GameCube to Notebook screen - help please

[LongTimePCUser]

I have an IBM Thinkpad A31 and my son has a GameCube. Is there anything that I can buy to use the screen on the notebook with the output from the GameCube?

 

[Le Québécois]

You need a video card with video in....

 

[DaveSimmons]

There are some USB TV cards, the USB 1.1 ones were pretty bad but the USB 2.0 ones should be better (enough bandwidth to work OK).

There have been some PC Card / PCMCIA video capture cards, but be careful some "video in" cards just have a firewire port for a DV cam and what you need is "analog" video in.

about $73 at buy.com : Hauppage USB dealibob

You might not like the results though, here is what someone said about a similar USB unit from AVerMedia:
"Delay/Performance Problems
The video quality is quite good. But, if you try to input a game console such as Xbox, Gamecube, PS2, to play video games in your vehicle on long trips, forget about it. I ran a Nintendo Game Cube into the composite input and captured to a laptop Pentium III 600Mhz. When you try to play a game and move your character, your character on screen doesn't move until almost a second later. There is a latency, in other words, from when the video hits the avertv usb to when you actually see it on the screen. This makes it a very poor choice for video games, or anything else where you need good audio/video synchronization or "real-time" video. I confirmed this via TV mode by going into a VCR first, then outputting on channel 3. I also tried s-video. They all perform the same way. So not too bad for the price I guess, but not that great, either. I couldn't really find anything else comparable other than the ATI USB, and it's reviews look even worse. I guess I'll just have to break down and buy a flat screen TV with direct video inputs, for the kids in the van on the long trips."

 

[paradawx87]

If my TV card has only a coaxial input, how would i connect the gamecube, which has the A/V plugs (red, black, yellow)? Is there some sort of converter I can use?

 

[Knightlife]

Get the RF adapter, although video quality will probably suffer.

 

[LongTimePCUser]

I got a Hauppage USB-Live. About $50. Seems to work OK. The Thinkpad is a 1.6 GHhz P4 running WinXP and has 512 MB RAM. I am using the S-Video input. My son is playing games on it. He says it is a little strange but basically OK. We don't have the sound working yet but I am fairly certain it will work. You run a program to display the video. The program has lots of options that need to be adjusted but the manual neglects to describe any of the setup options. Hauppage has an FAQ at their website that is helpful once you read each item 2 or 3 times. They are really challenged when it comes to writing a manual. I also downloaded the latest drivers from their website.