=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- PowerVCR 1.3 (c) Copyright CyberLink Corp. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Last update : 1999/9/20 Welcome to CyberLink PowerVCR! This file contains the most up-to-date information and technical notes about PowerVCR. PLEASE READ THIS FILE IN DETAIL BEFORE RUNNING PowerVCR!! The following information is available in this README file: - WHAT'S NEW WITH PowerVCR 1.3 (updated from PowerVCR 1.0) - SETUP NOTES - GENERAL PERFORMANCE AND QUALITY ISSUES - CAPTURE CARD ISSUES - DISPLAY CARD ISSUES - AUDIO CARD ISSUES - VIDEO RECORDER - VIDEO CONVERTOR - VIDEO EDITOR - Check whether your system has DirectXMedia V6 and Indeo Codec installed - TECHNICAL SUPPORT =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= WHAT'S NEW IN PowerVCR 1.3 =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * Compared to PowerVCR 1.0, the major improvements of this version (PowerVCR 1.3) are listed as follows. 1. Improvement of Encoded Video Quality. In PowerVCR 1.3, we have developed a new video compression technique, such that dramatically enhances the quality of compressed video. Thus, for the purpose of saving your HD space, the default video profile has been changed from Constant Quality to VCD NTSC profile (Constant Bit-Rate). Generally, the new default profile can save half or more disk space without degrading video quality. On the other hand, the maximum recording time is extended (PowerVCR 1.0). 2. Crashing on capture devices using Bt8x8 chipsets problem. There are many capture devices using Bt8x8 series chipset. However, the newest version of Bt8x8 drivers conflicts with the Windows system, causing the Windows system to stall when recording for long periods at a time using PowerVCR. In PowerVCR 1.3, we solved this problem by quarantining several critical bugs from the Bt8x8 device driver. The current version has passed our rigorous testing. However, since the Bt8x8 device drivers are not developed by CyberLink, we cannot guarantee that PowerVCR will never stall during recording. If problems persist during recording using PowerVCR 1.3, please follow these instructions: a. Do the procedures described in section "CAPTURE CARD ISSUES". b. Call CyberLink Customer Support. 3. Supporting VCD format. In PowerVCR 1.3, you can record MPEG file conformed to the VCD format. You may edit this MPEG file and the output MPEG file of the editor will be automatically conformed to the VCD format. 4. Other Features You can set a output file name when you want to set a recording schedule or set a time limited recording. PowerVCR 1.3 will automatically copy the recorded video into the specified file. . ASUS 3000 and ASUS 3400 setup crash problem has been solved. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= SETUP NOTES =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * During setup, it is HIGHLY recommended to specify a large disk space for the WORKING DIRECTORY because PowerVCR generates temporary files. * PowerVCR will install DirectShow Runtime during setup. You can re-install by executing "setupdxm.exe" in PowerVCR installed directory if you are unable to playback .avi and/or .mpg files properly. But this will not affect the encoding function of PowerVCR. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= GENERAL PERFORMANCE AND QUALITY ISSUES =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * Intel Systems : Pentieum II precessors at 300MHz or above are HIGHLY recommended for optimum performance and quality. PowerVCR 1.0 also supports Pentium III. Non-Intel System : PowerVCR has also been tested for K6-2 300 CPU with MVP3 chipset. * It is HIGHLY recommended that you enable the DMA option of your Hard Disk to reduce the CPU utilization overhead. Win98 and Win95 OSR2 have built-in support for DMA-enabled IDE HDDs. Since Win95 OSR2 and Win98 contain native support for this feature, any other third-party bus master driver is NOT recommended. However, for Win95 retail version users, you must have a third-party bus master driver installed to enable that option. Since old versions of bus master driver may not properly support new IDE devices, such as DVD-ROMs and IDE removable storage medium, always check the date of the driver and make sure you have the newest version of the aforementioned driver that supports your HDDs !! To identify which version of Win95 you have, click on "Control Panel" and then the "System" icon. You'll see a version string with the form "4.00.950 x". Win95 retail version has a version string "4.00.950" or "4.00.950 A". Sometimes you may find that the DMA option is not available even if you have OSR2 installed in your computer. This is because OSR2 does not recognize some of these new chipsets, such as Intel 440LX, 440BX and 440EX. Thus the default driver with DMA support is not installed. A patch program from Intel named "Intel 82371xB INF Update Installer" can be downloaded from the INTEL web site to conduct necessary patches for Intel chipsets. After that, you have to reboot your system, wait for OSR2 to find all the new hardware, and reboot one or several times again until you make sure the DMA-option is enabled for your HDDs. For Win98, the problem does not exist since Win98 was released after those chipsets were announced so therefore Win98 can recognize all of them. However, for future new chipsets, you may still have to apply a patch before the DMA mode is available to be activated. For chipsets from other vendors, you should find the proper patch programs for OSR2 or Win98 in your mainboard support disk/CD-ROM or the vendor's web site. * Please make sure the DirectDraw driver of your display card is properly installed. Refer to your display card manual for detailed instructions, or you may have the most up-to-date Microsoft DirectX Runtime installed to enable this support. If your capture device does NOT support "Video Overlay" Mode or you did not enable it, PowerVCR uses DirectDraw for the best display quality during video preview while encoding. After encoding / converting, the playback of the MPEG-1 file is played by DirectShow, which was previously named "Active Movie". On some display cards, dynamical resolution switching can cause system malfunctions or crashes. We recommend not to switch the display resolution when PowerVCR is activated. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= CAPTURE CARD ISSUES =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * It is HIGHLY recommended that using fast and reliable video capture cards for high frame rate capture. PCI capture cards are HIGHLY recommended. * Generally speaking, capture cards with VFW driver support is adequate. * PowerVCR currently supports the following VIDEO FORMATs(four cc): YV12, Y41P, YUY2, UYVY, cyuv, I420, YUV9, RGB16, RGB24 * Other than those formats listed above, PowerVCR will not work properly with other video formats. * Currently, PowerVCR has been tested on Bt829, Bt848, Bt878, Zr36120 and ITT VPX3225 capture chips. * Because of the driver implementation, capture cards with ITT VPX3 chips are UNABLE to capture more than 15 frame per second. * Because of the poor capture driver implementation, some capture cards with Bt8x8 chip sometimes unpredictably stall the entire Windows system while performing recording for long periods of time, especially for cards with TV-Tuners on it. Suggestion: If you want to record for long periods of time using the Bt8x8 chip, you can increase the recording success rate by doing one or more of following procedures: 1. Reboot your system before recording. 2. Don't execute other applications when recording. Also, close other background applications if possible. 3. Please uncheck the "Online Audio Compression" item if you have checked it. 4. Reduce Video "Frame Rate" if possible. 5. Use a faster computer. * When using some of the ATI products (for example, All-In-Wonder Pro) when recording, if the PowerVCR video window is covered by another window, the recorded content may be corrupted. If this situation has occurred, please do the following procedures to solve this problem: 1. When recording, please don't execute any other applications, especially those that cover up the PowerVCR window. 2. Please use Preview mode for recording. 3. When recording, if the mouse pointer floats over the Stop button, the pop-up "Stop" hint window may corrupt the encoded video. You can press Ctrl-F8 to disable the hint window display if necessary. * When using some capturing devices for recording video in Overlay mode, the captured video may become noisy or unstable. Please use the Preview mode for recording. * Common USB or parallel port cameras are not able to perform high frame rate capture, it is HIGHLY recommended that choosing a lower frame rate through the CONFIG button provided in the video recorder of PowerVCR. * If audio and video are not synchronous during recording, the system may be unable to perform high frame rate recording. It is HIGHLY recommended that choosing lower frame rate through the CONFIG button provided in the video recorder of PowerVCR. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= DISPLAY CARD ISSUES =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * Any PCI or AGP VGA card will be sufficient to playback recorded video on PowerVCR. But it is still considered an energy-expending issue because PowerVCR uses DirectDraw to preview and display video. * S3 Savage VGA cards does not seem compatible with capture cards we have tested because PowerVCR possibly misbehaves on the platform when utilizing this VGA card. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= AUDIO CARD ISSUES =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * Sound cards with WAVE IN/OUT interface support is adequate. * The default driver for ESS-1868 WDM driver in Windows 98 doesn't seem like a stable driver. It is HIGHLY recommended to use the driver packaged with the sound card. * Mastro-1 and Mastro-2 sometimes cause PowerVCR to misbehave while performing encoding during long periods of time. Both of them also causes PowerVCR performance degradation. * The following sound cards/chips are compatible with PowerVCR: ISA cards : SB16, SB16PnP, AW35/Pro, YAMAHA 719, FM801, Crystal 4237B, Opti 931 ESS 1868 (Non-WDM driver) ESS 1869 PCI cards : SB PCI64, SB PCI128, SB Live!, YAMAHA 724, Crystal 4622, Trident 4DWAVE =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= VIDEO RECORDER =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * PowerVCR generates video and audio files respectively and mixes them after the user presses the STOP button. Consequently, if the user performs 10 minutes of recording, HD space with 20 minutes of recording time size is needed. But, the overhead HD space will be released after recording wraps up. * Using "Constant Quality" profile to perform 352 x 240 frame size with 30 frames/sec recording, 20MB data will be generated every minute. As the result, to perform 10 minutes recording, 20 x 10 x 2 = 400 MB HD space is required. * Using "VCD (NTSC)" profile to perform 352 x 240 frame size with 30 frames/sec recording, 10MB data will be generated every minute. As the result, to perform 10 minutes recording, 10 x 10 x 2 = 200 MB HD space is required. * PowerVCR will probably misbehave when opening files that are not generated by PowerVCR and then performs concatenating recording. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= VIDEO CONVERTER =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * PowerVCR currently only supports .avi files conversion to .mpg files. * PowerVCR converts .avi files through Windows ICM and ACM runtime libraries. If your .avi files are not properly converted by PowerVCR, right click on this file in File Manager to check its properties. If there is any unknown code, it is not supported by PowerVCR. * If the above problem has occurred, please install the "INTEL Indeo A/V playback drivers" that come with the PowerVCR setup CD, or download from the following URL: http://developer.intel.com/ial/indeo/video/driver.htm =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= VIDEO EDITOR =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * Currently, PowerVCR only provides common editing functions on .mpg files which are generated by PowerVCR. * In video editor, PowerVCR will not detect the attributes of input clips. Users are advised to merge video clips produced from the same profile. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Check whether your system has DirectXMedia V6 and Indeo Codec installed =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= 1. PowerVCR needs Microsoft DirectXMedia V6 software to playback video files. To check whether your system has the aforementioned software installed, follow the instructions below: (1) Go to Windows\System directory (2) Find the file "QUARTZ.DLL" (3) Right click on this file, and choose "Properties" (4) Click on the "Version" tab and check if it is version 6 or above. 2. PowerVCR's video converter utilizes Windows system codec to convert special AVI video formats to MPEG such as Intel's Indeo codec. There are many AVI files that have been created by Indeo codec, but Windows 98 does not install such codec by default. To check whether your system has Indeo codec installed, follow the instructions below: (1) Click on "StartŪControl Panel". Then double-click on "Multimedia." (2) Click on the "Device" tab and select "Video Codecs" from the list. (3) If "Indeo Video" is on the list, Indeo Codec is installed in your system. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= TECHNICAL SUPPORT =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= If you have any problems or comments about PowerVCR, feel free to contact us. Tel : +886-2-8667-1298 ext. Customer Support. Fax : +886-2-8667-1300 E-mail : powervcr@cyberlink.com.tw URL : www.cyberlink.com.tw -------------------------------------------------------------------------