[HLUG] usb video capture

[j michaelson]

hello all,

i've been looking at ways of getting video into my pc. i'm intrigued
by usb devices like this...
http://www.vertexinfo.com/usbmpeg1.htm
...because i could use it on various machines and it looks fairly simple.

has anyone used anything like this before? i want to be able to watch
it, record it and possibly stream the output over a network.

is it essential to get a device that encodes the video into mpeg or
are there versions that simple pass it on to the computer unencrypted
and let the computer do its own encryption? if these devices exist are
they cheaper?

also can anyone reccomend a good program for editing mpegs? i'd like
be able to cut them up re-arrange them and splice bits back in.

thanks in advance
john