Using the nVidia/VIVO for Console Gaming

[THX1139]

Hello All,

I have a Gainward GF4 Ti4200 Ultra650XP 4X AGP 128MB DDR video card which is based on the nVidia platform. I am using Windows XP Professional as the operating environment and would like to play my X-Box on my Abit IT7-based PC.

The Device Manager shows the following hardware elements listed under the Sound, video and game controllers section:

Audio Codecs
Avance AC97 Audio
Legacy Audio Capture
Legacy Video Capture Devices
Media Control Devices
nVidia WDM A/V Crossbar
nVidia WDM TV/Audio Crossbar
nVidia WDM TV Tuner
nVidia Video Capture (universal)
Video Codecs

I opened up Microsoft Movie Maker, clicked on the Record button, and the Record window spawned revealing that it was successfully receiving a video signal from the VIVO Composite input. Cool beans! This undoubtedly is using the some/all portions of the video VIVO features, but the preview window in the Record Preview window is waaaaaayyy too small for using for gameplay.

Gainward did NOT include any capture/tuner software with this card or ANY of their cards that have VIVO. I am not trying to capture video in a recording sense, but WATCH in a 'TV tuner' sense. Are there any freeware software available to take advantage of these nVidia video-input features?

 

[Confused]

DScaler may do what you're wanting


Confused

 

[THX1139]

I thought DScaler was a de-interlacing program (e.g. for going from 480i to 480p)?

 

[Cat]

One of D-Scaler's many features is the ability to de-interlace a signal. However, many people, including myself, use it to play console games, and watch cable TV.

 

[THX1139]

Interesting. I actually d/l DScaler a while ago for preparation (and consideration) for an HTPC.

 

[THX1139]

Cat, I could not get DScaler 3.10 to detect my Gainward GF4 Ti4200 Ultra650XP video card. In fact, the only 'hardware' option was other. This was also the case when I installed the 4.x Alpha version, too.

I have the Composite video output from the XB feeding into the Composite VIVO input, and verified this in Microsoft Movie Maker's pre-Record (the Record's preview window) screen as I can see the XB dashboard. But, I get nothing from DScaler. Do you mind asking exactly how you have your setup configured?

Again, I am attempting this under XP Professional.

 

[Stack]

Have you tried PowerVCRII? I just got an Asus TV Card and it came with PowerVCR II. I hooked my PS2 up to it an I am playing it through PowerVCRII. I am still trying to get DScaler to work with my Asus card, but I haven't been successful yet. It would be nice to deinterlace the signal.

 

[chizow]

Originally posted by: Stack
Have you tried PowerVCRII? I just got an Asus TV Card and it came with PowerVCR II. I hooked my PS2 up to it an I am playing it through PowerVCRII. I am still trying to get DScaler to work with my Asus card, but I haven't been successful yet. It would be nice to deinterlace the signal.

Get DScaler 4.1.6. It supports the Asus and many of the other CX880 tuners. I haven't been able to get the sound from the tuner to work properly, but it captures s-video in just fine and looks great!!! I've got an optical toslink to my receiver for sound, so DScaler works great for video games and looks about 10x better than PowerVCRII.

Chiz

 

[THX1139]

Actually, someone on another forum pointed me to MyTV and it seems to work. Has both tuner and capture abilities. You select from a variety of tuner chipsets, too.

 

[StinkyMeat]

I use this only because it's the first one that worked for me, and I haven't had any significant problems with it yet.

 

[aphex]

Here's the one i use, FLYds

 

[Stack]

Yeah, I found that DScaler 4.16 works with my ASUS TV card. It is definitely better than PowerVCRII. With DScaler, you can choose between different deinterlace modes to find which one works best for you.

As a side note, I found that the AsusDVCR application, which originally shipped with the old Asus TV cards, works fine to. It has an option to choose between 3 deinterlaced modes or no deinterlace.