Power Mac 8500 Video Capture

MaxHeap · May 17, 2013

I got a free Power Mac 8500 and put 8.6 on it and the video capture is horrible (and my expectations of this machine aren't very high). Do I need the exact restore CD's for machine or is that what I should expect for OS 8 and need to go to System 7. If I do need the exact restore discs or software, can anyone point out a good place to get it (other than ebay).

Thanks.

skateny · May 17, 2013

MaxHeap said:
I got a free Power Mac 8500 and put 8.6 on it and the video capture is horrible (and my expectations of this machine aren't very high). Do I need the exact restore CD's for machine or is that what I should expect for OS 8 and need to go to System 7. If I do need the exact restore discs or software, can anyone point out a good place to get it (other than ebay).

Thanks.

Your rig is going to give you "horrible" video capture, even in comparison to 15-year-old G3s, and no matter which OS you're using.

I don't know of any other resource besides eBay that offers pre-OS X install disks.

MaxHeap · May 17, 2013

skateny said:
Your rig is going to give you "horrible" video capture, even in comparison to 15-year-old G3s, and no matter which OS you're using.

I'm not expecting much at all for this old of a machine. Just seems that I'm missing some type of software or install piece for a $4,000 AV machine at the time to produce such bad results.

skateny · May 17, 2013

Maybe this thread will help.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1236418/

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MaxHeap said:
I'm not expecting much at all for this old of a machine. Just seems that I'm missing some type of software or install piece for a $4,000 AV machine at the time to produce such bad results.

The cost of the machine has little to do with its capabilities when you're dealing with technology that was current seventeen years ago.

Dhack21 · May 17, 2013

Have you looked at lowendmac for system disks? I'm sure someone on the swap group might have an old copy for sale.

Sent from my RM-824_nam_att_101 using Board Express

Hrududu · May 17, 2013

Capturing video on a pre-G3 system can be done without too much trouble. I found the main bottleneck is HDD write speeds. I used BTV Pro software to capture, and write it to a FireWire external drive. Its actually pretty decent video.

Lil Chillbil · May 17, 2013

Bare in mind that my powerbook g3 can capture video thru its firewire ports and can then be edited and burned to a dvd. given that its footage from a gl1 and it takes forever to export. All i'm saying is that it doesn't take much power to "Edit"

goMac · May 17, 2013

MaxHeap said:
I got a free Power Mac 8500 and put 8.6 on it and the video capture is horrible (and my expectations of this machine aren't very high). Do I need the exact restore CD's for machine or is that what I should expect for OS 8 and need to go to System 7. If I do need the exact restore discs or software, can anyone point out a good place to get it (other than ebay).

Thanks.

Duh. The 8500 has horrible video capture. That's just how it is, it's not a glitch.

Of course back in 1997 that was amazing video capture that was worth $4000! But that was 15 years ago. A $400 video card could barely play Tomb Raider back then too.

But I'm pretty sure the 8500 couldn't even do full SD capture. (Wikipedia verifies that while the card could handle almost SD, the actual hard drive was never capable of capturing at that quality due to the speed, so the quality was toned down.)

Lil Chillbil · May 17, 2013

goMac said:
Duh. The 8500 has horrible video capture. That's just how it is, it's not a glitch.

Of course back in 1997 that was amazing video capture that was worth $4000! But that was 15 years ago. A $400 video card could barely play Tomb Raider back then too.

But I'm pretty sure the 8500 couldn't even do full SD capture. (Wikipedia verifies that while the card could handle almost SD, the actual hard drive was never capable of capturing at that quality due to the speed, so the quality was toned down.)

When you compare these machines to the g3 towers you can see why people got so excited. they were the 1st modern processors along with the pentium II

Intell · May 17, 2013

goMac said:
Duh. The 8500 has horrible video capture. That's just how it is, it's not a glitch.

Of course back in 1997 that was amazing video capture that was worth $4000! But that was 15 years ago. A $400 video card could barely play Tomb Raider back then too.

But I'm pretty sure the 8500 couldn't even do full SD capture. (Wikipedia verifies that while the card could handle almost SD, the actual hard drive was never capable of capturing at that quality due to the speed, so the quality was toned down.)

The 8500/9500/8600 didn't have that bad of a video capture. About the quality of a new retail VHS tape played back on a nice quality VCR. With the proper hard drive bus upgrade like a ATA/133 PCI card, they can capture fairly high quality footage. Compared to other computer based video capture systems at the time, it was high end and one of the best. I seem to recall that LucasArts used a 8600 or Power Macintosh G3 (the beige model) to edit Phantom Menace with along with iMovie.

goMac · May 17, 2013

Intell said:
I seem to recall that LucasArts used a 8600 or Power Macintosh G3 (the beige model) to edit Phantom Menace with along with iMovie.

I wouldn't bet on an 8600 being used. iMovie came after the 8600, and of course it would be LucasFilm and not LucasArts.

They also probably used Final Cut Pro or something else professional grade. In no way was iMovie capable of the resolution Phantom Menace was edited at.

Even the Apple capture card on a Power Mac G3 wouldn't be able to capture at Phantom Menace's resolution.

Intell · May 17, 2013

goMac said:
I wouldn't bet on an 8600 being used. iMovie came after the 8600, and of course it would be LucasFilm and not LucasArts. They also probably used Final Cut Pro or something else professional grade. In no way was iMovie capable of the resolution Phantom Menace was edited at.

Even the Apple capture card on a Power Mac G3 wouldn't be able to capture at Phantom Menace's resolution.

Watch the special footage on the DVD's, they're using KeyGrip on a Mac. George even goes on to praise modern (circa 1997) day video editing and uses the word KeyGrip. KeyGrip was professional grade at the time, but not yet Apple owned. The 8600 would have been the logical choice for a powerful machine, with it being the latest and greatest. It may also have been the 9600. LucasFilm likely used a PCI based video import card as the built-in ones on the 8600 wouldn't have been able to work to the required quality.

goMac · May 17, 2013

Intell said:
Watch the special footage on the DVD's, they're using KeyGrip on a Mac. George even goes on to praise modern (circa 1997) day video editing and uses the word KeyGrip. KeyGrip was professional grade at the time, but not yet Apple owned. The 8600 would have been the logical choice for a powerful machine, with it being the latest and greatest. It may also have been the 9600. LucasFilm likely used a PCI based video import card as the built-in ones on the 8600 wouldn't have been able to work to the required quality.

Right. They didn't use the built in card, and they didn't use iMovie, and instead used what became Final Cut Pro, pretty much like I just said.

Lil Chillbil · May 17, 2013

I would like to point out that this movie was edited on a g3 beige

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mp06wyAfdmw

EDIT: and this one http://cinemassacre.com/2013/05/11/the-possessed-mask-of-snix-1998/

and this one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWTdzLUOGN8

Anonymous Freak · May 17, 2013

MaxHeap said:
I got a free Power Mac 8500 and put 8.6 on it and the video capture is horrible (and my expectations of this machine aren't very high). Do I need the exact restore CD's for machine or is that what I should expect for OS 8 and need to go to System 7. If I do need the exact restore discs or software, can anyone point out a good place to get it (other than ebay).

Thanks.

Define "horrible" please.

Do you mean the quality of the imported video? The interface for video capture?

If you mean the quality - yeah, that was what low-end video capture looked like back then. And $4000 wasn't an insanely expensive computer, either. That was MIDDLE OF THE ROAD. (Okay, bordering on high-end.)

Just take a peek at the ads in the Septembet 1995 issue of Byte Magazine. It was their 20th anniversary issue.

Intell · May 18, 2013

goMac said:
Right. They didn't use the built in card, and they didn't use iMovie, and instead used what became Final Cut Pro, pretty much like I just said.

KeyGrip only became the first version of FinalCut. Once Apple bought it, they completely rewrote and reworked it. Suffice to say, it's only the same in spirit.

MaxHeap · May 18, 2013

Anonymous Freak said:
Define "horrible" please.

A lot of stuttering. I was attempting to copy some old VHS tapes with it, which I didn't think would be too taxing. I almost didn't put the price of the machine down, thinking the thread might go on a tangent (and it did). I just wanted to see if there was anything I was missing software or hardware wise (faster hard drive seems to be the consensus). I was comparing the price to the similar 7500, which was only $2700 at the time. My first computer was a brand new TRS 80 III, so I have a frame of reference for older machines and when real AV machines first came out.

Lil Chillbil · May 18, 2013

Here comes the part where Rabidz says you can overclock it

I bet he'll even help you with the thermal paste

Intell · May 18, 2013

Lil Chillbil said:
Here comes the part where Rabidz says you can overclock it.

You can overclock PowerMac 8500s by about 50Mhz. If there's a G3/G4 upgrade card in it, you can even overclock the RAM by about 5-7Mhz. Having a slight overclock from 50Mhz to 55Mhz makes OS X go a bit faster on mine.

chrfr · May 18, 2013

MaxHeap said:
A lot of stuttering. I was attempting to copy some old VHS tapes with it, which I didn't think would be too taxing.

At full resolution? Yeah, probably too taxing. The built-in video capture performance in machines from that era isn't good with the stock disks. Back then, video capture required really expensive disk arrays to get the speed needed to capture at full bandwidth. Remember that stock SCSI drives from that era were writing far below 10MB/sec.

California · May 18, 2013

MaxHeap said:
A lot of stuttering. I was attempting to copy some old VHS tapes with it, which I didn't think would be too taxing. I almost didn't put the price of the machine down, thinking the thread might go on a tangent (and it did). I just wanted to see if there was anything I was missing software or hardware wise (faster hard drive seems to be the consensus). I was comparing the price to the similar 7500, which was only $2700 at the time. My first computer was a brand new TRS 80 III, so I have a frame of reference for older machines and when real AV machines first came out.

I have an OS 8 Disc somewhere.

goMac · May 18, 2013

MaxHeap said:
A lot of stuttering. I was attempting to copy some old VHS tapes with it, which I didn't think would be too taxing. I almost didn't put the price of the machine down, thinking the thread might go on a tangent (and it did). I just wanted to see if there was anything I was missing software or hardware wise (faster hard drive seems to be the consensus). I was comparing the price to the similar 7500, which was only $2700 at the time. My first computer was a brand new TRS 80 III, so I have a frame of reference for older machines and when real AV machines first came out.

Yeah. It's a combination of things. Video files were bigger back then because there wasn't enough CPU for compression (so likely the video is being recorded in MPEG), and the disks weren't fast enough for large video files (like MPEG.) An hour of SD video in MPEG is going to be a few gigs at least, so you can imagine the drive speeds required to write that.

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