Eureka!

I have been having a seemingly unsolvable problem with my Samsung digital camcorder, which I had used to record clips of video during my recent Myanmar trip. It uses a mini DVD+RW disc, which is double sided.

Everytime you use a new disc, it is mandatory that you format it the way you want to record and subsequently view it. Likewise, once you’re done recording on that side of the disc, there is another process called ‘finalizing’, which essentially means putting a ‘full-stop’ to the end of the recording.

I used a total of 3 discs (or 6 sides) for my recordings in Myanmar, but I was not able to finalize all of it. ‘Disc Error’ was all that’s stated on the LCD screen. You see, without finalizing the discs, you will not be able to put the disc into a DVD Rom drive on the computer and view the clips, much less try and edit the videos by compiling selected clips.

I had to make my way down to the Samsung service centre, which is located in a faraway land called Jurong East. I had enthusiastically traveled there, only to be told by the Samsung technician that he has no idea how to fix this problem. That only further affirmed my resolution not to invest in Samsung products in the future.

Both days of last weekend was mainly spent at the oh-so-famous Sim Lim Square, a place where you’d find solutions to almost anything. They should adopt this tagline and give me some credits for it. =D

On Saturday, I naively purchased this ordinary cable which joins my camcorder’s AV/S port to the USB port of a computer. As I expected, it failed to work, simply because the cable does not support data transfer.

So I continued doing research on how I can fix this problem and then I came across a website saying that you could use a device called ‘TV Tuner Card’. What this does is that it can capture live television programmes and you can choose to record whichever segment you want to record. Hence, I took the trouble to go back to Sim Lim Square again on Sunday, thinking of buying it. But there was a more suitable product – ‘Video Capture Card’ - which I eventually purchased.

I was crossing my fingers when I made the payment, hoping that the hefty investment would be paid off. And boy it did! The software could actually capture whatever that appears on the camcorder’s LCD screen on the computer and you can record as you play it on the camcorder. Not only that, it comes with video editing software which I have yet to explore.

And there! A problem solved! A problem which even the technician and several camcorder dealers at Sim Lim Square had to scratch their heads about.

Three cheers for me!