Legit Reviews

My parents have some VHS stuff they want saved in a more permanent format (me as a baby, other home movies etc). We are looking to keep the cost to an absolute minimum (i.e. I'd prefer not to buy a DVD/VCR combo as we already have both DVD and VCR and that would involve TONS of rewritable media). We have a Hitachi M270 DA4 VCR (so old it doesn't show up on Google except on Craigslist or MSN Shopping) which was used for years to record things to VHS tapes. I have dual 7900GTX cards in SLI which came with S-Video cables and HDTV out. I don't think this VCR has S-Video out.

What should I do?

check into the prices of having it done by a shop. Depending on the shop, the prices might not be that bad. Aside from that, I have an ATi All in Wonder Pro 9700 that has TV tuner in it that I use to do exactly this. You might be able to find something fairly cheap, as this is an older card now. There was a device called the Dazzle that was used for video capture, but I think someone bought them out and renamed it. You might search google for it and see what you can find, or what might have replaced it. Good Luck, and happy burning!

http://www.pinnaclesys.com/PublicSite/u ... Maker+Plus

I have the Pinnacle dvd maker deluxe, which i dont even see in the wild anymore (got it from woot i think).

I never have used it yet, but I bought it for the same thing you want to do. Only thing i do not know is whether you can record to the hard drive or if you have to record to a dvd, then transfer it to the hard drive. If so, you could always use other video capture software along with the interface to hook the vcr up to the computer provided in the pinnacle box.

Mike

You can do one of 3 things, 2 have been mentioned already (shop or the all in one box). The 3rd option, and this is the route I go, is to get a PVR card or DV bridge, encode all the video to AVI or MPEG2 (preferred), edit the video. Then you will need to get a DVD authoring software so you can build menus and such. The software will then compile the MPEG2 video and menus to VOB files to be burned to DVD.

Either way you're going to need big honking amounts of drive space for the raw video, edited video and the built DVD. If you just need 1:1 copy with no need to edit the video I would suggest the DVD/VHS recorder. Either way you go you're going to have to watch all of it, every second of video, then again to edit it, then again after you compile it. Thats what makes the DVD/VHS combo attractive for the mass amounts of home movies you have to duplicate.

well im about to buy this ati tv wonder 600 usb tuner/recorder...i do see it has the standard red,white , and yellow hook ups tha a vcr normally usees. I read that particular hook up can also be used for recording onto the pc...i havent tried it yet so i cant comment on it..but i figured since it sounds like this might be an option i thought id share the hint..i dont like best buy but i am indeed going there to pick one up..they're about $100 though....but u get that recording function plus the nice ablility to watch tv...standard and high def too...either that or one of those composite to vga converters that run anywhere between $30-$100+ depending on the brand..hell a composite to s-video cable should work as well provided you have he software to run the editing..that would be your cheapest route..bout how well that would work i dont know