Why am I dropping frames during capture?

Bexlee · 27-09-2003, 1:16 PM

I have successfully captured previously (to Studio 8 from Mini DV) but am now dropping frames all over the place (about 1000 frames in 18 mins of tape!)

Have tried deleting & reinstalling, all other programs are closed down - including virus check; latest upgrades to Studio 8 are in place.

Any ideas?

Bexlee

vonhosen · 27-09-2003, 1:21 PM

Perhaps the Studio 8 updates are to blame if all was OK before them ?

Luckily I don't suffer dropped frames. I do defrag before captures, make sure screen saver & all unnecessary programs are shut down. I also capture to a dedicated hard drive on a seperate channel to my OS drive.

Bexlee · 27-09-2003, 1:51 PM

I too have a separate hard drive solely for capture. Will try defrag.

MarkE19 · 27-09-2003, 7:28 PM

As vonhosen said disable all unneeded programmes, if not already I suggest you use a free download called EndItAll. You will be surprised what you miss doing it manually. Also disable ALL powersave options.
Is Studio 8 installed on your boot disk or the capture disk? It should be installed on the boot drive. The only thing on the capture drive should be the captured footage, no software etc. Also try and clear down the capture drive to make as much space available as possible.

Mark.

Bexlee · 27-09-2003, 9:56 PM

Only things on the capture drive other than footage are the two Studio 8 update downloads. Could they be interfering?

MarkE19 · 28-09-2003, 10:13 AM

The downloads AFAIK would only be the compressed files needed to install. They would not be used once the downloads were installed. Make sure that everything on the capture drive is in folders and not in the top level directory. This makes clearing down a lot easier, and less likely to delete something you still require.

Mark.

Bexlee · 28-09-2003, 6:27 PM

Studio 8 is on the boot drive. All that is now on the capture drive are the 2 Studio 8 upgrade compressed files. I have deleted 'regdelete' that was there too.

The odd thing is, I have just successfully captured 60 mins of tape onto the primary hard drive !?? But my clean and defrag.ed, 'installed for the purpose' secondary hard drive keeps on dropping frames!

Bexlee

Bexlee

MarkE19 · 28-09-2003, 10:01 PM

This then sounds more like a hardware problem.
Are both the hard drives on the same IDE channel or are their CD/DVD drives on the channel with the capture drive. CD/DVD drives can slow down the hard drive if on the same IDE channel.
I believe that Pinacle have a drive speed test application. Try down loading that and see if it is up to spec for their software.
Have you used a hard drive UDMA-100 or better spec cable for the capture drive or a lower spec CD-ROM drive cable? This could also slow down the speed of the drive.

Mark.

vonhosen · 28-09-2003, 10:12 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by MarkE19
This then sounds more like a hardware problem.
Are both the hard drives on the same IDE channel or are their CD/DVD drives on the channel with the capture drive. CD/DVD drives can slow down the hard drive if on the same IDE channel.

Mark.

Indeed.
Make sure you don't have a CD/DVD drive on the same channel as your hard drive. The data rate on the channel will be limited to the slowest device on the channel.
i.e. your CD/DVD drive

Bexlee · 29-09-2003, 6:46 PM

Thanks for your continued interest, I do appreciate it.

The 2 hard drives are on the same channel, the DVD drive & DVD writer are on another.

Bear in mind, I have already gone through the whole process of capture, edit and burn to DVD successfully once before- and this was by using the hard drive that is now dropping frames.

Bexlee

MarkE19 · 29-09-2003, 8:12 PM

The only other thing that I can think of is:

Does the capture drive have DMA enabled?

Mark.

Paul D · 29-09-2003, 8:57 PM

Are you running XP?

If so then you can mix CD/DVD-HDD on the same cable without slowing down to PIO v UDMA etc.

I wouldn't have your capture HDD on the same cable as your boot HDD. (I assue you have the second HDD set as slave etc)

My personal choice (through trial and error!) would be as follows.

Primary IDE:
Master = Boot HDD
Slave = DVD

Secondry IDE:
Master = Storage HDD
Slave = DVD Writer

Having the HDD on the same lead causes problems with windows swop file(or virtual memory) speed.

It's free to try, and if you don't like my setting swop them back!

30-09-2003, 12:05 PM

There is a HD utility which you can download from the Canopus website called Rextest. (unfortunately I'm not able to access right now).

This will tell you the read and write speeds of your hard drives.

I had a similar problem as you described and discovered that my capture drive was reading from OK, but writing to it was terrible - <1Mb/s even after a complete fdisk and format.

I ended up having to replace the drive which cured the problem instantly.

30-09-2003, 12:05 PM	#13
Powerhead Guest Posts: n/a	There is a HD utility which you can download from the Canopus website called Rextest. (unfortunately I'm not able to access right now). This will tell you the read and write speeds of your hard drives. I had a similar problem as you described and discovered that my capture drive was reading from OK, but writing to it was terrible - <1Mb/s even after a complete fdisk and format. I ended up having to replace the drive which cured the problem instantly.
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