Micomsoft SC-500N1 RGB Capture Card

[fagin]

Mmmm... mines the opposite.

Need to do some more testing when I get home.

Which driver is being used on all those screenshots?

[blizzz]

Mmmm... mines the opposite.
Which driver is being used on all those screenshots?

Micomsoft 108, but it's the same with both drivers.

[fagin]

OK thanks for the info.

[fagin]

This shit needs more patience than I'm willing to give it.

It's made worse by trying to disect a Japanese website with a translator, which basically makes it pigeon English about a subject matter I don't absolutely understand at this level.

I'll wait for Fudoh to do a guide!

[panzeroceania]

what are the differences between the following cards?

SC500
SC510
SC580

[Fudoh]

different input configs. Multiple HDMI inputs or multiple SDI inputs....

[fagin]

For anyone who is bored of life (lol) and wants to watch a video about this card, I have put one up now -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JHjO89B_ ... ature=plcp

First off quite a few people are saying that the video capture shown on my video is awesome. In my opinion it's horseshit as the re-encoding has gone tits up my end. The raw capture is much better (no scrolling issues and better quality) and the live monitor is even better quality still. Why am I saying this? Just incase you look at that capture video and are not that impressed with it.

I've never really thought much about it, but because the quality is so good and the handling of 240p input "just works", I would be inclined to recommend this as a solution instead of buying a cheap scaler. This assumes you don't mind using your PC (and in fact have one) and have stuff set-up to do this with your PC.

What's you view on this Fudoh?

All we need now is some kind of software scanline support surely?

[Fudoh]

What's you view on this Fudoh?

the idea isn't new. The Holo cards did an amazing job on turning the PC into an scaler already.

With 3 frames delay (v-synced) the Startech/Micomsoft card is kinda borderline. And for 480i input you at least need to run the signal through DScaler or Avisynth for proper deinterlacing which adds more delay. Software scanlines should be no problem

Another question would be how the PC has to be (without actual capturing). Is the Startech card's PREVIEW performence dependent on a good processor and graphics card or would - let's say - an Atom/Ion board be enough ?

I'm still more interested in the rotation feature.

[blizzz]

Another question would be how the PC has to be (without actual capturing). Is the Startech card's PREVIEW performence dependent on a good processor and graphics card or would - let's say - an Atom/Ion board be enough ?

I'm still more interested in the rotation feature.

I'm using an i3-2100T which is by far the slowest (and most powersaving) CPU in the Sandybridge line without an extra GPU. There are no problems at all watching and recording 720p at 60fps with AmaRec and Lagarith. With my H727 I've tested an AMD E-350 APU which showed the preview fine but couldn't handle recording 720p, 480p was the max. The E-350 uses ~15W (for the whole system), the i3 maybe a bit more because I'm using a normal ATX PSU which isn't optimized for <20W systems. I wouldn't really recommend the E-350 though. It's faster than Atom boards, but even with an SSD it feels slow, the i3 (with SSD) feels like my gaming machine in terms of normal Windows programs.

I suppose that rotation is done in hardware by AmaRec and doesn't take up more resources, but I haven't really tested it.

[Fudoh]

I suppose that rotation is done in hardware by AmaRec and doesn't take up more resources, but I haven't really tested it.

When I still had a Holo setup the rotation was done using the graphics card pivot function. The problem with that is the the graphic performance drops heavily in this mode and you needed a really good graphics card (at least 128-bit bus connection) to do this.

What graphics card are you using with your i3 setup ?

rotation is done in hardware by AmaRec

does Amarec or any other preview software you've tried have a rotation feature ?

[blizzz]

I suppose that rotation is done in hardware by AmaRec and doesn't take up more resources, but I haven't really tested it.

Ok, I tested it and I was wrong. Rotation is done in software (one of the deinterlacing modes is done in hardware).

Normal video | Rotated

What graphics card are you using with your i3 setup ?

None, just the integrated graphics core (HD Graphics 2000, 650MHz) (CPU Specification)

does Amarec or any other preview software you've tried have a rotation feature ?

Yes, AmaRec has rotation (None, 90° Left/Right, 180°), cropping and line-doubling.

[blizzz]

I tried to do some lag testing with the card (duplicating the screen, DVI to monitor, HDMI to SC-500N1).

Can anyone explain to me how it's possible to make a screenshot of hardware overlay? In the blog I posted earlier the guy seems to be using hardware overlay, or could オーバーレイ = oobaarei be something else? When I try to make a screenshot or have AmaRec on screen to create an infinite tunnel effect I only get this blackish colour that's used to overlay the video. Afaik the video is only in the GPU memory and not accessible for Windows.


On this photo it looks like 0 frame delay, but that seems too good to be true. There's no screen tearing with hardware overlay and disabled Aero. I also made some screenshots with EVR and get around 50-60ms delay, so 3-4 frames.

[Fudoh]

what exactly are you showing ? Are you looping the graphics card output back into the capture card ?

I have no idea about the iX CPUs with integrated graphics. So the mainboard has DVI and HDMI output connectors, but utilizes the CPU integrated in the processor, right ?

Could you compare what happens if you leave Amarec without rotation and activate the graphic's card rotation instead ?

[blizzz]

Could you compare what happens if you leave Amarec without rotation and activate the graphic's card rotation instead ?

AmaRec normal, Screen normal
AmaRec normal, Screen rotated
AmaRec rotated, Screen normal
AmaRec rotated, Screen rotated

what exactly are you showing ? Are you looping the graphics card output back into the capture card ?

Yes. The desktop is outputted both to the monitor (DVI) and the SC-500N1 (HDMI).

I have no idea about the iX CPUs with integrated graphics. So the mainboard has DVI and HDMI output connectors, but utilizes the CPU integrated in the processor, right ?

Depends on the mainboard, mine has DVI, HDMI, and Display Port. It's like older integrated graphics, only that now the GPU is fully integrated into the CPU and it actually has enough power for Desktop applications and video acceleration. For example the AMD E-350 has the graphics cores of a Radeon HD6310 integrated in the CPU (which they now call APU or Accelerated Processing Unit).

[dieKatze88]

Snippingtool.exe

[Fudoh]

Looking so good. I'm looking into getting some parts to try this myself. I'm sure I'll have some more questions after that

[blizzz]

On this photo it looks like 0 frame delay, but that seems too good to be true. There's no screen tearing with hardware overlay and disabled Aero.

I guess it was too good, seems to be caused by my Android phone. It always displays the same for both numbers but when I rotate the phone it's no longer the same. Now (with a different camera) I get 1-2 frames for overlay and EVR without Aero (and tearing) and 2-4 frames for EVR with Aero.

The weird part is that i got 10 times in a row 0 frame delay for EVR without Aero when I started, then I got something huge like 30 frames once and now it's stuck at 1-2 frames delay. Really weird...

[Fudoh]

Sub 2-frames for total processing - even including rotation is still VERY VERY acceptable.

[blizzz]

Sub 2-frames for total processing - even including rotation is still VERY VERY acceptable.

I didn't test the delay with rotation yet. I would be content with 2 or even 3 frames lag if I didn't get 0 frames for some time. I'm tempted to run some tests with the card on a high end machine, but that would be a huge pain.

Snippingtool.exe

Nope, doesn't work. I also tested two other tools that promised overlay capture, but they tell you to disable hardware acceleration which only works in XP and would change the lag. I don't think there's any program that can capture hardware overlay in Win 7.

Edit: It's still ~2 frames lag with rotation.

Edit 2: Now I'm pretty sure that the 0 frame delay is actually a bug. http://img690.imageshack.us/img690/9430/wtfqpf.jpg
Sub 16ms seems possible, but not this. There must be at least 16ms difference between the timers: the original and the first timer in AmaRec are generated at the same time, so the same value is possible. But the other timers are generated in 16 ms intervals. I have no idea how this happened. (The colour problem is caused by the "Enhanced" Video Renderer if anyone wonders)
This is more realistic.

[GregI]

Wouldn't a better test be splitting between a CRT and the display like this?

http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a217/ ... C01037.jpg

[Fudoh]

Hi method allows him to measure the pure capture/processing lag on the card - without the monitor's lag.

[dieKatze88]

This idea is pretty turbo dumb, but if someone lived near North Jersey, you could drag your entire setup over to my place, and we could literally screenshot the output of your computer loopbacked into it's self with my computer. That would give us a 100% Yes or No on if there's lag or not, without the pain and suffering of using a camera.

[blizzz]

This idea is pretty turbo dumb, but if someone lived near North Jersey, you could drag your entire setup over to my place, and we could literally screenshot the output of your computer loopbacked into it's self with my computer. That would give us a 100% Yes or No on if there's lag or not, without the pain and suffering of using a camera.

Oh right, I could have done that myself. Maybe later if I'm bored.

[fagin]

OK... I have now set-up a lag timer and video looping on my PC, which is a fairly high blown i7 set-up (4ghz, xfire gfx set-up etc).

I need to get on with some other stuff until later this afternoon, but will come back to this.

One question about these lag tests though.... wouldn't the lag be reduced further (although you can't measure it), if you were using the capture preview in fullscreen mode (i.e. no windowed desktop mode)? Or am I speaking out of my arse?

blizzz,
Can you tell me what you have changed from default options on the Amarec settings.... just so I can get "apples and apples" testing.

[Fudoh]

@fagin: please test with rotated screen settings as well (both in Amarec and within the graphic card's settings).

windowed versus fullscreen: it shouldn't make a difference. In theory the fullscreen mode should need a little bit more performance due to the increased scaling efforts needed, but with a modern CPU that should not make a difference.

[blizzz]

blizzz,
Can you tell me what you have changed from default options on the Amarec settings.... just so I can get "apples and apples" testing.

My settings

My machine: i3-2100T 2x 2.50GHz, SSD, no dedicated graphics card, Micomsoft SC-500N1, Win7 x64 Pro
HDMI (720p60) to SC-500N1
DVI (720p60) to H727 (in a different machine, Core 2 Quad Q9450 4x 2.67GHz, Radeon HD4870 OC, doesn't matter though as it doesn't add any lag)

My tests were:
1. Win7 Aero + EVR
2. Win7 without Aero + EVR (invalidate Desktop composition)
3. Win7 without Aero + Hardware Overlay (invalidate Desktop composition)
Keep in mind that EVR is controlled by your graphics driver which may process the image. I used a flash app as a timer. This might add some inconsistencies but it seems to work quite good.

One question about these lag tests though.... wouldn't the lag be reduced further (although you can't measure it), if you were using the capture preview in fullscreen mode (i.e. no windowed desktop mode)? Or am I speaking out of my arse?

This might be the case for DirectX fullscreen, but I don't think that any capture application uses it. And even then the difference would only matter on something like a netbook.

Ok, now the results:
Overlay - 50ms 33ms 34ms 17ms 33ms 33ms 33ms 50ms 34ms / 3 2 2 1 2 2 2 2 3 2 frames
EVR (no Aero) - 17ms 16ms 17ms 16ms 16ms 16ms 16ms 17ms 16ms 17ms / 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 frames
EVR (Aero) - 50ms 50ms 50ms 50ms 50ms 50ms 50ms 50ms 50ms 50ms / 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 frames

Overlay: lag is ok (~2 frames), but the image looks worse than with EVR
EVR (no Aero): lag is minimal (1 frame), would be the winner, but screen tearing makes it look really bad on my machine
EVR (Aero): lag is consistent (3 frames), no screen tearing (triple buffering?)

For me, EVR with Aero is the best option. A better PC might remove the screen tearing issues on EVR without Aero though, so that would be perfect. The results also match perfectly with amaman's.

Good luck fagin with your tests, if you get 0 frame delay and no screen tearing I'll put the card into my main machine

Btw: The Micomsoft capture application uses EVR when Aero is on and overlay otherwise.

@fagin: please test with rotated screen settings as well (both in Amarec and within the graphic card's settings).

Sorry, forgot that and had the tests already done.

[Fudoh]

Sorry, forgot that and had the tests already done.

I know and thanks a lot ! Would just be happy to see fagin to do the same to make sure the results are quite consistent over different PC platforms.

[blizzz]

With rotation in AmaRec: Overlay = 2, EVR = 2. (Rotation in the display driver would make it a 720x1280 stream which can't be captured)

I also noticed that EVR + Aero has only 2 frames lag if I make the window smaller. I suppose it does double buffering and the integrated GPU is simply too slow to handle 2 frames for a bigger window size. If that's correct, fagin should get 2 frames independent of the window size.

[Fudoh]

(Rotation in the display driver would make it a 720x1280 stream which can't be captured)

no The pivot function actually changes the mouse and icon orientation, but the signal itself should definitely stay the same.

[Vixtro]

I think I'm going to take the Startech + Sync Strike setup to replace my H727 card.

Just a few questions though...

Will the Startech card accept HDMI from an Xbox 360 okay? Is there any problem with HDCP?

Also more importantly, is this card fine with PAL-60 signals through 240p RGB?? My H727 hates PAL-60 and gives a black & white image for the likes of my Dreamcast and Gamecube via composite, only with the Wii via component is PAL-60 okay on the H727.