Hauppauge Colossus HD-PVR - Page 14

Are you running driver 29291? I'm not saying that driver will fix your issue - just that 29291 is the latest driver.

Yes, using driver 1.2.29291.0.

Does Titan TV work okay with this card?

I read all the posts and saw someone post that Titan TV does not work, and no follow up regarding that problem.

I use Titan TV with my 1212 HDPVR and l would like to continue to use it's remote scheduling feature (I use a program I wrote to hit the "ok" button... What joker had the bright idea to force the user who is not home to hit "ok"?)

Thanks!

Hello everyone,

I'm expecting my Colossus, the first capture card I have owned, to arrive tomorrow. I'm sure I'll have a few questions as I get things up and running, but for now I just have a couple--and I appreciate the information everyone has provided in this thread. Again, this is my first capture card, so this world is pretty new to me.

1) I will be primarily capturing recorded and live programming from an HR24, and live gameplay from a PS3. Is it possible to forgo Arcsoft software entirely and just use Windows Media Center (Win 7 Pro x64)? At this point, I don't plan on controlling the HR24 with MCE. Although, I can't tell for sure from this thread if MCE saves recorded files in h264 format.

2) Has anyone compared PQ between component and HDMI? Theoretically I would expect HDMI to be slightly better as it doesn't have to go through an A/D stage like component would. I think for what I'm trying to do though (especially if I go from my AVR instead of directly from the HR24 or PS3) component would be a lot easier to deal with, as I wouldn't have to worry about using an HDMI splitter or anything like that. Any thoughts or recommendations?

3) Has anyone gotten their Colossus to stream live with VLC or anything else? I would be interested in LAN or internet streaming to one client at a time.

Thanks!

Titan TV works fine for me. I have the Directv guide dispalyed and I use it to record shows. When I schedule something, there is a popup at the bottom that I have to hit "open". That loads the scheduled recording into WinTV. Nothing comes up after that - it just records when it is scheduled to record (usually in the middle of the night).

I did find an easy way to use handbrake, although I'm not 100 percent sure it works all of the time. I simply record using Arcsoft, and then remux using TSmuxer to a .ts file, and then encode using handbrake.

Assuming you're using ShowBiz to do your recording, try the .TS or .M2TS containers/format when recording. I have this same problem if I try to use mp4.

Kudos and congrats to you folks that are happy and successful using your Hauppauge Colossus.

I am returning mine; I get better results with my Hauppauge 1212 HD-PVR even though it only record at 13.5Mbps as opposed to the Colossus 20Mbps. I got ghosting/combing/moving horizontal-bar-noise with my Colossus and tried using the high-quality component cables I retrofitted to my "1212", but still had no success. I was defintely getting bigger, 20Mbps files, but without the quality.

I guess YMMV?

Regards,
Jay

You ask some valid questions. I have never been able to discern any picture quality improvement with the Colossus. And I take into account the fact that Colossus allows a higher bit rate. I am going to hook mine back up just for fun. I am sure I will have to re-license my DVB-Link software for hd- pvr as I have not used it for awhile.

I too had an issue with my Colossus and a moving horizontal bar. It was about 1/3 the width of the screen and slowly moved from the bottom to the top. Wherever the bar was the color would be off a bit too.

I found it pretty annoying so I contacted Haupaugge support via email and they mentioned that I should move the card to a slot farthest away from the power supply. Good advice (I think) but it didn't fix the issue.

The last thing they said to try was different component cables. The minute I changed them to quality set I had lying around the issue dissappeared completely and the picture was a sharp as a tack.

I mentioned that in my email to Hauppauge and they sent me out a new set to replace the ones included with the card. I'm surprised the stock cables 'leaked' because they are pretty darn heavy-duty.

At any rate, I get awesome picture quality from my card but I suspect you have the same issue I had. I'd encourage you to have another go at it - once I changed out my cables the picture was perfect and the horizontal band was gone.

It may also be important to keep the cables away from power cords etc.

Speccifically, this is what Haupaugge support mentioned about the 'banding'

"That sounds like some type of RF interference or maybe EMI. You might want to try moving the Colossus board away from the power supply in the computer in case. If your computer is plugged into a surge protector you can try plugging directly into an outlet to see if it is a ground problem. The other place you might pick up noise is over the video cabling."

Thanks to mmiller99, SHS and mobilelawyer for your responses (!) They were genuinely appreciated.

I utilized your suggestions and it improved the quality somewhat, but not enough for me to keep the Colossus. Yes, the the Colossus's, as well as the 1212's (white, Steren Python) cables apparently had some leakage, even though they both appear to be heavy-duty. I also tried plugging my PC into its own wall outlet, as opposed to a surge protector.

FWIW, colors seem bolder with the Colossus than with the 1212.

Regards.

If I take the component output of a device, and run it into this device/converter (above), and then take that output/HDMI out---and run it into the HDMI input of the Colossus, will I get HDMI quality?

Thanks for indulging me.

Of course not.

The quality of each is highly subjective. Passing it through this device and getting "equal" is too. Too many factors to say yes or no but sometimes with systems a converter is needed and if it "works", that's good.

The questions seems to assume that "component" quality is somehow less than "HDMI" quality, an assumption that seems dubious in this context.

Either can produce an HD result. The limiting factors are more likely the source (if you're capturing cable or satellite, you aren't going to end up with a picture better than the original highly compressed picture) and the Colossus itself (which is limited to 1080i).

Basically, component can deliver anything the Colossus is capable of capturing.

Not intended to transmit the notion that component is less than HDMI, just a little different. It's very impressive (especially at the modest price tag) and has some "digital-ness", to my eyes, when you play the blu-ray or dvd disc on a blu-ray player.

Just my humble 2 cents.

I always get a kick out of the whole component vs. hdmi subject... People tend to believe "Well, HDMI is newer and digital, therefore it MUST be better!" The simple fact is that both provide (with these devices) 1920x1080 interlaced H.264 video. Things like color depth are determined by settings either within the capture or playback software. With a decent, short run, shielded component cables, the picture quality will not suffer a single bit. I prefer component in my setup, as I don't have to deal with any HDCP nonsense, but that's just me.

Two reasons for me. First, as you say, no HDCP headaches. Second, the HDMI from my Directv DVR goes to my AVR and I really don't want to mess with changing cables every time I want to record something on my htpc, so the component/optical from my DirecTV box go to my Colossus.

The Colossus produces a result indistinguishable from the original (already highly compressed) DirecTV picture.

Just a quick post on this topic.

I finally took the plunge and got the colossus a couple of weeks ago.
The setup was only difficult because i had difficulties finding the right codes for my STB.
It took me about 1 hour cycling through all possibilities to finally find the right one.
Overall though I am very happy with e result so far.
I am using component input at the moment since hdmi goes to my av receiver.
The picture quality is just as good - I compared it side by side with the hdmi picture and both are great on my projector.
The channel changing is good and fast enough.

So far I am very happy. I finally have tons of channel available in win7 media center and all in HD.

Merry XMas to everybody at avsforum.

If you want to try HDMI capture you can buy this splitter:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...00_i00_details

It works great for me. My HR24 HDMI output goes to splitter, then one output from splitter goes to my AVR and another to Colossus.

But why bother when you can just use the component/otptical?

Because my HR24 has only two Hi-Def outputs and I have three sources to feed (besides my kids).

1. Component video and RCA stereo audio outputs go directly to TV for casual viewing so my kids can watch Dora and Gaba-gaba with 1080i and just stereo sound without using AVR.

2. HDMI output goes to splitter. From splitter:

a) Output-1 goes to my AVR so I and my wife can watch movies with 1080i/p and 5.1 surround sound.

b) Output-2 goes to Colossus so I can do 1080i video and 5.1 audio recording on my HTPC.

This way I don't have to move my TV and switch cables every time and don't need to use optical audio output.

Ok, I can understand that. We don't use the "TV sans AVR" approach, so HDMI goes to AVR, component/optical go to Colossus.

Also, like you, so I don't have to ever switch cables.

hello.

i have been having an issue for quite a while. posting it here.
my setup
i run a dual screen to a 24 inch 1680 x 1050 monitor and to a 42 inch 720p panasonic tv. since i have installed the colossus and whenever i i use the monitor. lets say to surf the web and write this. live tv is fullscreen in 7mc i have a stutter in the tv video. it has been the same through different colossus and mce drivers. the stuttering varies. i have tried setting the recording drive to a different drive as well with no luck.

does anyone else experience this? or have any fixes?

also let me add i have a 5850 video card. and this doesnt happen when live tv is watched in a window. no matter what the window size is. i do have an overscan of about 10% set in ccc.

Sounds like a horsepower issue. Proessor, video subsystem, RAM, video driver ver., etc?

catalyst 11.12
phenom x4 955
5850 visiontek driver 8.920.0.0 hdmi to tv. dvi to hdmi to monitor.
g skill ram 8gb 1600
3 samsung hd204 hdd
seagate 1gb 7200
vertex 64 gb ssd
samsung blu ray drive.
650 watt antec earthwatts

How many of you are using this card with Mediaportal, and the 4TheRecord addon?

I ask because I've been doing this for years now with the HD-PVR. I recently bought two Colossus cards to replace my HD-PVRs as in addition to being a cleaner looking setup (two HD-PVR's on top of two cable boxes is a bit of a show in my cabinet) I've read, and now found to be fact, that the Colossus is more stable in Mediaportal. Though that may be due to the fact that I have early-model versions of the HD-PVR which were plagued with overheating issues (I have fans on mine, which does not improve the already cluttered appearance).

Using Mediaportal's TV server as a backed, and 4TheRecord as the front (if you've never heard of it, it adds a very "Tivo" like scheduling experience to Mediaportal, and includes a very, very nice web front end as well) I have in my opinion the best live and recorded TV experience available for an HTPC - and this is coming from someone who's been using HTPC's for over a decade and used/seen them all.

Use a MediaPortal skin like Argus (my personal favorite) and you'll be hard pressed to find something that works or looks better. 4TR's scheduling is second to none, you can do season-pass like recording, record shows with certain actors/directors/etc, automatically schedule around conflicts, automatically cut commercials, and more. I'm surprised more people don't use it here, frankly, sticking instead with programs like Titan TV, which are way more of a hassle to use.

Anyone had a problem with the Colossus no longer capturing anything? In Arcsoft Showbiz the Colossus is no longer listed as a capture device and in Device Manager the status is "This Device Cannot Start (Code 10)." So far I've tried uninstalling the device, reinstalling, uninstalling and switching to the 29291 drivers. Even went into the registry and removed everything that I found for Colossus. Yet each time after a uninstall and install of the drivers the Capture for Colossus gives the same "This Device Cannot Start" message. Only getting this message on the Capture, in Device Manager there is another listing for the Colossus as Encoder but that one has no flags or errors on it. I read about using the hwclear program to remove all Hauppauge drivers but I really don't want to go that route since I'm using other Hauppauge cards for OTA tuners. Going to email Hauppauge as well but interested if anyone else had a similar problem.