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Can any kind soul guide me towards the best software for downloading my camcorder clips into mpegs through my firewire port.

As the moment I am using Video deLuxe which creates arrangements OK but loses resolution when exporting to mpegs.

I am using a programme called Honetech for editing mpegs which works very well, but it does not capture from my camcorder.

Your resolution will depend upon the codec that you use for your mpeg, and the parameters that you use. I have found that it is possible to get dv quality by using divX 5.0 pro. However it is trial and error to find the best settings to use. Sorry I can't be of more help

Capturing from camcorder in MPEG at real-time is not a good idea. You will get much better quality capturing as DV AVI files then converting them to MPEG with a proper stand alone MPEG encoder program. The best one available for MPEG1 VCD is called TMPGenc, available free at www.tmpgenc.com
If you want to encode in MPEG2 (for DVD, SVCD etc) you will need TMPGencPlus which has a 30 day trial then you have to pay.

Watch out, in the settings window there is something called Motion Estimation Performance. If you are really bothered about getting the best quality you possibly can then make sure thats on HIGHEST QUALITY - it says in brackets (very slow) and it doesnt lie! It takes ages but its worth it.

Editing with MPEG is not very good, and most people would avoid it if possible. Its very slow to work with, and to seek different points of the files. DV AVI was designed more for editing and is a lot faster for editing. I, and I'm sure most other, capture DV, edit DV, send DV back to the tape for backup, and encode an MPEG file from the final edit to be burned to VCD. MPEG1 wil always be worse quality then the DV, thats why I keep a backup on miniDV in case I decided to do something with it later on where better quality is required, like DVD or possibly broadcast.

I use Pinnacle Studio 8 Deluxe and it auto downloads as an avi. Then it can be converted to anything from dvd quality to mpegs for low speed Internet access. This kit is around ?250 but if you have the card then the programme "Studio 8" is a lot cheaper and available from PC World.

To find out about this programme

Thanks everyone - thats very helpful and I have ordered pinnacle.