Lloyd Pearson
2014-05-22 02:07:04 UTC
Hello Jason,
Although we're no longer using Access Grid, we regularly use Blackmagic Quad and Duo SDI capture cards for other video conference programs.
We've had no problems with them, but having said that there are a few things we've learnt:
* BNC coax quality can be significant: I tested out a box of short random brand coax cables running 720p/50 from a Sony HD1 and about half either gave a black screen or occasional blackouts. There were 3-4 brands of coax which were consistently reliable. As part of my testing, I've strung together several 1-3m coax's, all using BNC connectors and have had excellent reliability for several months. (Some of the heavier coax's were fitted with PL259 connectors but these were unreliable. - A check of the tech specs for PL259's shows they are nowhere near as good as BNC's for higher frequencies, and I suspect were only ever intended for heavier power ratings at VHF.) A colleague in a TV studio said they've had excellent reliability on lengths up to 220m when using Belden B1855A coax with King's brand 75ohm BNCs.
* The settings for SDI capture need to be set in the Windows 7\Control Panel\Blackmagic Design Control Panel\ "Set default video standard as" to the HD resolution that the camera has been set to, and the capture device then also has to be set to those settings. (We normally run 720p/50 8bit for our video conference programs, but 720p/50 10bit works equally well.)
* The SDI out for each channel on the quad and duo cards doesn't run in loop-through mode unless that channel has been opened by a capture program. Amcap ver 9.0 is very useful for this as multiple instances can be run so that each channel can be outputted to other devices or PC's. (I suggest not using Amcap ver 9.2 because it pops up a "please register" message and shuts down after about 10mins.) The mini-converters always run in permanent SDI loop-through mode.
* Changing cables or connecting an SDI source into an SDI output can cause the card to get upset and not handle any SDI, so a restart is necessary. The same can occur on the mini-converters so take care when changing connections. No error message gets displayed if this happens.
* SD isn't output from a Sony HD1 on SDI, but must be captured from the composite or S-Video outputs. (We've used Analog-to-SDI mini-converters very successfully for both composite and for S-Video. Coax quality and length can be very significant for both, particularly for composite.)
* When running SDI capture on older PC's, the processing time is often a bit slow, and any time a Task Manager\Processing\CPU graph hits about 80-90% then you can expect video delays.
* We've used a few Blackmagic SDI driver versions over the last year or two and had no problems.
We're trying to standardise our Windows7 PC's with a quad SDI capture card and dual RGB capture card, with the idea of using external converters for any other format. However we're currently running an 4 x composite video capture card(Osprey 440) as well for a slightly odd reason: We also run Adobe Connect, and the current version we are running seems to have a limit on the number of pixels it can use for video cameras, such that as more cameras are opened, it progressively crops the sides of HD images. However by running SDI HD cameras into an SDI-to-Analog converter and that composite output into the Osprey, no cropping occurs. (We can run multiple instances of Adobe Connect on one PC to get multiple cameras.) Lower quality, but at least all participants on each camera remain visible. Lync appears to do something similar but I haven't done much with that.
Our main video conference room is wide rather than deep, and two Sony HD1's side-by-side can cover it well. We usually run a Sony EVI-D100P SD camera as well for a close-up of a presenter if needed. That requires 3 x PC's when we use some programs such as Scopia or Skype, but SeeVogh supports multiple video sources such as cameras, RGB capture etc and seems to handle them all well.
I can't offer any good suggestions for SD capture. In the XP days we had good results with Belkin composite + S-Video to USB converters, but there seems to be no support for Win7. We did find a Win7 driver but it wasn't reliable. The Osprey 440 and Spectra8 composite capture cards never gave as good a quality as the S-Video, though could be close with short very good coax.
And I'm still hopeful of finding alternatives to the Sony HD1's but the few alternatives have usually had either insufficient remote PTZ capability or insufficient lens width. Suggestions welcome.
Regards,
Lloyd Pearson
eConferencing Specialist
Teaching & Learning Facilities, ITS
University of Otago
Dunedin
New Zealand
Ph +64 3 479 8997
***@otago.ac.nz
From: Jason Bell [mailto:***@cqu.edu.au]
Sent: Thursday, 22 May 2014 11:24 a.m.
To: accessgrid-***@lists.sourceforge.net
Cc: accessgrid-***@lists.aarnet.edu.au
Subject: [AG-TECH] Decklink SDI capture card - SD captuer issues
G'day Colleagues (apologies for cross posting)
I am having an issue with an AG system that I recently converted to Windows 7 and I am having some issues with capturing 'SD' Video on a brand new (well never been opned) Decklink SDI capture card.
I have installed the latest 'decklink' drivers, but unfortunately I cannot get it to detect when any SD input is connected.
Therefore, I have some comments/questions that I am hoping the AG community can assist me with.
* The capture card appears to be working fine, as I connected it to a Sony HD1 camera and it worked fine (But this was 'loaned' for another AG system);
* I have tried connecting it to three different - Sony EVID 100 Cameras and one Panasonic Cameras (Panasonic WVCP240 CTV Colour Camera) without success;
* Unfortunately the other IVCE-8784 do not have windows 7 drivers - so I don't have other options;
* Has anyone used a Decklink SDI capture card to capture SD video on a windows system before? I am wondering this, just in case the latest drivers is what might be causing me by grief;
* Does anyone recommend a good 'Windows' 7 capture card that accepts SD video. A single input is suffice.
Thanks in advance,
Jason.
Jason Bell (B.I.T. Honours)
Senior Research Technologies Officer | Information and Technology Directorate
Video Collaboration Champion & eResearch Analyst | Queensland Cyber Infrastructure Foundation (QCIF)
CQUniversity Rockhampton, Building 19 Room 1.07, Bruce Highway, Rockhampton QLD 4702
P +61 (7) 4930 9229 (x9229) | M +61 409 630 897 | E ***@cqu.edu.au<mailto:***@cqu.edu.au>
[Description: Description: Description: Description: Description: Description: Description: Description: cid:85EC7C23-30ED-4B35-AF92-A4F1331360C9]<http://www.cqu.edu.au/social-media>
[cid:EDD230D6-BC0B-45EA-B2AC-0EAB8271B4A5] <http://www.cqu.edu.au/comprehensive>
Although we're no longer using Access Grid, we regularly use Blackmagic Quad and Duo SDI capture cards for other video conference programs.
We've had no problems with them, but having said that there are a few things we've learnt:
* BNC coax quality can be significant: I tested out a box of short random brand coax cables running 720p/50 from a Sony HD1 and about half either gave a black screen or occasional blackouts. There were 3-4 brands of coax which were consistently reliable. As part of my testing, I've strung together several 1-3m coax's, all using BNC connectors and have had excellent reliability for several months. (Some of the heavier coax's were fitted with PL259 connectors but these were unreliable. - A check of the tech specs for PL259's shows they are nowhere near as good as BNC's for higher frequencies, and I suspect were only ever intended for heavier power ratings at VHF.) A colleague in a TV studio said they've had excellent reliability on lengths up to 220m when using Belden B1855A coax with King's brand 75ohm BNCs.
* The settings for SDI capture need to be set in the Windows 7\Control Panel\Blackmagic Design Control Panel\ "Set default video standard as" to the HD resolution that the camera has been set to, and the capture device then also has to be set to those settings. (We normally run 720p/50 8bit for our video conference programs, but 720p/50 10bit works equally well.)
* The SDI out for each channel on the quad and duo cards doesn't run in loop-through mode unless that channel has been opened by a capture program. Amcap ver 9.0 is very useful for this as multiple instances can be run so that each channel can be outputted to other devices or PC's. (I suggest not using Amcap ver 9.2 because it pops up a "please register" message and shuts down after about 10mins.) The mini-converters always run in permanent SDI loop-through mode.
* Changing cables or connecting an SDI source into an SDI output can cause the card to get upset and not handle any SDI, so a restart is necessary. The same can occur on the mini-converters so take care when changing connections. No error message gets displayed if this happens.
* SD isn't output from a Sony HD1 on SDI, but must be captured from the composite or S-Video outputs. (We've used Analog-to-SDI mini-converters very successfully for both composite and for S-Video. Coax quality and length can be very significant for both, particularly for composite.)
* When running SDI capture on older PC's, the processing time is often a bit slow, and any time a Task Manager\Processing\CPU graph hits about 80-90% then you can expect video delays.
* We've used a few Blackmagic SDI driver versions over the last year or two and had no problems.
We're trying to standardise our Windows7 PC's with a quad SDI capture card and dual RGB capture card, with the idea of using external converters for any other format. However we're currently running an 4 x composite video capture card(Osprey 440) as well for a slightly odd reason: We also run Adobe Connect, and the current version we are running seems to have a limit on the number of pixels it can use for video cameras, such that as more cameras are opened, it progressively crops the sides of HD images. However by running SDI HD cameras into an SDI-to-Analog converter and that composite output into the Osprey, no cropping occurs. (We can run multiple instances of Adobe Connect on one PC to get multiple cameras.) Lower quality, but at least all participants on each camera remain visible. Lync appears to do something similar but I haven't done much with that.
Our main video conference room is wide rather than deep, and two Sony HD1's side-by-side can cover it well. We usually run a Sony EVI-D100P SD camera as well for a close-up of a presenter if needed. That requires 3 x PC's when we use some programs such as Scopia or Skype, but SeeVogh supports multiple video sources such as cameras, RGB capture etc and seems to handle them all well.
I can't offer any good suggestions for SD capture. In the XP days we had good results with Belkin composite + S-Video to USB converters, but there seems to be no support for Win7. We did find a Win7 driver but it wasn't reliable. The Osprey 440 and Spectra8 composite capture cards never gave as good a quality as the S-Video, though could be close with short very good coax.
And I'm still hopeful of finding alternatives to the Sony HD1's but the few alternatives have usually had either insufficient remote PTZ capability or insufficient lens width. Suggestions welcome.
Regards,
Lloyd Pearson
eConferencing Specialist
Teaching & Learning Facilities, ITS
University of Otago
Dunedin
New Zealand
Ph +64 3 479 8997
***@otago.ac.nz
From: Jason Bell [mailto:***@cqu.edu.au]
Sent: Thursday, 22 May 2014 11:24 a.m.
To: accessgrid-***@lists.sourceforge.net
Cc: accessgrid-***@lists.aarnet.edu.au
Subject: [AG-TECH] Decklink SDI capture card - SD captuer issues
G'day Colleagues (apologies for cross posting)
I am having an issue with an AG system that I recently converted to Windows 7 and I am having some issues with capturing 'SD' Video on a brand new (well never been opned) Decklink SDI capture card.
I have installed the latest 'decklink' drivers, but unfortunately I cannot get it to detect when any SD input is connected.
Therefore, I have some comments/questions that I am hoping the AG community can assist me with.
* The capture card appears to be working fine, as I connected it to a Sony HD1 camera and it worked fine (But this was 'loaned' for another AG system);
* I have tried connecting it to three different - Sony EVID 100 Cameras and one Panasonic Cameras (Panasonic WVCP240 CTV Colour Camera) without success;
* Unfortunately the other IVCE-8784 do not have windows 7 drivers - so I don't have other options;
* Has anyone used a Decklink SDI capture card to capture SD video on a windows system before? I am wondering this, just in case the latest drivers is what might be causing me by grief;
* Does anyone recommend a good 'Windows' 7 capture card that accepts SD video. A single input is suffice.
Thanks in advance,
Jason.
Jason Bell (B.I.T. Honours)
Senior Research Technologies Officer | Information and Technology Directorate
Video Collaboration Champion & eResearch Analyst | Queensland Cyber Infrastructure Foundation (QCIF)
CQUniversity Rockhampton, Building 19 Room 1.07, Bruce Highway, Rockhampton QLD 4702
P +61 (7) 4930 9229 (x9229) | M +61 409 630 897 | E ***@cqu.edu.au<mailto:***@cqu.edu.au>
[Description: Description: Description: Description: Description: Description: Description: Description: cid:85EC7C23-30ED-4B35-AF92-A4F1331360C9]<http://www.cqu.edu.au/social-media>
[cid:EDD230D6-BC0B-45EA-B2AC-0EAB8271B4A5] <http://www.cqu.edu.au/comprehensive>