Capture card with DVI/HDMI input

[LarryB]

How come we don't have a capture card with DVI or HDMI as and input?

Is it the MAN who is sticking it to us and not letting us do that.. I would not mind taking the DVI output of a cable / sat box and capturing it to my system.. I don't think that the transmission from the cable box to the tv over this digital cable is encrpted in any for... otherwise how could I see it on my tv. maybe i'm just to simple minded and came up with this ingeneous idea.

help me understand... thanks.

Larry

[Kilrsat]

A raw HDTV stream is roughly 1.5Gbps. The hardware required to handle this level of information and encode it on the fly simply is out of the consumer's budget at the moment. In the professional video market there are devices that will do this, in the $2000-$10000 range.

When the hardware becomes cheaper, it may show up, but then again, when it is cheap enough the demand may not be there. With the push for HDCP being required for next gen settop boxes it would mean that there simply won't be unprotected DVI/HDMI signals to capture, and if the device is HDCP compliant, then it will have to respect the copy restrictions put in place on the content.

[mrgrocery]

The technical reason is not acceptable, it is the man preventing us from doing so.

[Hamsterdan]

Originally Posted by LarryB

How come we don't have a capture card with DVI or HDMI as and input?

Is it the MAN who is sticking it to us and not letting us do that.. I would not mind taking the DVI output of a cable / sat box and capturing it to my system.. I don't think that the transmission from the cable box to the tv over this digital cable is encrpted in any for... otherwise how could I see it on my tv. maybe i'm just to simple minded and came up with this ingeneous idea.

help me understand... thanks.

Larry

One 4-letter word

HDCP

Copying and copyright infringements aside (it's *way* too easy to download almost anything), You won't be seeing this any time soon.

[LarryB]

Got a good chuckle.. But thanks for the explanation. I know I'm not the only one with this question.


Larry

[ssmith10pn]

A raw HDTV stream is roughly 1.5Gbps. The hardware required to handle this level of information and encode it on the fly simply is out of the consumer's budget at the moment. In the professional video market there are devices that will do this, in the $2000-$10000 range.

Then how are the Set top boxes processing it?
How are the TVs processing it?

Guess I will have to be happy with 480i off the satellite.

[Kilrsat]

Originally Posted by ssmith10pn

Then how are the Set top boxes processing it?
How are the TVs processing it?

Guess I will have to be happy with 480i off the satellite.

Because they aren't trying to compress the raw stream. The two things that are easy to do: decode the encoded stream and display the raw stream. Both of the situations you asked about involve these two situations. The one thing that is still hard to do, encode the raw stream, is not covered.

By asking for a card to take a DVI/HDMI input, it needs to be able to compress that 1.5Gbps down to 19.5Mbps, in real time. This is the hard part of the equation, not playback, not decoding, both of which everyone can already do.

[ssmith10pn]

Thanks,
I understand now.

So a satellite DVR receiver is only dealing with a compressed stream? Is this assumption correct?

[mrgrocery]

I am just trying to understand this as well. What kind of stream is it when one is using an OTA HD Capture card? Would it be any easier to have a capture card that uses component instead?

[ssmith10pn]

While looking around tonight for a second capture card I stumbled across this:


ViewSonic NextVision N5-2 VGA Interface TV Tuner Box, REMOTE - Retail

It caught my eye because it has Component in.

[HomeyFour]

Originally Posted by mrgrocery

I am just trying to understand this as well. What kind of stream is it when one is using an OTA HD Capture card? Would it be any easier to have a capture card that uses component instead?

Its pretty much a big data file, precompressed MPEG kinda sorta. You're recording a data stream. Think of it more like a modem - the HD card is picking up the digital broadcast stream, and just downloading the data.

[mrgrocery]

Thanks, but how is this so much different from component or dvi capture?

[bobhaze]

Perhaps our dreams are finally answered. Anybody have any more insight on this?

http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/intensity/

Bob

[Fonceur]

Originally Posted by bobhaze

Perhaps our dreams are finally answered. Anybody have any more insight on this?

There's about 5 threads about it in the past 9 months... Take a look at:

Will Beyond TV have support for ..

The short answer is that it is useless for us...

[wxboy]

not exactly. it can't detect HDCP if using analouge inputs