Yes.

Though the Colossus does not have a dedicated composite video connector, just connect your composite video cable to the blue cable on the Colossus A/V cable set. Recordings will be done from the composite video source.

When you playback an Colossus recording on your PC screen, you need a fast CPU and at least 256MB of graphics memory.

Processor Requirements (minimum):

Dual core CPU 2.0Ghz or faster

Graphics with 256MB memory (or greater)

Sound card

PCI Express x1 slot

Coming soon....work in progress.

At this time, there is no Linux support for Colossus.

Yes. By connecting the Component video output from your high definition cable TV or satellite TV set top box to the component video inputs of the Colossus, you will be able to record the TV programs coming from your set top box to the hard disk. Component video connections are normally the Red/Green/Blue connectors on the back of a set top box. Sometimes they are also called YPrPb or YCrCb connectors.

Colossus encodes in real time directly to the hard disk in an H.264 format with AC-3 audio.

There are three formats which you can choose when recording a video:

.TS which is a generic 'transport stream' compatible with many digital media players

.M2TS which is compatible with the Sony Playstation3

.MP4 which is compatible with the XBox360

All recording file types can be used to burn AVCHD Blu-ray compatible disk recordings.

The Colossus files can also be burned onto a standard DVD+R or DVD+RW disk for playback in a Blu-ray disk player using the included Arcsoft application.

Note: Some older models of Blu-ray DVD players cannot play AVCHD files on either DVD-R or DVD+R discs. Check your owner's manual to see if your Blu-ray player is compatible. If it is not, check with the manufacturer to see if a firmware update is available

There are three ways of bringing audio into Colossus: through the stereo audio jacks on the A/V adapter cable, through the HDMI connector or through the optical audio connector on the back panel.

When bringing audio in through the stereo jacks, audio is digitized and then recorded as AC-3.

When bringing audio in through the HDMI connector or the SPDIF optical audio jack, the audio is recorded in the format which is received. If the source provides AC-3 audio, the audio track is AC-3. If the source provides AAC audio, AAC audio is recorded. There is no conversion of the audio format.

DTS audio is currently not supported.

AC-3 5.1 channel audio is preserved if you are creating an AVCHD DVD. If you are creating a standard DVD the audio will be transcoded to AC-3 2 channel. Creating MP4 files will also result in 2 channel audio.

Record high definition video at up to 1080i resolution, 720p or VGA/D1

Record at datarates from 1Mbs to 20Mbs, constant and Variable Bit Rate

Make Blu-ray format AVCHD recordings, so you can burn your TV recordings onto a standard DVD disk (up to 2 hours of video at 5MBits/sec) and playback on Blu-ray DVD players

Make sure you’re gaming system is not set to 1080p. The Colossus does not understand this format. Please set the output resolution to 1080i or 720p. Please see the appropriate setup instructions for your game console:

PlayStation 3 setup instructions

Xbox 360 setup instructions

Yes. In the Arcsoft Showbiz application, once you have your completed video file (from the edit section) ready for upload, simply go to the ‘Produce’ section and choose “Upload to Youtube”. The software will automatically create the .MP4 file compatible for Youtube content and prompt you a screen to access your Youtube account, ready for upload.

If you have an H.264 decoder on your PC or Mac, here is a little video clip (15 seconds) which shows a recording made from a cable TV box through the component video connections. It was recorded using the Arcsoft ShowBiz application at 8Mbit/sec.

http://hauppauge.lightpath.net/support/2011_4_7_13_50_13.zip

If you are a developer, you can bring H.264 encoded video in from either Colossus or HD PVR into VLC so it can be streamed out from your PC. Microsoft provides a sample network transmit/receive filter set in their DirectX SDK.
Here is the way this works:
The HDPVR encoder filter produces transport packets. If you (the developer) create a small 'network push' filter that can receive the transport packets in the directshow graph, then forward them to a udp network address and port (for example udp://192.168.1.1:1234), then VLC is capable of receiving and rendering them.
Start VLC from the command line with: vlc udp://192.168.1.1:1234

Sony Vegas does not detect non-AC-3 audio in .TS or .M2TS files. When recording videos in the Arcsoft Capture module, make sure AC-3 is selected under Format settings. If using Colossus with Sony Vegas, you must use either optical audio (Dolby Digital AC3 audio format) or you must record in MP4 format with AC-3 audio.

If you are using an Xbox360 and want to record TS files, you must use either HDMI or optical audio. You can set your Xbox to output Dolby Digital in System settings / Audio settings

If you are using a PS3 and want to record TS files for use in Vegas, you must use Component Video and optical audio. To set your PS3 to optical audio out, in your PS3 go to Settings / Sound settings / Audio output settings. Select Optical digital and Dolby Digital 5.1 Then use an optical audio cable for recording.

In Showbiz you have to set the default resolution used when uploading. This is done by going to Options; Preferences; Other and selecting the desired YouTube resolution.