Video Capture Question

I just got myself a DV. And I am trying to capture the video to my computer. I have Adobe Premiere 6.0, Microsoft Movie Maker, and Ulead VideoStudio 5.0 DV. I tried Adobe Premiere 6.0 but it is giving me drop frame. And the Ulead VideoStudio 5.0 DV, is giving me errro after a while capturing. So, I went for the Movie Maker. But it is saving it in wmv format. How do I convert it into mpeg or other format. I am planning to editing it, and put it on a CD and play it like a VCD. If I am planning to upload it to the web, what format should I use. And what other software would you recommmand.

A 5400rpm hard disk can do job fine too. Just make sure you defrag your hard disk, enable DMA and close all other applications before starting to capture.

There could be lots of reasons for dropped frames, but all of them mean that the signal you are sending to the computer (ie the Digital Video from your camcorder) is too much too quickly for the computer to read and store it.

I have seen the following reasons:
Hard drive - DMA not enabled. Other than this reason, even a 5400 speed drive that isnt defragmented should be ok, although defragging is ALWAYS a good idea. You might want to investigate the 'write cache' option on it too, but certainly make sure DMA (and that it is at least a UDMA 66 drive) is enabled. You could also, just to be really safe, check you have a good enough cable that connects the hard drive to the motherboard.

CPU - Anything less than a P2 at 300Mhz will struggle. I'm hoping you have at least a decent CPU for the job.

Motherboard - Ditto the above - if you have a rubbish motherboard, this will again be a bottleneck for data flow.

RAM - I have seen 64MB do the job, but you need at least 128 MB to be safe.

Windows - Win 98SE and above should be fine. Close all non-required programs before capture, especially anti-virus programs, memory defragmenters, and anything that will be active during capture.

Hope this helps - its based on experience.

MSIC

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