davidrg wrote on 2026-01-24, 20:44:

JammyPajammies wrote on 2025-12-30, 21:47:

I've skimmed through and have seen mentions of VCS but I'm not entirely sure what VCS is/if it is relevant for my use case/if it is compatible with VisionAV and can't find a readily available download link right now (the github repos seem to be gone), so I am tabling that for the time being.

VCS should work for your 'source preview' type use case - this is what I primarily use it for too with a VisionAV-HD and its much nicer than the program that comes with the Datapath drivers. As you've found it is effectively unmaintained at the moment, but I believe the latest source and binaries for Windows can be found here: https://github.com/arnoo-sel/vcs - this is what I use on Windows 11, and it works fine. There is source for a slightly newer version here but its linux only.

Thank you I did try vcs, however when I switched to Input-2 'S-Video' for this card, it reported appropriate video signal detected butlocked up both the application and my operating system and I had to pull the power and restart from a hard boot.

I have found that OBS 32.0.4 seems to work with it quite well.

The video capture and audio capture are quite sharp (good input signal makes for a good capture ect..) but the software maps to the expected Video Capture Device and Audio Mixer - Video Capture Device, which is very rare. It seems to be a captrue card "built-for" or properly supported for windows 8.1 and Windows 10 - (even) rarer

The hard parts with this card seems to be;

1. Realizing the card has to be used under Windows 11, 10 or at least Windows 8.1 - or a compatible version of Linux
2. Finding the version of the Device Drivers that has the model 199 firmware included with the device drivers

For me this came from [ DriverInstall_v701.exe ] nothing earlier has the firmware - payload included with the DGC133_WIN10 device driver.

For me using the latest [ DriverInstall_V722.exe ] introduced a driver that was less stable, A.I. advice was that DataPath may have had to make some development choices that favored later cards that adversily affected older cards like this one, or they did not test as thoroughly, or cared by that time. - Which is odd since the internals filesd indicate the driver files were created in 2025, so maybe an automated build process is involved at Datapath?

I have had no contact with Datapath, and merely 'guessed' my way into this situation. The 3D printed backplane rails were a big help.

Again I am only guessing, but the s-video input looks to be going through an RC network to create a composite signal for one of the chips, so that is sad, but its still a great card for the HD-RGB, DVI-I, HDMI and SDI inputs, and the S-Video input is very handy.

The Jumper "must be removed" thing is very odd, but for me, very real.. there does not appear to be any Datapath documentation for why it needs to be removed.

There is Datapath documentation for all the other jumpers in user manuals for other cards, mostly its to individually address multiple cards in one computer.

Kordanor wrote on 2025-12-30, 21:50:

So...I don't quite see how 320x200 can have analogue noise, but 640x480 is perfect.
Is that some inherent issue of double scans?

What do you guys do to get a clean recording of 320x200?

If you are seeing 320x200 come out odd, but 640x480 is great.. then the only issue I can think is noise caused by slightly mistimed sampling (i.e. the number of clocks per scanline, and front/back porch timings).

The 640x480 video signal is very standard, since it was standardized by VESA. But 320x200 is not, so maybe that is being sampled slightly off. Not 100% sure, this is a bit of a guess. I can't think of a reason why 320x200 would have more noise than 640x480 otherwise.

The other guess is that if the two modes are sourced by a different oscillator, maybe there is a bit too much jitter in one or other clock.

One idea that comes to mind is, since you are using OBS - maybe it would be possible to develop a denoise filter into OBS, that would take into account the pixel upscaling. So if 320x200 is being upscaled to 1600x1200 (i.e. 5x6 integer upscaling), then maybe an OBS filter could be used to average all those 5x6 pixels before output. And also quantize back to VGA 6 bits per color channel, rather than 8. That should stabilize noise down by quite a bit.

I don't think it's the timings. I set the sampling to the optimal via VCS for the datapath manually, and used the values Phil showed in his video for the retrotink4k. And both results in the same issue. And as mentioned it happens with two different graphics cards. So it's not like one card is a bit off (which I think happens on some cards/resolutions).

The idea with OBS also came to my mind. My request can be found here: https://obsproject.com/forum/threads/filter-r … remover.186294/
And I also posted about it on the OBS Discord. But unfortunately there is no resonance (not even from someone asking for the same).
I am not experienced with programming OBS Filters. Maybe I could Chat-GPT Slop something together. But that sounds ... painful.

davidrg wrote on 2026-01-24, 20:44:

VCS should work for your 'source preview' type use case - this is what I primarily use it for too with a VisionAV-HD and its much nicer than the program that comes with the Datapath drivers. As you've found it is effectively unmaintained at the moment, but I believe the latest source and binaries for Windows can be found here: https://github.com/arnoo-sel/vcs - this is what I use on Windows 11, and it works fine. There is source for a slightly newer version here but its linux only.

Thanks for the tips! I tried using VCS along with different driver versions and still experienced hanging on my pc when using the software. I later bought a DGC150C (VisionRGB E2S) from just for kicks and it worked out of the box with the whole Datapath software stack, VCS, and OBS. It's wild what proper software support can do for the overall usability of a product. Zero headaches, no weirdness.

Awkwardly, the DGC150C might be a side-grade in latency performance since it seems that on my setup, OBS still appears to have the lowest latency between OBS source preview, VCS, and Vision Window in a side-by-side-by-side comparison. 😅 Oh well, at least using all of the software no longer carries the risk of hanging!

leileilol wrote on 2022-01-16, 14:50:

Anyone got some handy VGA-corrective LUTs for OBS?

Here's my attempt at one (from viewing original.png through VGA capture then attempting to reverse the changes, per channel). Of course, as is the nature of VGA hardware, not every result will be the same.

Great solution!

My cheap capture with VGA2HDMI adapter loses brightness and HDMI2USB distorts colors due to YUY to RGB conversion.

I use Vegas Pro with the Color Match plugin to fixing colors, but rendering takes a long time.

I would like to try OBS with Apply LUT filter.
@leileilol Can you share instructions on how to make your own LUT-file?

Thanks!

Anyone got any recommendations for a Linux-friendly alternative to the Datapath VisionRGB E1/E1S?

I ask because at some point, I plan to work towards migrating to Linux given the current state that Windows is heading. However one of the major hurdles that prevent me from going any further with the migration is the capture card itself. Their drivers are mostly reliant on old Linux kernels and are a pain to deal with. I recall seeing some fixes on GitHub but the fact I am fighting having to compile kernel modules can be a headache on its own. I may try it again on Ubuntu 24.04.4 (Debian-based OSes are my preferred choice of Linux)

Obviously I aim for supporting DOS resolutions and PCI-E since its more friendly to latency and I won't have to resort to using VGA splitters all the time. If possible I aim for budget solutions that won't break the bank, maybe between $50-$100.

THEBaratusII wrote on 2026-03-30, 16:21:

Anyone got any recommendations for a Linux-friendly alternative to the Datapath VisionRGB E1/E1S?

I ask because at some point, I plan to work towards migrating to Linux given the current state that Windows is heading. However one of the major hurdles that prevent me from going any further with the migration is the capture card itself. Their drivers are mostly reliant on old Linux kernels and are a pain to deal with. I recall seeing some fixes on GitHub but the fact I am fighting having to compile kernel modules can be a headache on its own. I may try it again on Ubuntu 24.04.4 (Debian-based OSes are my preferred choice of Linux)

Obviously I aim for supporting DOS resolutions and PCI-E since its more friendly to latency and I won't have to resort to using VGA splitters all the time. If possible I aim for budget solutions that won't break the bank, maybe between $50-$100.

Why not boot an old Linux kernel from a USB flash drive, when needed to capture, and call it a day ?

darry wrote on 2026-03-31, 05:40:

THEBaratusII wrote on 2026-03-30, 16:21:

Anyone got any recommendations for a Linux-friendly alternative to the Datapath VisionRGB E1/E1S?

I ask because at some point, I plan to work towards migrating to Linux given the current state that Windows is heading. However one of the major hurdles that prevent me from going any further with the migration is the capture card itself. Their drivers are mostly reliant on old Linux kernels and are a pain to deal with. I recall seeing some fixes on GitHub but the fact I am fighting having to compile kernel modules can be a headache on its own. I may try it again on Ubuntu 24.04.4 (Debian-based OSes are my preferred choice of Linux)

Obviously I aim for supporting DOS resolutions and PCI-E since its more friendly to latency and I won't have to resort to using VGA splitters all the time. If possible I aim for budget solutions that won't break the bank, maybe between $50-$100.

Why not boot an old Linux kernel from a USB flash drive, when needed to capture, and call it a day ?

Because I find it inconvenient for my workflow.

In a scenario where I want to use my capture card but I'm in a Discord call with friends, I would have to leave the voice chat just to boot to another OS. Better yet, what if I want to stream my capture on YouTube (which meant loading up my VTuber) but also want to be in a voice chat too? That means I would have to reboot to the flash drive and hope that the software would work reliably.

I'm basically not too big into dual-booting just for somewhat small tasks like using a capture card and would prefer to keep most of my tasks under one operating system. If anything I much rather pull off a dual-PC setup just so I can have the best of both worlds without the constant rebooting. (In my case, the capture setup would just use Windows 10)

Problem with achieving that is figuring out how I would go about routing audio from OBS to OBS without issues (like audio delay because I tried a network-based solution like NDI)

On my current Windows setup, I have ASIO Link Pro installed and should be networkable, except ASIO isn't supported on Linux. So unless I can find a virtual audio mixer that can be networkable while keeping compatibility between Windows and Linux, find a hardware-based selection that doesn't cost a kidney but can pull off what I want (behaves similar to programs like Voicemeeter), or wanted to go through the trouble setting up roughly 3-4 PCs with good enough specs that fulfil their purposes each like gaming/capture, voice chat, music, and the VTuber software while having to route the audio to one headphones, having a dual PC setup can be out of the question.

Worst case scenario, I may have to suck it up and deal with Windows 11's BS or hold on to Windows 10 until most of the software I use drop support for it.

THEBaratusII wrote on 2026-03-31, 12:37:

Because I find it inconvenient for my workflow. […]
Show full quote

darry wrote on 2026-03-31, 05:40:

THEBaratusII wrote on 2026-03-30, 16:21:

Anyone got any recommendations for a Linux-friendly alternative to the Datapath VisionRGB E1/E1S?

I ask because at some point, I plan to work towards migrating to Linux given the current state that Windows is heading. However one of the major hurdles that prevent me from going any further with the migration is the capture card itself. Their drivers are mostly reliant on old Linux kernels and are a pain to deal with. I recall seeing some fixes on GitHub but the fact I am fighting having to compile kernel modules can be a headache on its own. I may try it again on Ubuntu 24.04.4 (Debian-based OSes are my preferred choice of Linux)

Obviously I aim for supporting DOS resolutions and PCI-E since its more friendly to latency and I won't have to resort to using VGA splitters all the time. If possible I aim for budget solutions that won't break the bank, maybe between $50-$100.

Why not boot an old Linux kernel from a USB flash drive, when needed to capture, and call it a day ?

Because I find it inconvenient for my workflow.

In a scenario where I want to use my capture card but I'm in a Discord call with friends, I would have to leave the voice chat just to boot to another OS. Better yet, what if I want to stream my capture on YouTube (which meant loading up my VTuber) but also want to be in a voice chat too? That means I would have to reboot to the flash drive and hope that the software would work reliably.

I'm basically not too big into dual-booting just for somewhat small tasks like using a capture card and would prefer to keep most of my tasks under one operating system. If anything I much rather pull off a dual-PC setup just so I can have the best of both worlds without the constant rebooting. (In my case, the capture setup would just use Windows 10)

Problem with achieving that is figuring out how I would go about routing audio from OBS to OBS without issues (like audio delay because I tried a network-based solution like NDI)

On my current Windows setup, I have ASIO Link Pro installed and should be networkable, except ASIO isn't supported on Linux. So unless I can find a virtual audio mixer that can be networkable while keeping compatibility between Windows and Linux, find a hardware-based selection that doesn't cost a kidney but can pull off what I want (behaves similar to programs like Voicemeeter), or wanted to go through the trouble setting up roughly 3-4 PCs with good enough specs that fulfil their purposes each like gaming/capture, voice chat, music, and the VTuber software while having to route the audio to one headphones, having a dual PC setup can be out of the question.

Worst case scenario, I may have to suck it up and deal with Windows 11's BS or hold on to Windows 10 until most of the software I use drop support for it.

I am in the same boat. Until I packed away my DOS computers I was using a Magewell HDMI Pro Capture under Linux. It uses a vendor supplied kernel module which obviously makes it not-quite a plug and play solution, but it was working well against mainline Ubuntu/Mint until early last year (when the aforementioned DOS computers got packed away in preference to laptops).

I've not found any capture devices that use built-in kernel modules/v4l subsystem drivers *and* can nicely capture non-desktop type resolutions/refresh rates.

Windows capture build in a small box + route raw frame data via network to a Linux client for display + connect audio to Linux directly.

vvbee wrote on 2026-05-02, 01:24:

Windows capture build in a small box + route raw frame data via network to a Linux client for display + connect audio to Linux directly.

I guess it really depends on how that can be accomplished.

There have been several times where I made attempts to offload my capturing for both my main PC and my vintage hardware using a dedicated box but was met with issues leading myself to revert to doing recordings only through on my main PC using OBS (GPU encoding).

Now here are the two main hurdles I am referring to. The first one is routing the capture via network and I tried a few methods via OBS like obs-teleport and NDI but was met with delays (even on a local network).

The second hurdle (which also conflicts with the first hurdle) is the audio-mixing I utilized. Back then I used Voicemeeter to separate audio between my main PC, Discord VC, etc. Due to the delays, not only I would have to figure out routing the capture via network but I need to do the same to the audio devices and I have yet to find a solution that doesn't unify all the routed audio as one audio device. Nowadays I use ASIO Link Pro instead of Voicemeeter since it has up to 16 WDM devices I can separate things to. It does have networking capabilities but even I struggled getting it to work properly. These attempts were more Windows <-> Windows than Linux <-> Windows however.

But I could do some dual PC (without the networking) setup for the sake of easing the migration to Linux (and off-loading resources) but I would need to figure out a good solution to the audio mixing hurdles without some compromises. I thought about finding a hardware solution that behaves much similar to Voicemeeter but could be routed to multiple PCs. The problem with that (besides the chances of it not being a budget-friendly investment) however is I don't really know what kind of device that fits what I want. (Which would be separating audio into multiple audio devices instead of one unified audio output)