Computer based video system

Abstract

A computer based system for displaying and compressing video including a video capture card with a video compressor and a bus interface circuit that acts as a busmaster and outputs uncompressed video and compressed video to a computer bus for display of the uncompressed video on the computer monitor and storage of the compressed video on a memory of the computer. The system also includes a software virtual interrupt generator that uses timer events provided by a computer system service and a transfer status indicator to generate interrupts to initiate transfer of a new block of video; an overlay controller implemented in software that transfers video from the video capture card over the computer bus to a graphics subsystem for display in a window on the computer monitor in an overlay mode; a display controller implemented in software that causes display of uncompressed video from the video capture card or software decompressed video; a software controller that compresses audio in software and sends video data to be compressed across the computer bus to the compressor; a controller that is implemented in software and calibrates startup delay of the audio input subsystem and uses the delay to synchronize the audio and video; and a user interactive input mechanism for adjusting the rates of compression within a range of acceptable rates that varies as a function of the output target medium for compressed video.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.