LGR - How I Capture Footage From Retro PCs
Added 2018-11-12 21:55:29 +0000 UTCReceived a number of questions about capturing video footage directly from classic PC hardware after doing my MCE2VGA review.
While I made a video like this a couple years back, what I use and how I use it has changed so it seemed like a quick kinda video to make. Hope it's helpful to those that have asked!
Comments
Serge hooked me up with this as well! Thank you for the update, it's useful stuff indeed :)
LGR
2018-12-13 04:40:35 +0000 UTCHey Clint, It's me the MCE2VGA creator, glad that you liked the converter. If you can get one USB-Blaster (maybe Serge can help you out in this quest there are fake FTDIs) you can try this firmware from: <a href="https://github.com/lfantoniosi/mce2vga/tree/vga-common-res/output_files" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://github.com/lfantoniosi/mce2vga/tree/vga-common-res/output_files</a> In this firmware I am outputting only 640x480@60Hz for EGA/CGA and 1024x768@60Hz for MDA/Hercules. 800x600 would look too bad on MDA/HGC. Although these modes will not give you a good aspect ratio, at least you can capture and correct the aspect ratio as a post-effect.
2018-11-26 08:33:54 +0000 UTCNice, I enjoy mine quite a bit
LGR
2018-11-14 02:58:06 +0000 UTCDidn't know about the VCS software, that looks ideal for what I need to accomplish. Just wish you could capture audio as well, it's a real pain to have to record that separately and sync every clip later. I've seen the Datapath AM2 audio module is a thing for some of their other cards, but it doesn't seem to be for the RGB-E1S.
LGR
2018-11-13 20:47:12 +0000 UTCYeah it's a tough pill to swallow, but it's also a lot cheaper than their internal capture devices which climb to $1,200. <a href="https://www.epiphan.com/products/dvi2pcie-duo/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.epiphan.com/products/dvi2pcie-duo/</a>
LGR
2018-11-13 20:19:14 +0000 UTCWow, I knew it was a labor of love but didn't realize to what depth. I've been holding onto a slightly older LCD (because it still supports VGA) but have run into issues with it not wanting to work with oddball resolutions (like those from older Macintosh machines). After watching your video, I was all excited about the AV.io until I saw the price tag... Now I see why it's so rock solid.
Carey Brown
2018-11-13 18:29:41 +0000 UTCThat MCE2VGA is really fascinating and interesting to a lot of people I think. It's nice how greatly it fits LGR. Getting one for myself from Santa :D
2018-11-13 11:17:26 +0000 UTCWow, that's a lot of work to capture old PC games. :o
Alyxx the Rat
2018-11-13 08:28:22 +0000 UTCThe reason was some a-hole destroying the Internet, see here for an explanation: <a href="https://twitter.com/JayKothari26/status/1062103368116498432" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://twitter.com/JayKothari26/status/1062103368116498432</a>
BastetFurry
2018-11-13 07:17:47 +0000 UTCLike some strange pile of VideoToaster cards.
JennaKay
2018-11-13 03:25:11 +0000 UTCThe magic is ruined! I thought you just imagineered the video onto Youtube through a series of Amigas. :-(
JennaKay
2018-11-13 03:24:53 +0000 UTCfunny, i just recently bought the same mackie monitors to use for my old school gaming rig
2018-11-12 22:36:34 +0000 UTCI think that Micromsoft scaler is actually integrated with my video capture device (USB3HDCAP from Startech), as those features sound a lot like the ones in my video capture device. If so, it seems to work great so far, but I haven't had a chance to hook my DOS gaming machine up to it yet... mostly because my DOS gaming machine has a tendency to just not work. :(
aetherspoon
2018-11-12 22:27:51 +0000 UTCYesssssss, this is one of the things I've asked before. Thank you!
aetherspoon
2018-11-12 22:15:53 +0000 UTCI recently aquired a Datapath VisionRGB E1s used on Ebay. It's great! It supports through dongles DVI-I (VGA, HDMI), SCART RGB and component and captures anything I could throw at it! 50hz PAL consoles, DOS, Windows, 60hz 70hz, 75hz, 320x200, 640x480, 800x600, 1024x768, 1280x960...1920x1200. It captures at 24-bit colour at lower res and can do about 41 FPS output at 1920x1200. The only issues is that analogue signals do require some manual adjustments and it cannot transport audio. The image quality it produces is great though. The default "Vision" software isn't that great though, I recommend a custom software called VCS which supports custom scaling and profiles so you don't have to manually adjust signals all the time.
Tore Svendsen
2018-11-12 22:13:00 +0000 UTCYoutube seems to be having issues in my neck of the woods, might be a widespread outage. So, while I can't watch this video yet, I can say that I purchased my Avermedia C127 based upon your recommendation a few years ago. It's still in my prime machine today and gets plenty of use :)
2018-11-12 22:04:54 +0000 UTC20th anniversary hype
LGR
2018-11-12 22:03:26 +0000 UTC
