Micomsoft XCAPTURE-1 USB 3.0 Capture Unit

[goji]

Thanks guys.

Just tried x264 codec in amarectv, it gets better but still lag.

I tried H264 record setting in videokeeper, almost no lag^^. I guess a ssd drive would be ok ?

[eightbitminiboss]

Faster hard drive would help at a hardware level since I'm almost sure what you have is a 5400rpm hard drive in there. On a software level you could try to lower the bitrate or resolution of your captures.

[Smashbro29]

Fair warning that according to the site it's a beta.

I'd wait for the stable release.

[goji]

Just tried SSD and lower resolutions, everything seems ok now, thanks guys .

[AkibaDecker]

Happy Holidays, everyone

I recently received the XCAPTURE-1 from Solaris Japan, and wanted to ask if anyone has experienced this issue... It's regarding capture for livestreaming.

Now, I've used XSplit and OBS and the device seems to work great for both. One little issue I noticed was that, in Xsplit, when I've had to adjust the audio source, the video on the screen flips to this crazy green, as shown below:



The fix for this is to go into the XCAPTURE-1's properties. Once there, all I have to do is click on the same "VIDEO INPUT" and it "refreshes" the device, so the video is correct again.

Has anyone seen this issue with theirs before? As far as I can tell, the XCAPTURE is no lemon for what I need it to do. Wondering if it's just a driver thing or something else. For the screenshot, I connected an XB1 directly to the XCAPTURE, with HDMI-out going to my TV. The color shift does not show up in passthrough to the TV, just on my PC (in Xsplit, OBS or even the included VideoKeeper program). I'm using the latest drivers from Micomsoft (November), version 1.1.0.140.

[blizzz]

Thrill discovered a new capture product from StarTech that was released this winter, the USB3HDCAP. You can find his thoughts about it in his blog.



Basically it looks like it is based on the same chipset as the XCAPTURE-1, but lacking the pass through. It's cheaper and easily available in Europe, but even if it has the same quality as the XCAPTRUE-1, I'm not happy about the removed pass through ports. It's available from Amazon.co.uk for around £140 or $190 from the US site. Still, since it is available in Europe you don't have to pay import taxes, which makes it a lot more appealing.

Importing the XCAPTURE-1 to Germany costs around 301€ (device, shipping, taxes). The USB3HDCAP from Amazon.co.uk costs around 189€.

[Sixfortyfive]

Passthrough would be nice to have, but it's not an extra ~$130 nice.

Although I mostly say that because I already have HDMI, VGA, component, and composite splitters on-hand anyway...

[Whitesnake]

Does anyone have an in depth review of this StarTech USB3HDCAP? I would definitely consider pulling the trigger on this device if it can at least match the XCapture-1.

Although looking at the official website it doesn't claim 240p support etc.

I'm guessing the way to feed 15khz RGB into this device would be via a home made Female SCART to DVI adaptor using the analog DVI pins?

[blizzz]

The PEXHDCAP also doesn't mention 240p support. The way you would connect RGB from consoles is with something like a Sync Strike. But this is all a guess, I don't know anyone who owns this device and could test it.

[Sixfortyfive]

IIRC, the XCAPTURE-1 requires separate sync, so that might be the same for this. Looks like the packaging includes a VGA-DVI adapter though, so you'd probably need a SCART-to-VGA or SCART-to-DVI solution that includes a sync separator.

[Thrill]

Does anyone have an in depth review of this StarTech USB3HDCAP?

Gonna put up a review in a few days.

[Thrill]

I doubt anybody cares but here it is: http://www.thethrillness.com/2015/01/st ... eview.html

[NightSprinter]

Hey, I cared enough to read it. I am let down by the fact I have to swap adapters for composite/s-video and settings not sticking, but it seems more viable an upgrade for me, given my NEC monitor.

Now, do you think it has support for the more unique arcade resolutions/refresh rates? Still got my eyes out for an r-type board and a Kung-Fu Master board.

[Thrill]

Not got any arcade boards so couldn't tell you, sorry.

[Whitesnake]

How does it handle switching between 240p and 480i? e.g. Sonic 2 or Saturn/PS1 games.

It seems like every time I look for a capture device or scaler I'm often put off by certain caveats.

XRGB Mini caveat being its inability to switch between 240p/480i in a reasonable time frame.

Thanks for the review

[NightSprinter]

If it has the same chipsets as the Dempa-Micomsoft device, then it will perform just as the XCAPTURE-1 did in Thrill's review of it.

[RGB0b]

In your blog, you write:

That about wraps everything up. Would I recommend this? Probably not. The only target audience I see for this is people who already have all the different splitters or just want lossless 1080p60 without having to import other products from Japan. Even then the bugs I mentioned means this product has very few practical applications and if you just want 1080p60, the AVerMedia C710 is maybe a better alternative (also cheaper).

I'm confused why you wouldn't recommend it. If someone doesn't already own a capture device and wants to record both old and new consoles, wouldn't this be perfect? It seems like it handles 240p RGB just fine and your 1080p 60 video looks good as well. People in the US can get it for $167, which to me seems like a great deal:

http://www.rakuten.com/prod/usb-3-0-vid ... 13754.html

[Thrill]

Well of course it's just my opinion. I just feel like there is better alternatives out there.

[RGB0b]

Well of course it's just my opinion. I just feel like there is better alternatives out there.

Okay, cool. I'll order one and try it out. For the price, I feel like it's worth a shot.

[RGB0b]

I received the USB3HDCAP yesterday and only spent a short amount of time with it. It seems like a USB version of the PEXHDCAP that StarTech.com sells.

There's one thing I'm confused about...and I'm sorry if this is a stupid question, but I don't know much about these capture cards: I was under the impression that the XCAPTURE-1 upcales video as it captures. The USB3HDCAP (just like the PEXHDCAP) definitely does not, when using StreamCatcher; Videos are captured at 720x240. Is this correct?

[blizzz]

720x240 is usually what you want to record. In the driver settings for the other cards you had to enable auto scaling, but there were some quality issues.

[Smashbro29]

Recently had a huge issue with this card and OBS (I didn't try it anything else, no time), I was getting about 10fps with an i7 2700k, 16 gig ram, GTX 680. The card would instantly max out my CPU if it was active in a scene, no matter how low the resolution. I reinstalled everything and while it still makes it run to 100% it's not dropping the framerate or quality.

Why does it run up to 100? Why is it only recently making OBS run about 60% of my CPU when it was about 30 before on identical settings? I read it's a bug that kicks your CPU into overdrive but tell me in detail how to get past it.

[eightbitminiboss]

Recently had a huge issue with this card and OBS (I didn't try it anything else, no time), I was getting about 10fps with an i7 2700k, 16 gig ram, GTX 680. The card would instantly max out my CPU if it was active in a scene, no matter how low the resolution. I reinstalled everything and while it still makes it run to 100% it's not dropping the framerate or quality.

Why does it run up to 100? Why is it only recently making OBS run about 60% of my CPU when it was about 30 before on identical settings? I read it's a bug that kicks your CPU into overdrive but tell me in detail how to get past it.

In Windows (Windows 7 in this case), go to Control Panel > Power Options.
Click on "Change plan settings" for your current power plan.
Click on "Restore default settings for this plan".

That should temporarily get rid of the bug. In my experience it only comes back when I disconnect the XCAPTURE-1, so as long as you keep it connected, it'll hold. The only band-aid we got.

Edit: And of course I forget to say what is the cause. Supposedly when the device is plugged in, it turns off all the power saving features for your processor and goes hogwild. Hence when you reset power settings it should put it back to normal.

[Smashbro29]

Recently had a huge issue with this card and OBS (I didn't try it anything else, no time), I was getting about 10fps with an i7 2700k, 16 gig ram, GTX 680. The card would instantly max out my CPU if it was active in a scene, no matter how low the resolution. I reinstalled everything and while it still makes it run to 100% it's not dropping the framerate or quality.

Why does it run up to 100? Why is it only recently making OBS run about 60% of my CPU when it was about 30 before on identical settings? I read it's a bug that kicks your CPU into overdrive but tell me in detail how to get past it.

In Windows (Windows 7 in this case), go to Control Panel > Power Options.
Click on "Change plan settings" for your current power plan.
Click on "Restore default settings for this plan".

That should temporarily get rid of the bug. In my experience it only comes back when I disconnect the XCAPTURE-1, so as long as you keep it connected, it'll hold. The only band-aid we got.

Thanks, but for some reason its using a hell of a lot more CPU then before when everything was in order, I'm doing a 1080p 60fps video capture and here are my settings in OBS:

https://imgur.com/a/kyt7r

It's not an OBS issue, I've had a near identical with Video Keeper 2. Just running the preview made the program itself jump to about 30%-ish usage and made my CPU overall run at 100% via making everything else jump up in CPU.

Exact same windows with VK2

ON: http://i.imgur.com/N7OvSvm.png

OFF: http://i.imgur.com/DPEGxmt.png

The power reset trick only works for a few seconds and then it all goes right back up.

I just reinstalled the thing too with the latest. I just don't get it, it was working fine for a really long time.

[Sixfortyfive]

Even though the most recent driver update came out a while ago, I've yet to give the new features a proper test, so I'm doing that now. I've got the Dreamcast hooked up via VGA and am giving the 240p test suite a run. I'm kind of stumped on a few things, though, some of which are new and others I've never really bothered to ask about before, so I might as well do so now.



The options in the Color Range box seem to do literally nothing. No matter which of these options is checked, it doesn't change the level of black or white crush in the output, and it doesn't seem to alter the overall brightness or contrast of the image at all. Doesn't make a difference whether I'm capturing in YUY2, RGB24, or RGB32. Does this simply not work over VGA, or does it not work in general?

Is there a specific reason to ever change the aspect ratio under VGA Advanced Property? Toggling between 4:3 and 1:1 doesn't seem to change anything, at least for Dreamcast.

What are HDMI/DVI EQ, Auto Phase, VBI Lines, Single Resolution Output, and Frame Rate Adjustment actually used for?

Is there a reason why "RGB24/32 Output" has been appended to the Auto Resolution Scaling option? RGB24 and RGB32 seem to be available to pick from whether this option is checked or not.

Are the last two checkboxes ever not grayed out?



As I said before, YUY2, RGB24, and RGB32 seem to always be available. I can switch between them in either of these option screens. (VirtualDub rejects any other choice in the right box if I try to pick them. Only 24-bit RGB, 32-bit ARGB, and YUY2 are valid options.)



I use this alias format filter in VirtualDub to correct color space issues when possible. It only seems to work if the XCAPTURE-1 is set to YUY2, though. Any reason why?

If anyone else could offer some insight on any of the questions above, I'd appreciate it. In particular, I'm wondering whether the RGB options are usable, and in either case, what the best ways to are to correct color space issues moving forward.

[Pasky]

Does the USB3HDCAP capture 1080P like the X-Capture1? I know they advertised the PEXHDCap as 1080p but it could only do 1080i. Anyone know?

EDIT: Nevermind, read the review, it sure does. I don't need the passthrough on the XCapture-1 so thinking of taking the plunge on it.

[aperturegrillz]

Hello, long time lurker, first time poster.
I have an XCAPTURE-1 which I bought a few months ago which has been great for YPbPr and S-Video capture. However, I'm having a problem. I'm trying to capture video from a JAMMA game (specifically, Tetris the Grand Master 2 PLUS) via a smallcab supergun, using the video passthrough on my PVM. The smallcab outputs SCART, which goes to a 4xBNC breakout connected to the PVM, and the PVM passthrough is connected to the XCAPTURE's RGB IN via a 4xBNC to VGA cable. What happens is that the XCAPTURE recognizes the video mode, but the image it outputs is all-black.


Here you can see it's getting sync as it says "1440x240 @ 60.00FPS". If I check the "SOG" box or disconnect the sync BNC that changes to "NO SIGNAL".


But as you can see, the image is completely black -- not the "NO SIGNAL" display, just a black picture.

Unfortunately I can't try connecting the smallcab video directly to the XCAPTURE as I'm missing the necessary cables, but I don't think the PVM is the issue considering, it's obviously passing sync and it works fine for YPbPr.
Anyone else have a similar issue or ideas for what to do? If necessary I can get a linedoubler but I'm hoping I don't have to as I thought the XCAPTURE would support 240p RGB with composite sync.

[kazuo]

Pretty sure the XCAP needs split H/V sync like the SC500N/1 cards if you're feeding it 15khz RGB straight from the PCB (which is what it sounds like).

[aperturegrillz]

Pretty sure the XCAP needs split H/V sync like the SC500N/1 cards if you're feeding it 15khz RGB straight from the PCB (which is what it sounds like).

Is that so? If you're right that's mildly disappointing as someone told me it was capable of it. Oh well, guess I'll have to pick up a sync strike or something equivalent.

[blizzz]

The SC-500N1 doesn't need HV sync, it works with normal clean c-sync. Maybe the voltage is too high on the sync signal? Do you have other boards that work with the XCAPTURE?

I remember that someone said that Tetris The Grand Master is a bit picky to record, but I can't remember if that statement was for 1, 2 or 3. I believe the framerate is above 60fps on these games. You could also ask on the SDA Forums, they had all 3 Tetris boards at the recent AGDQ, so someone there should know how to record them.