RGB component HD capture solution?

[Robert Knecht Schmidt]

Looking for a recommendation on an inexpensive capture card or USB device to capture HD video from RGB component (standard RCA connectors). Is there anything good out there?

[Chris Medico]

I used this one to record TV shows from my HD Receiver. It was OK.

HD PVR Product Description

[Robert Knecht Schmidt]

Thanks, Chris. This has a hard drive in it and I can transfer an MP4 file to a PC over Ethernet?

[Chris Medico]

It connects to your computer via USB and the recordings are saved on the computer's hard drive. It is only an interface device. It does do the encoding inside the adapter itself so it doesn't require a powerful computer to use it.

[Robert Knecht Schmidt]

Thanks, I looked into it, and it seems like there is a version 2 of this product, the 1512. Does anyone know anything about that?

One retailer review of the 1212 noted that the 1212 "[g]enerates H.264 at Baseline Profile 1.0 only -- not the High Profile 4.1 that x264.exe-based programs generate. The Baseline H.264 quality is not as good as the High Profile quality using the same bit rate." I wonder if the 1512 is any improvement in that regard?

I notice that the 1512 doesn't have component RCA jacks on the back, but I presume that's not much of an issue.

[Jim Andrada]

It's not much of an issue if they provide a breakout cable to attach to the RGB RCA connectors.

I think they do because they mention an adapter cable in their product description, but I didn't see any detailed description on their web site. I had one of their interface boxes once - it was OK but not amazingly great. Recording quality was just sort of OK.

[Robert Knecht Schmidt]

I bought the 1512 and overall am happy with it, for the most part, for component-in capture. Captures exhibit a gradual audio sync drift, with the audio leading the video (i.e., the picture lagging the sound) which gets more noticeable with longer captures. For captures that are just a few minutes, it's not so big a deal. For 2+ hour captures, the desynchronization is on the order of several seconds and is intolerable. Apparently this is a well-known problem with no fix. The last driver update for the device was at end of 2014 and I doubt Hauppauge is going to devote too much more in the way of support resources to this product. Still, the capture software is relatively stable (it does crash, but only when you don't give it time to do its thing) and the unit doesn't overheat like some reviews report. Captures are high-quality and play back smoothly with no blips or skips. There's a several-second delay between source and real-time display on the screen, but I don't mind that since it allows me to hit the capture button as soon as the content starts without losing the beginning of the content. The pass-through delay, on the other hand, is on the order of microseconds and is not perceptible except perhaps in the most demanding of gaming applications. The pass-through picture shows no perceptible degradation in image quality.

With thanks to Chris for the heads-up.