Elgato Video Capture – USB 2.0 Capture Card Device, Easy to Use, Convert Analog to Digital, with VHS VCR TV to DVD Adapter, for Mac, Windows or iPad

I have an old 8 mm Sony camera that used FireWire for uploading the video to a computer. It worked great on windows XP. But when Windows 7 released it was glitchy, and I’ve never been able to get it to work on windows 10. It also has a component video audio out port. That is a small 2 1/2 mm plug that adapts to the yellow red white component video connections. It is an amazing old camera but technology moved away from fire wire. I sent the camera to a high-end camera shop that cleaned and tested it. I read a number of Internet blogs on how to make fire wire work with windows 10. I download countless drivers, tried numerous configurations, and it would not upload video. I finally gave up on the FireWire cable, and purchase the Pinnacle Dazzle component video capture device. Years ago I had pinnacle studio 14 and loved the program so I had high hopes this would work, but it did not. Driver issues and all kinds of glitchy gave me countless hours of troubleshooting to no avail . I was really frustrated! I was really getting worried since I have about 50 tapes spanning 35 years I need to digitize and preserve. Nearly 100 hours of memories. After watching an excellent YouTube video about this Elgato device I took one more chance and purchased it . It’s the best $90 I’ve ever spent. I hooked up the device to the component video on my camcorder, went to their website and download the Software for the capture device. I double clicked the software, and there’s four simple steps. 1. name the video click next. 2. Push play on the camera to make sure the video is coming through on the screen. once you see the video click next.3. Confirm you have sound. You can hear the sound when it comes through and there’s a 2 bar scale at the bottom of the page for the right and the left channel of sound. Once you have sound push the red button that says record.4. Wait for the entire video to play which most tapes can run up to two hours and once the video is finished click stop recording. No joke it’s that simple! They had some nice features like muting the sound so if you want to upload the video while you’re doing other work you’re not distracted by the sound. If you know your video on the cam corder is only a 60 minute tape you can automatically stop recording the video at 60 minutes so you can leave your computer and not have to worry about being there to stop it. There’s another simple area that will allow you to adjust the contrast brightness and other settings of the video to try to improve it. I played with this for a little while but found the default setting is the best for my videos. Depending on your computer it takes a short while to render for finalize the video and store it on your hard drive or which ever device you are saving it to. I have a New computer with the Intel I9 processor and and Nvidia 3070 graphics card and a 2 hour video takes about three minutes to process which is incredible! Each hour of 8mm video takes about 1 GB of memory. In the past two weeks I’ve uploaded nearly 25 of these two hour videos directly onto my NAS! I highly recommend anybody with a component video VHS or 8 mm camcorder or anything with the yellow red white cable that wants to save their memories to buy this device! Spend the $90 for this particular one since Elgato’s capture software is the secret sauce! There are hundreds of these devices for sale that look pretty much the same and there only $15. Don’t get fooled by a cheap price! If pinnacle studio can’t get the dazzle device correct I can’t imagine a $15 cheap knock off will get the software correct. Thank you El Gato! You have a very reliable very easy and excellent product! My children in their 30s and my grandchildren are enjoying watching all of these videos through my Apple TV!

LOVE this product! It works perfectly and it is amazing! I've had it a little over a month and have converted about 10 tapes so far. Transferring my old family tapes to MP4 files has been on my to do list for years. It would have cost a fortune to pay for a conversion service because we have accumulated over 35 tapes in the past 25 years. Plus, I do not trust my tapes in the hands of strangers. The majority of my tapes are the 8mm cassettes from an old Sony camcorder. Downloading and installing the software online was super easy. I just connect the camcorder to the device with a cord that originally came with my camcorder. Then I connect the device to a USB port on my computer. The software is very self explanatory and easy to use. The video plays in the software as you are recording. You can watch it playing on you computer screen as well as in the play back screen on you camcorder. You do have to play the whole tape in real time to capture everything (there is no high speed dubbing like with old cassette tapes and some VHS recorders), but the software has an option to automatically stop recording after a time period you set, so you don't have to sit and watch it while it records. You can leave and have it work and stop on it's own. I have a Windows 10 Dell computer that is about 2 years old. Its not super powerful or anything (I bought it at Walmart for $400). I would recommend not running other applications while you are doing a conversion so the software has full access to all your computer's memory. That may be why others had issues. The converted MP4 file plays fine and is great quality. Sound matches exactly to the video. There are no skips or jumps in the video. (Again, I recommend you do not surf the internet or run any other applications on your computer while these conversions are in process.) In my 10 conversions I only had one fail early on where the software bombed out when it was creating the file after the tape finished playing. I think it was because I had some other applications running on my computer at the same time. Since I stopped using my computer during the conversion, I have not had any issues. In addition to my Sonny 8mm tapes, I was able to convert VHS tapes and DVD's which were played on my old Magnivox VCR/DVD Player/Recorder combo unit. I disconnected the Video Out cords which connected the unit to play on the TV. I used the cord that came with the Elgato device and connected it to the same Video Out connections in the unit and the other ends of the cords to the Elgato device, then connected the Elgato to my computer. You will then see the VHS tape or DVD play on your computer in the software while it is recording since the VHS/DVD player is no longer outputting to your TV. Recording results were the same as my 8mm camcorder tapes. I highly recommend this Elgato device! You will not regret it and you will get your money's worth if you have as many old tapes to convert as I do. Plus, you will have peace of mind knowing your recordings will be saved forever in a media that won't decay like old tapes eventually will.

I just bought the Elgato Video Capture and I absolutely love it. It's dead simple and does exactly what I want. In the box: - Elgato Video Capture hardware - Elgato Video Capture software CD-ROM (for Mac 10.5.8+ and Windows 7) - Cyberlink PowerDirector 8 CD-ROM - Proof of purchase key (on the Video Capture software CD envelope, which I never had to type in anywhere for some reason) - Composite-to-SCART adaptor - Composite video/RCA stereo cable (which is only three feet long, so you may want to invest in a longer cord) Something to keep in mind if you're going to purchase this used like I did, the one I bought came with everything but the Cyberlink PowerDirector 8 CD and the composite to SCART adaptor, so I can't comment on either of those items. But I believe if you have iMovie or Windows Movie Maker, you probably won't need the PowerDirector program. Also, although I don't intend to install this on Windows (especially considering my laptop is running Vista, not 7), I'm very happy that this device works on both Mac and Windows. Setup (I'm using an Intel iMac, running Leopard 10.5.8 with 4GB RAM): Setup was quick and painless: connect the composite cables into the back of the device you want to record from (in my case, the TV 1 area on the back of my DVR). Connect the other ends into the Elgato capture hardware and then plug the USB into a USB port on your computer. Then install the application by putting the CD in and then dragging the app icon into the /Applications folder. Boom, done. The Software: The app itself is very straightforward and I haven't had any issues with it crashing or hanging. The app is in a setup format: Screen 1: Naming the video file and choosing how long the recording will be. The time length option is only for letting you know how many MB the final file will be, rather than a time restriction. Screen 2: Selecting the video input and aspect ratio. Here, you can select if the video input is S-Video or Composite and if the aspect ratio is 4:3 or 16:9. Personally, I would play around with the aspect ratio to get the best looking picture. For instance, even though my TV is a widescreen, I chose 4:3 in the app and adjusted my TV to stretch 4:3 (non-HD) video across the screen (making it 16:9) and that was the best choice for video quality (in my opinion). I used 16:9 in the app to record a 16:9 (HD) video. It really depends, so I would suggest doing a couple of tests with different settings to see what will give you the best video quality. Screen 3: Audio check. Nothing to do here except make sure you have sound. Screen 4: Recording. There are two checkboxes for automatically stopping the recording after 10 minutes and muting the sound (not of the recording but of the playback over your computer speakers) and a large red record button. There is next to no lag time when you press the record button. Also, there's a timer at the bottom of the screen that shows how long you've been recording, as well as how large the file is becoming (which is very helpful to know). A 30 second clip is about 6mb, so make sure you have plenty of space on your hardrive. Screen 5: Viewing and trimming the video. If you recorded too much, you can trim the beginning and end (no ability to trim video from the middle). You don't have to utilize this feature if you plan on editing in iMovie later but it's very helpful if you just want to trim, export and go. Screen 6: Once you make it to this page, the video will export to the location of your choice (which you can choose in the Preferences pane). This screen lists where the file was saved, as well as giving you options to play the video in Quicktime Player, add to iTunes, edit with iMovie and upload to Youtube (the app stays open if you choose any of the options). At the bottom are two buttons to exit the app or begin the process again. The Preferences are also short and sweet: Tab 1: Choose where the videos will be saved, which format the video will be (Automatic, MPEG-4 or H.264) and a checkbox for checking for updates automatically [haven't had any updates (and I probably won't since I'm on Leopard) but I feel better knowing that updates will come in the app rather than requiring me to go searching all over]. Tab 2: Video adjustments (Brightness, Contrast, Saturation and Hue controlled by percentage sliders, which you can adjust while watching the video, before recording) Tab 3: Audio adjustments (Volume) Video and Audio Quality: Here are some screencaps showing the video quality: Screencap of a 4:3 recording (originally 4:3 video stretched to 16:9 on the TV): [...] Screencap of a 4:3 recording (originally 4:3 video kept at 4:3 on the TV): [...] Screencap of a 16:9 recording (originally 16:9 video kept at 16:9 on the TV): [...] I was worried the video quality wouldn't be very good, based on some of the reviews, but I'm very happy with it. It's not HD quality but I didn't expect it to be (you're using composite cables... can't get much better than 480i). It's slightly fuzzy but otherwise, very acceptable for my purposes (I just wanted to archive some clips on my computer, not burn Blu-ray quality video to disc). Compared to the Dazzle DVC 80 I used to use long ago, this is much better. I'd give the video quality a 4.5 out of 5. The audio quality is superb. Negatives (nitpicks, really): - I don't like that the app always creates a new folder in the /Documents folder called EyeTV Archive. There's nothing in it... so why is it there? It's harmless enough but I just hate when programs create folders unasked. - I wish the input source and audio check screens were located in the preferences pane instead of the main app. Once it's set up, I don't need to adjust the input (it is what it is) or audio (I can hear the audio through my computer speakers when I'm on the record screen so I'll know if the audio is working or not). It's just a bit of a waste, having to run through those screens every time. Overall: I fell in love with this device after five minutes and I think you will, too. It does what it says it will and it does it well.

This is a very good product, though ultimately I returned it. There is very little you need to think about in terms of settings, etc.; it basically handles it all for you automatically, and there is a lot to be said for that approach. It will: - decide on the video format (compression format) based on the capabilities of your Mac (you can also do a manual override) - crop the video ever so slightly, to remove the unsightly "overscan" lines at bottom or other edges. - apparently apply mild color/contrast adjustments that make dark areas more visible (compared to the other capture device I tried) - capture the video directly into the final storage format you'll likely want. The quality is quite good, in many cases it is hard to tell it apart from the source material, especially if you are not a perfectionist. For some material -- dimly lit video with detailed patterns like the weave of a carpet -- blocky patches of compression are visible and can be distracting. If you go with the manual override (and have a fast enough Mac), you get to choose from two formats: h.264 at 1.4 Mbps, or MPEG-4 at 2.4 Mbps. They are awfully close in quality for most material--goes to show how good h.264 is, to yield near-identical quality at half the data rate. I found MPEG-4 to show fewer compression artifacts overall, just barely. The Elgato can drop frames (miss brief portions of the source video) if you try to do much with your mac while it is capturing. Turning off auto-sleep and leaving the Mac alone is a good idea. I did extensive comparisons with a Canopus ADVC-55 (more than double the price) and decided the quality was just enough higher with the Canopus to settle on it and return the Elgato. It helped that I got lucky and picked up a used ADVC-55 for $25. The quality differences were visible on still frame comparisons of paused video -- though I'm not sure how valid such comparisons are in the real world (comparing playing video is what really matters of course, but sometimes I do like to pause video to check out stills). When playing the video, it can be very hard to see differences that are apparent in still frames. What a really wished with the Elgato is that it had an h.264 @ 2.4 Mbps setting -- I think that would be an ideal balance of quality and storage size. It's likely the current options already max out the processing capabilities of the hardware, or maybe Elgato opted to not provide a bunch of choices for the user to stress over--again, a lot to be said for that. So, I am going with the ADVC-55. Note that it produces DV format video, which has a more complex workflow: - use iMovie to capture the DV stream from the ADVC-55. - wait for iMovie to generate thumbnails (about 10 min for a 120 min video) (You can stop after this step, but only if you want to use up about 10x the storage space of the h.264 format as generated by the Elgato--a reasonable option actually, if you have the space.) [Although if you want to play the video on the AppleTV (I do), conversion is a must.] - decide if you want to crop the overscan, or just ignore it. - using Quicktime Player, iTunes, or iMovie, save from DV to the final storage format (h.264 for me). Note: I found a QuickTime export eliminated interlacing artifacts ("combing"), while the iTunes 10 "Create iPad or AppleTV version" made a file that showed clear combing artifacts on the AppleTV. Both methods created a file around 2.5 Mbps with h.264 compression. This procedure does produce a higher quality video in the end. If I get a chance, I'll post some clips for comparison.

Like most people who're older than 20, I have a stack of older videotapes of various family events gathering dust on a shelf somewhere in my house. These videos may be dusty because they're not the kind of thing I'd want to watch often, or even regularly. But they DO represent valuable family history that can't be replaced if lost or destroyed, and although they're not something I'd watch often, I want to preserve them. But the truth is that analog video tape degrades over time. Oxide particles become brittle and chip off the tape surface, resulting in degraded picture and sound, and eventually rendering the tape unplayable. What to do? I'd known about such analog-to-digital conversion units for years -- they are not new to the market by any means. But it was something that, in the hustle and bustle of everyday life, I just hadn't gotten around to researching quite yet. However, when my wife sent me a link to a service that puts tapes in digital format for $25 PER HOUR OF TAPE, I figured now was the time to finally get started on this project. I've been using Apple computers since the days of the II+, so the name Elgato was familiar to me already, and after having a look around at some of the other options out there, this was the unit I settled on. Other units either had universally shaky reviews (both professional and user), such as the Roxio Easy VHS to DVD for Mac or they were solutions which cost much more money, designed to be a much sturdier, higher-use product for the a/v professional, not the weekend warrior like me. If that type of unit is really what you want or think you need, there are companies out there who will happily sell you a product that does the same thing as this one, for two to six times the price, such as the Canopus / Grass Valley ADVC-110 Advanced Digital Video Converter - 77010150100 . I'm sure you'll get a wonderful piece of pro-grade equipment which will outlive you. ;o) But if what you need and want is a sleek, compact, easy-to-use (and understand) video conversion unit which has very good quality and that inimitable "it just works" Mac-like interface, look no further than this Elgato video capture device. One thing we tend to forget, in this age of 1920 x 1080 and progressive-scan 1080p and retina display resolutions is that NTSC (which is what virtually all broadcast TV and video tapes were until the advent of digital broadcast) is still only 640 x 480. Always has been, always will be: that's the written standard for NTSC. On one of today's high-res monitors, a 640 x 480 window looks rather small and cheap indeed...nevertheless, that's what all of our TVs' resolutions used to be. The point is that you don't NEED an Avid console to render digital video at that resolution; a small and sleek device like the Elgato is plenty to extract the maximum resolution capable out of the format and convert it to digital. And the interface is - as I mentioned - drop-dead simple. It allows you all the basic functionality you'd need, offering you choices about how you want to store the media after conversion (YouTube upload and import-to-iMovie features are standard), and guiding you through the few steps of the process. Seriously, your mom could do this; it's that well-explained. And, at it's current price on Amazon, you could only pay a professional service to do three hours of tape before you exceeded the cost of purchasing the Elgato and doing it yourself, at your own pace -- and having a solution available to do it again, should you ever need or want to. This one's a no-brainer: if you're looking to convert hours and hours of old NTSC video to digital format where it can be safely stored away from the ravages that afflict analog tape, you really can't do better than this unit. All you could do is spend more, and why would you want to do THAT?

The short of it is to say that I've been unable to use this device no matter what I try (I'm tech savvy, and have tried LOTS of things). The software continues to insist it cannot be recognized. I've followed Elgato's help page regarding camera privacy settings in Windows 10 to no avail, in addition to uninstalls, restarts, deleting drivers and letting Windows find them (goes to a page which won't even open). I've reached out to Elgato via email, because their CS lines aren't open when I need them to be. Based on the other 1-star reviews here, I'm going to guess that there's no work-around, and I'll be offered a warranty refund; you know, because that makes this giant waste of my time okay. WHERE are all the 5-star reviews coming from? WHO are these Windows 10 users who use this successfully and daily? A few minutes online hasn't turned up any for me, and there's usually one supporter in the fold who likes to scream about how dumb the rest of us are for not getting this to work. This is not the first time for me with Elgato either. I bought a game capture device on my old laptop, and it tried to kill my machine ON TOP of not working at all as well. I should have known better than to trust this high Amazon rating, as the other product was rated as phenomenal as well. Apparently I really needed to learn this lesson twice. WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: This company does a great job of hiding the negatives and troubles users encounter. Their marketing is top notch, so you'll want to buy this. If you're on Windows 10, please don't; at least not until you can find an article somewhere they've written which assures Windows users that the latest troubleshoot works. They post help articles which they're fully aware don't fix the problem, and they bug people who write poor reviews (based on my previous purchase & review experience) to no end; clearly hoping they'll remove the review once they have their money back. Run. Run very, very far from this company. Am I upset as I write this? Yes. Is it making me blow things out of proportion? No. It's extremely rare that a serious company will fail you twice over the course of only two product encounters separated by YEARS. But this company has offered me exactly that. I'll be sure to post a comment or update to the review if I actually get help; by which I mean a product which functions as advertised, not a refund.

I received my Elgato Video Capture Device the very next day after ordering. My computer is an iMac running OSX 10.7.5 (Lion). Installing the software was simple and straightforward. After starting up the software for the first time, a message came up recommending that I update to the latest software (version 1.1.2) which I did. To test it out, I connected it to a DVD player. At first the signal was being received and I was able to do a test capture. Turned out perfect, just as it should. But, after attempting a second capture, the signal went missing. I checked and re-checked all connections, tried a second DVD player, and still no signal. I even quit the program and restarted it without any luck. Next I tried the device on my MacBook Pro laptop (OSX 10.7.5 Lion). The same thing happened - Signal received on first try, but on subsequent attempts, no signal being received. So I tried the device on another iMac, this one running OSX 10.6.8 (snow Leopard). The device worked flawlessly, time after time. Ok, so next I decided to go back to using the original software that came with the device (version 1.1.1), and give that a try. Back on my computer, device connected, and running the original Elgato software version 1.1.1, everything worked perfectly! So it appears the their latest software does not work well with OSX 10.7.5. Only version 1.1.1 is working properly. I've been capturing video with excellent results for a week now and I am happy with the performance of device and software, and of the quality of the video captured. One thing I did notice, on very old VHS tapes where signal was less than perfect, the device actually lost signal from time to time. This occurrence was rare and most of my older tapes were captured without any problem. Overall I would recommend this product with high acclaim. It has been performing as good or better than I expected. It is easy to set up, easy to use. The software allows you to adjust video characteristics such as brightness, saturation, contrast, and hue. Audio input signal level is also adjustable. It allows you to save in both H.264 and MPEG-4 formats.

That almost sums it up, need only to add “Impressive little piece of equipment!” My review is not taking into consideration the major differences there are between A/V output sources and the many different types of PC's/software/hardware & setups that other people have.. this is based ONLY on my experience.. My A/V output source is coming from a S-VHS video recorder, yes an antique, with a Satellite dish as the input source to the S-VHS and running over (2) 8-Ft HQ RCA composite cables spliced together.. yes, that's 16 Ft due to the distance from source to PC – which is a 2 yr. old Dell XPS running Win 10 Pro, latest update, 16 GB RAM, 2 TB HD, 64 Bit OS, Intel Core i7 3.60 Ghz. The ElGato (“The Cat” in Spanish.. WTH came up with that name..? lol) PRO's: 1. I'm not a Prime subscriber, but this arrived within 2 days of my order.. WOW! 2. Small size. Came with the install CD, instructions & a bunch of other I/O accessories I didn't even know came with it, like a SCART adapter – ok so maybe I didn't read the whole 'what's included' part, lol. 3. Downloaded/installed the software & drivers from their website, plugged this little bad boy in, opened the app, and.... IMPRESSIVE! There it was. Easy to understand GUI, simple settings, audio & picture quality options, loved the 4:3 or 16:9 choice when recording! 4. I would have used an S-VHS cable instead of splicing the RCA's together, but couldn't find one long enough. At first I noticed some 'interference' lines in the video & discovered it was due to an electronic RCA signal booster I was using. By-passed it and got a clean, HQ video stream. 5. I had looked at some other capture boxes even into the $250+ range but the reviews left a lot to be desired, this one had the best reviews – and price. I tried other capture software but most record in the MPEG-2 format which yields HUGE file sizes and although there's heated debate over it, in the end it seems MP4 is the format of choice, that's what this device uses. The size/rez output of the ElGato is 640x480, but when using the 16:9 Widescreen option it provides an exceptionally decent video & small file size. I use a Pro-sumer AV editing suite to edit so I can easily convert these to higher/lower resolutions as needed. 6. Features a convenient option for selecting the length of recording time, either pre-defined or custom. 7. Tried my first 30 min continuous recording on one of the most CGI/Graphics intensive piece of video I had on hand: “THOR: The Dark World”. The results were absolutely exceptional. The video was exactly as clear & HQ as I saw in the stream feed window before recording. NO 'artifacts', distortions or skips whatsoever & NO audio lag in the entire video, that's just awesome! 8. Just for giggles n' grins I also installed & tried it out on my 5 yr old Asus laptop.. same exceptional results! Footnote: On both PC's I closed ALL windows & Apps (via Task Manager) so the PC's would run lean & clean BEFORE starting any recording so the CPU wouldn't get distracted or bogged down by other background process that might cause 'data skipping' and affect the recording process. CONS: Only one I've found so far. The GUI does not have a “PAUSE” recording option. You have to record the entire length of time chosen & start all over again. To me at least, that's rather inconvenient & frustrating because I might have a 30 minute clip that I'm working with, but only need several 1-3 minute or numerous seconds long pieces of it and with no Pause option I have to record each piece individually & start all over going thru each of the 4 steps of the interface for the next piece. Conclusion: I've been using it daily since purchase & haven't encountered even a single problem. I'm completely satisfied with the consistent, reliable video/audio quality, ease of use, small size & affordable price! (Hint-Hint) Could you guys at El Gato PLEASE add a Pause button to the GUI software..?