, plus I am seeing it even when I've not been using my capture card (but then, others have reported that too).

I will boot Windows 7 and give that a try tomorrow too.

[TechReverso]

Those are my specs and yes I'm on 8.1 (not much point staying on 8 when it's a free update). I wasn't using anything in particular, I just noticed it while running regular desktop apps. Firefox, Thunderbird, Notepad ++, uTorrent, day to day stuff. I have been periodically loading task manager to keep an eye on it and just noticed it then. Soon as I reset the power saving options back to normal the 100% was gone, just as before with the old drivers.

Certainly possible there's something else on here that causes it as I have a lot of programs and things installed, plus I am seeing it even when I've not been using my capture card (but then, others have reported that too).

I will boot Windows 7 and give that a try tomorrow too.

Alrighty BuckoA51, thanks for the update, let me know how that fares tomorrow, I had a fresh install with my attempt (8.1), besides obs, and mobo drivers, intel mobo drivers, and gfx card drivers, the card itself, there wasn't anything else I installed.

[RGB32E]

Picked up the PEXHDCAP and took a few captures from a NESRGB toploader via a XSYNC-1. I've tried the latest drivers from Startech and Advantech and haven't had an issue with the CPU bogging down (i7 930 on X58). Video Keeper works fine, but it seems like I'm not getting uncompressed capture, even for stills. Perhaps Amarec or some other software might work best.

[BuckoA51]

I've tried the latest drivers from Startech and Advantech and haven't had an issue with the CPU bogging down (i7 930 on X58).

Are you on Windows 7 or 8?

Video Keeper works fine, but it seems like I'm not getting uncompressed capture, even for stills.

Yeah I think that's just how Videokeeper is.

[blizzz]

Amarec should give you better results. You might also have to use the horizontal color adjustment in the advanced settings tab.

Spoiler

[TechReverso]

I'm still observing this thread, intel 930 x58 chipset, working no 100% cpu load using Advantech drivers AND Startech, interesting.
I'm bent on the chipset vs firmware being the equalizer.

What version of windows ?

If he followed my tutorial, it must be 8.1...