1
2 ***********************************************************
3 * EasyCAP USB 2.0 Video Adapter with Audio, Model DC60 *
4 * and *
5 * EasyCAP002 4-Channel USB 2.0 DVR *
6 ***********************************************************
7 Mike Thomas <rmthomas@sciolus.org>
8
9
10
11SUPPORTED HARDWARE
12------------------
13
14This driver is intended for use with hardware having USB ID 05e1:0408.
15Two kinds of EasyCAP have this USB ID, namely:
16
17 * EasyCAP USB 2.0 Video Adapter with Audio, Model DC60,
18 having input cables labelled CVBS, S-VIDEO, AUDIO(L), AUDIO(R)
19
20 * EasyCAP002 4-Channel USB 2.0 DVR, having input cables labelled
21 1, 2, 3, 4 and an unlabelled input cable for a microphone.
22
23
24BUILD OPTIONS AND DEPENDENCIES
25------------------------------
26
27If the parameter EASYCAP_IS_VIDEODEV_CLIENT is undefined during compilation
28the built module is entirely independent of the videodev module, and when
29the EasyCAP is physically plugged into a USB port the special files
30/dev/easycap0 and /dev/easysnd1 are created as video and sound sources
31respectively.
32
33If the parameter EASYCAP_IS_VIDEODEV_CLIENT is defined during compilation
34the built easycap module is configured to register with the videodev module,
35in which case the special files created when the EasyCAP is plugged in are
36/dev/video0 and /dev/easysnd0. Use of the easycap module as a client of
37the videodev module has received very little testing as of June 2010.
38
39
40KNOWN BUILD PROBLEMS
41--------------------
42
43(1) Recent gcc versions may generate the message:
44
45 warning: the frame size of .... bytes is larger than 1024 bytes
46
47This warning can be suppressed by specifying in the Makefile:
48
49 EXTRA_CFLAGS += -Wframe-larger-than=8192
50
51but it would be preferable to remove the cause of the warning.
52
53
54KNOWN RUNTIME ISSUES
55--------------------
56
57(1) Randomly (maybe 5 to 10% of occasions) the driver fails to produce any
58output at start-up. Closing mplayer (or whatever the user program is) and
59restarting it restores normal performance without any other remedial action
60being necessary. The reason for this is not known.
61
62(2) Intentionally, this driver will not stream material which is unambiguously
63identified by the hardware as copy-protected. The video output will freeze
64within about a minute when this situation arises.
65
66(3) The controls for luminance, contrast, saturation, hue and volume may not
67always work properly.
68
69(4) Reduced-resolution S-Video seems to suffer from moire artefacts. No
70attempt has yet been made to rememdy this.
71
72
73SUPPORTED TV STANDARDS AND RESOLUTIONS
74--------------------------------------
75
76The following TV standards are natively supported by the hardware and are
77usable as (for example) the "norm=" parameter in the mplayer command:
78
79 PAL_BGHIN, NTSC_N_443,
80 PAL_Nc, NTSC_N,
81 SECAM, NTSC_M, NTSC_M_JP,
82 PAL_60, NTSC_443,
83 PAL_M.
84
85The available picture sizes are:
86
87 at 25 frames per second: 720x576, 704x576, 640x480, 360x288, 320x240;
88 at 30 frames per second: 720x480, 640x480, 360x240, 320x240;
89
90
91WHAT'S TESTED AND WHAT'S NOT
92----------------------------
93
94This driver is known to work with mplayer, mencoder, tvtime and sufficiently
95recent versions of vlc. An interface to ffmpeg is implemented, but serious
96audio-video synchronization problems remain.
97
98The driver is designed to support all the TV standards accepted by the
99hardware, but as yet it has actually been tested on only a few of these.
100
101I have been unable to test and calibrate the S-video input myself because I
102do not possess any equipment with S-video output.
103
104This driver does not understand the V4L1 IOCTL commands, so programs such
105as camorama are not compatible. There are reports that the driver does
106work with sufficiently recent (V4L2) versions of zoneminder, but I have not
107attempted to confirm this myself.
108
109
110UDEV RULES
111----------
112
113In order that the special files /dev/easycap0 and /dev/easysnd1 are created
114with conveniently relaxed permissions when the EasyCAP is plugged in, a file
115is preferably to be provided in directory /etc/udev/rules.d with content:
116
117ACTION!="add|change", GOTO="easycap_rules_end"
118ATTRS{idVendor}=="05e1", ATTRS{idProduct}=="0408", \
119 MODE="0666", OWNER="root", GROUP="root"
120LABEL="easycap_rules_end"
121
122
123ACKNOWLEGEMENTS AND REFERENCES
124------------------------------
125This driver makes use of information contained in the Syntek Semicon DC-1125
126Driver, presently maintained at http://sourceforge.net/projects/syntekdriver/
127by Nicolas Vivien. Particularly useful has been a patch to the latter driver
128provided by Ivor Hewitt in January 2009. The NTSC implementation is taken
129from the work of Ben Trask.
130
131