|  | Posted by Gene on 02/14/07 19:41 
LOL - not a tale, just the absolute facts in my case  :-)
 Gene
 
 
 "Ray S" <mail@mail.com> wrote in message
 news:2yJAh.2935$G23.2638@newsreading01.news.tds.net...
 > Gene wrote:
 >> I got a Belkin F5U503 PCI card in the mail a few days ago,
 >> and replaced an old VT6306 (VIA chip) PCI firewire card.
 >>
 >> I took a 1.5hr LP MiniDV tape & my old Sony PC100 camcorder,
 >> as well as two Sony D8 camcorders at 1.5hr LP and captured
 >> about 20 or so hours to disk with the Belkin F5U503 PCI card.
 >> I had "ZERO" freezes, hang-up, etc.  It was a 100% success.
 >> With the old VIA card, it was constant crash.
 >>
 >> All of the programs like Roxio 9, Sony 7, Nero, etc. worked
 >> without incident. Zero problems.  (I'm SURE some of these programs
 >> have bugs, but I did not find any during the tests.)  With the VIA
 >> chip, I usually froze with all of these programs during capture to hard
 >> drive via the firewire cable.
 >>
 >>
 >>
 >> To make a long story short:
 >>
 >> If you are trying to get Sony camcorder data into a hard drive file
 >> on a PC with firewire (DV , iLink) and you THINK it's your software
 >> and/or
 >> a cheap iLink (DV or firewire) cable - it may NOT be that at all.
 >> It may be the logic in the firewire chip on your motherboard, or
 >> bus card. The logic in the PC VIA chip may be having a timing
 >> problem, etc. with the Sony camcorder logic chip(s).
 >>
 >> I SOLVED my capture problem by simply buying two used :
 >> Belkin F5U503 PCI cards on eBay for a whopping $0.99/USD
 >> each, plus shipping.  That's two cards for < $17 total :-)
 >>
 >> BTW: I purposely chose a really cheap, and long firewire cable for the
 >> tests.  I ended up using a 3' Belkin, but they ALL worked just fine.
 >> Additionally, I did not need any additional drivers, or software - my
 >> Windows XP Pro recognized the TI chip & all was well - just plug
 >> the PCI card in & re-boot.
 >>
 >> CAUTION:  I would ONLY get the Belkin F5U503 PCI card, and no other
 >> card - not even another Belkin model.  The Belkin F5U503 PCI card
 >> is the only one that I KNOW works, otherwise, YMMV. It is not
 >> 800, but I think the Sonys are only 100, so no big deal.
 >>
 >> LOL - hope this helps someone, and that you do not accept the "all
 >> firewire
 >> chips are the same" nonsense , as I initially did:-)
 >>
 >> Gene
 >>
 >>
 >
 > A well stated cautionary tale.
 >
 > While it is true that 'generally' PCI firewire cards are interchangeable,
 > there will always be instances where one of the nearly infinite
 > combination of hardware, drivers, software and devices will produce the
 > most annoying conflicts.
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