Digital Home Thoughts: ADS Tech VideoMPX - Digital Video to Go

Installation and First Impressions
The VideoMPX is a small palm sized device with four inputs. RCA audio/video (the standard red/white audio and yellow video plug) and one S-Video input. Installation is as simple as inserting the CD, installing the drivers and connecting the device. Also included on the CD is Ulead VideoStudio 8 SE VCD, a special version of Ulead's VideoStudio which works nicely with the VideoMPX device. The device itself captures raw video and requires software for command and control, compressing, editing and saving the final video.

For my first test I borrowed a friend's Video 8 camcorder to digitize a bunch of old 8mm tapes that I've accumulated from over the years. The VideoMPX comes with a brief manual which describes how to get started with the VideoStudio software and a short description of the various compression schemes. I will get into some more detail of compression options in the next section. I was not quite sure where to begin and a bit frustrated at first trying to figure out which scheme met my needs.

Overall the software is fairly intuitive and easy to use. ADS Tech recommends a system with a Pentium 4 2.4ghz or better especially for DivX compression because this compression scheme needs the extra processing power to create smooth video. While these requirements are not unheard of for new systems, it might alienate some laptop users which seems to me to be the prime market for this type of product.

My laptop is a Pentium M 1.7ghz which is supposed to be on par with a Pentium 4 3.0ghz. I found some of my DivX video to be a bit jumpy at times but acceptable. It would be a nice feature if VideoStudio could capture RAW video and then apply a compression scheme later instead of trying to keep up by compressing in real time during the capture.

VideoStudio has a simple library management system which organizes your clips so that you can assemble them into larger projects later. One of the quirks I found with the software is that if you move the files around it will pop up a warning for each clip and make you re-link each one individually. This could be cumbersome for moving a directory full of clips which I did at one point in my testing.

The VideoStudio editor should seem familiar if you have ever used any video editing software. It has a video/audio channel, video overlay channel, one title channel, a voice over channel, and one music channel. There is a trim feature which makes it easy to strip off extra footage on the beginning or end of a video segment. There are also a ton of effects including the typical wipes, fades and barn doors plus some other fun effects like blowout and shatter.


Figure 1: The VideoStudio software has a simple intuitive interface.

Barring a few minor annoyances, I was fairly impressed overall with the amount of features and functionality of this edition of VideoStudio. It would also be interesting to see how the VideoMPX interacts with other video editing/capture programs.