Game Capture HD60 - Next Generation Gameplay Sharing for Playstation 4, Xbox One & Xbox 360, 1080p quality with 60 fps

Customer service review below product review Ok so I took a while to get back to this and here is my updated review. The product itself is great. Its powerful, easy to use, and gets the job done right. I have had a few unresolved issues with recording time, but as long as I don't record for over an hour its fine for me. I have had multiple elgato capture systems and have loved every one of them. With that being said I still have resentment towards the elgato customer service system. I don't hate them but I try to avoid calling or contacting if at all possible and try to find a solution myself. You can read the customer service review below to see why. Overall this is a great product that I throughly enjoy. CUSTOMER SERVICE REVIEW 2015 My 1 star rating is not related to the hardware. The reason I have decided to take my time and give this product a 1 star rating is due to the extremely disappointing interactions I have had with the tech support department. I have had slight issues with the software in the past and have had the issues resolved in the past through their tech support dept with relative ease and in a timely manner. However, when I contacted the elgato tech support dept on Sep 17 of 2015 I began my troubleshooting procedures with the representative that was assisting me through email. This particular problem was apparently rare and had the technicians just as confused as me. Well we emailed back and fourth until I received an email on Oct 2 requesting a sample file to be re sent through their eye tv reporter to get a better look at the issue. I replied with a message saying that I had sent the file to them. Well some days passed without a word so I decided to send an email to ask if anything had been found out yet. No response. I waited 2 weeks and sent another email requesting a response (at this point I was frustrated and just wanted to know what was going on). After getting no reply for a few more days I decided to open another case hoping to get someone who could help me. All I received was an automated email saying that I would get a reply within 2 to 3 days. I replied saying that I have been having communication issues and would like to know why. All I got was another email with the exact same automated response. It is now Oct 26 and I still have not heard anything from anyone at Elgato and my issue still persists. Due to this distasteful interaction I am seriously considering to stop supporting and promoting the Elgato brand and going to another capture device if my issue is not resolved soon. The device itself is powerful, HOWEVER if you have an unusual or complicated problem, I hope that you know a lot about programming or the Elgato hardware because you will be on your own.

The Elgato Game Capture HD60 is a fantastic piece of equipment and a must-have for anyone looking to capture video console gameplay videos. The hardware itself is small and sleek. Most should find it completely unobtrusive even when left attached to your console (though there may be some minor issues with video if you do this – see below). Installation and set-up are both a breeze. The HD60 only has HDMI input, but any console from the “current” generation (WiiU, XB1, PS4) has HDMI out. Just hook your console’s HDMI output to the HD60’s input, use the supplied HDMI cable (or any other you own) to connect the HD60 to your TV, and then the supplied 80-inch USB cable to connect the HD60 to your computer. You’ll need to download the software from the Elgato website, but once that’s done you’re set. Once the HD60 starts sending video to your computer, the Elgato software acts like a DVR. You need not worry about missing any critical moment you want to capture. Just play your game and then you may rewind the live preview back to the point you want to save. Press the record button and it will automatically save the previous video and record from that point on. Once you have your video recorded, the software has a basic video editor and exporter. You can make some simple cuts to your video before exporting it to your hard drive in MP4 format, YouTube, Facebook, or Twitter. While the video recorded is not “raw” uncompressed video the quality (especially at 1080p) is excellent and no real degradation is noticeable. My computer is actually below their minimum specs (my CPU is an i7-930; minimum is a second-gen Intel core i5) but it can still record 1080p at 60fps. One small issue noted above is that if you use this with a Wii U and leave it connected to your Wii U and television you will notice that unless you have the HD60 connected to your TV and the Elgato software is running, the image is a little washed out and the blacks are not as dark. This is because the Wii U always outputs in “limited” RGB, but the Elgato, by default, outputs in “full” RGB. This means that, for example, what the Wii U has as its darkest black is actually a lighter shade in full RGB. If the Elgato software is running, you can tell the HD60 to also output in limited RGB, but this setting will only be active when the software is running. Unfortunately at this time there is no way to set the Wii U to output full RGB. Thus if you leave your HD60 always connected to your Wii U and TV, to get the true color range you will either need to adjust your TV or hook up the HD60 and start the software. My computer is close enough to my TV and the included cord is long enough that it isn’t an issue, but it’s something to keep in mind. Other than that, this little device has been nothing short of a game-changer for me. It was my first introduction into the world of video creation and editing and I’m really enjoying this new aspect of my gaming hobby!

[UPDATE] The Elgato Game Capture HD60 works fantastic. It records up to 1080P, 60FPS. The recording/editing software supplied by Elgato is very nicely done. You can quickly cut, edit, record, tweak quality settings, and even upload straight to sites such as YouTube, etc, and you can even change the video settings on YouTube like your bio, tags, title, and more. Overall, I am very impressed with this capture card. The Flashback seems to go back as far as you play.. I've recorded over 2 hours of footage and rendered in less than 10 minutes. (Of course the rendering process depends on your PC speed, but it's pretty quick even for the slower computers.) I don't even see it's there, the Elgato sits nicely on the back of my desk, and is constantly hooked up. Anytime I want to record, I just turn on my Console, open the software, and I'm free to play. It's very simple, yet fascinating with so many options, well done, Elgato. (Oh, and the best part; you can use this on pretty much anything! It uses a USB to hookup to your Computer, instead of HDMI. You can run this bad boy really on anything that can run the software and has a USB port.)

I lowered my rating on this to 4 stars because of the problems with HDCP and home theater systems. It is what it is. I initially had some other problems with this as well. I suspect that like anything else you do not want to use the "minimum" system it says you need. My gaming PC is extremely powerful and of course the Elgato works great with it. I have an HP Envy laptop that is 2.6GHz Core i7 w/8GB RAM and 1TB 5600rpm HD. This works great with this device, and it's hella convenient because I'll tell you what's not convenient: Having my gaming desktop anywhere near my living room LOL. Having a PC in there is just plain ugly. The laptop works great. When playing the video back in the Elgato editor I noticed the audio and video is not synced, yet when playing back the rendered output files they are perfectly in sync. I suspect it is the overhead of the application. The application is slow. The other issue is if you have a home theater system that is modern to work with Blu-ray that means it probably has HDCP enabled output ports and WILL NOT, I repeat WILL NOT be recordable to the Elgato regardless of which console you use or input. Example: My Yamaha mixer HDCP's EVERYTHING coming out of the HDMI output and Elgato sees it as copy protected. Elgato even sees the output of this HDMI splitter as copy protected (When original signal is coming from Xbox One).. This is the solution I am doing.. I have an HDMI extension cable, 1 for each console, PS4, Xbox One and Wii U, going into the receiver, and I have the other ends labelled.. and the consoles plugged into those cables. When I want to record gameplay footage I unplug the console's HDMI cable from the extension cord, and plug it into the Elgato, which is plugged into another HDMI port on my TV. This allows me to record gameplay. The caveat of this obviously is that the audio will be going to the TV and my home theater will not be getting it. If doing live commentary, for me this is not an issue, as I have a pair of Turtle Beach surround headphones I use and usually would mute the TV anyway, so that the game audio does not interfere with live commentary.. However, if just wanting to record footage then you have to deal with not using the home theater for audio. Outputting the Elgato into the home theater is possible, yet when I used the receiver's output in the Elgato's input in standby mode (it will work as long as the app is not open) I heard crackling in the receiver. I haven't tried plugging the Elgato output into the receiver. I am already using 4 out of the 5 HDMI ports on my receiver though. Amazon Fire TV, XBox One, PS4, Wii U. So the 5th would be the Elgato. I have 5 HDMI ports in my receiver though. Not everyone does. All in all this is an OK solution and a good product but I would much prefer a product where pretty much all the processing happened on the device, which would reduce the need for a powerful PC. I like to have my consoles in the living room. Another possibility for Elgato is to produce a product which takes advantage of the Windows 10 streaming of XBox One to a PC and recording that way, if it's not already possible in Windows.

Concatenated version: It's awesome, records 1080p over HDMI at flawless framerates as well as high bitrate, manages source resolution changes in the middle of recording surprisingly well, good audio that's properly synchronized, and doesn't need any excessive cables to operate (low-profile). This is a very good product that is perfect for people who want to record gameplay or any HDMI device that doesn't have HDCP encryption (until Elgato decides to include an HDMI splitter in the recording device or the user has their own). It earns 5-stars as a recording/livestreaming device, not video editing software. A lot more details: The image quality is like the source (check included pic) and he recording bitrate is quite high relative to YouTube's recommendations. YouTube's recommended bitrates for 60 FPS are on the left and my recording results are on the right, also at 60 FPS. 360p: YT~1.5 Mbps | HD60~N/A 480p: YT~4 Mbps | HD60~11 Mbps 720p: YT~7.5 Mbps | HD60~20 Mbps 1080p: YT~12 Mbps | HD60~40 Mbps 1440p: YT~24 Mbps | HD60~N/A 2160p: YT~53-68 Mbps | HD60~N/A You may need some more hard disk space if you decide to record in a higher bitrates/resolutions. Cool thing is that the bitrate is high enough that it would be worthwhile to upsample the video to a higher resolution if you're using YouTube to allow the video player to output the higher bitrate to improve video quality. It should be mentioned that you can record interlaced (I tried 1080i), but only at 30 FPS. It is strongly apparent that the HD60 automatically deinterlaces the video (based off of the output video properties which was set to export at MP4). Major pluses for that. Audio is recorded at around 224 Kbps, with 2 channels (stereo), and with a sampling rate of 48 KHz through HDMI (I was unable to test the 3.5mm jack). Nothing fancy, simple, and sweet. It also allows you to record commentary and audio from HDMI/3.5mm source independently so you can control/modify it in post-production if need be (as long as you don't edit with the built-in software). Livestreaming is extremely computer intensive and your system should be up to par with the mandated specs if you want to, but if your computer can handle it, it's impeccable. Audio control for both game and commentary is astonishing with simple "knobs" with db levels next to them as well as audio monitors. The software is well set up for uploading directly to YouTube and streaming by allowing information for the game you're playing, what level you're on, the title of the video/stream, and the description as well as doing simple tasks like cutting the video and placing it where it needs to be. It's sufficient for say a new YouTube user, but someone more professional or one that yearns for higher quality and options for editing may want better software that can import images and control audio levels post-recording. Lights on the top of the HD60 indicate what is being transmitted to the device and what's happening if you're familiar. I did not have to use it and it tends to be out of sight, but it's helpful if you need to troubleshoot the product for whatever reason or for alerts for if something happens in the software that was unexpected and you can't view it while recording.

TL;DR: With a lot of time sunk into setting stuff up an some extra hardware it works great. Rince. Re-read. Bought this as a "plug and stream" solution. Couldn't be farther from the truth. Let's begin with the fact that the passthrough image though HDMI cable is distorted. Not unrecognizable, but enough to get on your nerves while playing. For some unexplainable reason the same pasthrough image is perfectly fine when fed to my monitor through HDMI/DVI cable. And no, it's not HDMI cable that is the problem, I tried combination of 4 different HDMI cables and image is distorted regardless. In fact, If I didn't have HDMI/DVI lying around from my PS3 days I'd be refunding the card now. As it is, I found a mode that works for me, so I don't want to go the route of possibly being marked as "false refunding" by amazon if for some reason the bug is not reproducible on their system. Continuing hardware problems: It is incompatible with USB 3.0 If you don't want unexplainable BSOD's under win 7, don't even think of attaching Elgato to one. What's more, audio and video tend to stutter if Elgato is on a same USB controller as camera/mic. Have fun managing what is plugged where. Next is the software. I have an i7 2700K and gtx980 machine and it is seemingly not enough to make Elgato's software encode with a camera embedded into the picture. REALLY IMPORTANT: don't even think of using older OBS. The audio will stutter as hell and I was not able to find a solution. Took me couple hours to realize that the only acceptable (and free) solution to stream with Elgato is the rewritten OBS aka OBS Studio. ^^^^ You see all of the above? it doesnt change the fact that the damn thing works marvelously under the setup of: HDMI/DVI Cable 64 bit driver OBS Studio 64 bit Still, as I said, I bought it as "plug and stream" solution so... Elgato, what the hell?

This review is for the Elgato HD60, and for all the negative reviews, I will explain why it hasn't worked for you. 1. Please make sure you have the requirements to run this capture card (MOST IMPORTANT). 2. Make sure you have great internet connection, over 20mbps download and 4 mbps upload speed if you decide to stream (MY OPINION). 3. Downloading other softwares like OBS and sunflower will create lag while streaming, not very compatible at the moment with the capture card. But with the Elgato HD60 with the new software update you can actually connect you mic, webcam and insert an overlay through the Elgato HD60 and surpass any lag while streaming. 4. If you own a next gen console please buy the Elgato HD60 because the old elgato will not be able to connect your mic, webcam or any overlay inserts. Conclusion: Overall this is probably the best EXTERNAL capture card in the market, it's flawless, it does everything i wanted to do and more. I'm a big time streamer, and this device has taken my streaming into a whole new level. Other note: I own a Mac Mini (500gb memory, 4gm RAM, duo processor i5) and it works phenomenal. Also, for MAC users i will recommend if you want to create your own overlays, download from the apps store PIXELMATOR in which is better than adobe photoshop. This will allow you to create an overlay and insert it into the Elgato HD60 for your stream. UPDATE: 05.22.15 i just went from a mac mini to PC Tower, new specs are 16gm Ram, 4.0ghz intel 4th gen i7 and runs on windows 2TB memory. That being said, this capture card is even better when it comes to streaming. Now i can download OBS and make my stream a whole lot better. For all the MAC users, i read an article on the elgato website that states that the ELGATO is not compatible with the OBS on the mac. For all the people looking for a capture card that doesn't have a delay, it doesn't exist. FYI. Specially when trying to capture or stream with a console. You're always going to have a delay time between 1 to 1.5 secs with the elgato hd60.

I was first introduced to Elgato recording software with EyeTV over 3 years ago on my old MacBook Pro with my Hauppauge PVR (1st gen). I loved the software and have been looking for a program for years that provided similar functionality (flashback recording and built-in video editor) on PC for my Hauppauge HD PVR 2 Gaming Edition. No apps that were compatible with the Hauppauge were up to the same quality as the old Elgato EyeTV application. My Hauppauge 2 had been crashing lately, so I made the jump to the Elgato HD60 this week and I was immediately blown away at how great the software is! It's EXACTLY what I've been looking for on PC since I used Elgato's EyeTV over 3 years ago on my old Mac. The application, in my opinion, is the main selling point for this device. It works with no manually setting tweaking required. It's very intuitive and I was able to add an image overlay and facecam within seconds without needing to reference the manual. I then punched-in my Twitch and YouTube credentials, and BAM; I was up and streaming in less than 5 minutes from opening the box! I also love how small the HD60 is and that it's powered by USB. The only criticism that I have for the software is the MP4 file output rendering process. By default, it converts your .ts file to a .mp4 and this is a very CPU-intensive process and the .mp4 file is approximately 2X the size of the original .ts file and it takes a very long time to create the .mp4. It would also be nice if the original .ts file was deleted once the .mp4 file was created, but I don't see a setting for that. There is also a bug in the current version of the Game Capture HD software that unmutes your gameplay/mic in the app if you have everything muted, switch to the Edit panel, and then switch back to the Capture panel. This isn't a big deal, but a minor inconvenience because I have to click the mute button 2X (to unmute and re-mute) to reset the mute. TL;DR: The Game Capture HD software is the main selling point (to me) because it provides all the functionality a YouTuber/streamer really needs in a single app. It's resource-heavy, so make sure you have a decent PC to run it though. The HD60 can record up to 1080p60 at 40Mbps, whereas the Hauppauge HD PVR 2 Gaming Edition is capped at 14Mbps; recording quality is notably better.