My OS is XP. I simply want to take my valuable canon optura 100 tapes and get them onto DVD. What is a stable, simply software to use? I was thinking windows movie maker for it's most likely already on my system, or if not I can get it free. Just want to keep it simple, stable and preferably freeware. Thank you for any suggestions.
Your computer needs to have a firewire connection, as does your video camera. Your video camera does, so check your computer to see if it has a firewire connection. You can find out if it does, by going to Device Manager, and check to see if you have a listing for IEEE 1394 Bus Controllers. Get a firewire cable, with ends that match your video camera and the connection on your computer. Usually it will be a 4-pin to 6-pin cable, that you need. For a free software, that can capture from the video camera, via firewire, get WinDV, here: http://windv.mourek.cz/ Capture as a DV-AVI file. You will need a large hard drive, if you are going to be doing a lot of video work.
yes, have all the connections. cable in the mail. 160gig hd. cool, i'll try that proggy you suggest. i have maybe 8 60 minute tapes that i really want to get transferred and burned. i have dvdflick for converting avi. just curious as how the taped info. gets converted. pretty neat. any info is extrememly helpful. thank you
Nero8 does cracking HD capture.. way better than winDV .. It's not very often you hear me say anything good about Nero. I use cinelerra for video editing, but it's not available for mickey mouse operating systems.. If you only want quick cut/join type edits then avidemux will do those for you for free. If you want more features (and this one feels like ulead movie studio in use.. if anybody remembers that far back) and free then how about http://jahshaka.org/ the download links are confusing for somebody who may never have seen sourceforge before.. you want the installer.exe versions.. http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=24035&package_id=32439 the 5th one down doesn't include the player.. which may be better or not.. Don't know.. My version uses mplayer. If you give it a spin (remembering it's still in beta) let us know how it works out.