I couldn't be any "newbie -er". I have about 1000 VHS tapes I've recorded over the years including priceless family gatherings, including people who have died years ago. I want to back up all my tapes onto dvd, but, the catch is I want to edit and pick and choose what to record. Also I would prefer NOT to do it on my computer, but rather just find a machine that I can put the vhs tape into and record from it till I want to change, and then put in another vhs tape and continue burning the dvd. Can this be done? And if it can, what do I need to buy? I am old pro at recording, editing, and making vhs tapes, but this is all too new to me. I am fairly good at my computer but no genius and certainly no "geek".
it can be done you will have to get dvd recorder and you can feed the video and audio out from the vcr to the audio and video input of the dvd recorder
You could use a stand alone DVD recorder to do this and hook up your VHS to it. But it would be a pain to edit out stuff you didnt want on it. You would have to pause the record button on the DVD burner when a part came up that you didnt want to copy. The easiest way would be to buy a capturing card and capture it on your computer if you want to bebale to edit the video. Or You could still get a Standalone DVD recorder and use DVD-RW to record the VHS to the DVD-RW and then bring the DVD-RW to your computer and edit the video that way. (I suggested using DVD-RW so you can use the same DVD over and over when burning the VHS to it) After you get your video edited on the PC then burn it to a DVD -/+ R media.
I have recently gone through this exercise, transferring only 9 X 3hour VHS tapes to 9 X DVD5 discs. I have a WinFastXP2000 capture card, my VCR is connected to my comp and the images are captured to my HD in mpeg format, from there I use NVE (NeroVision) to edit and burn my DVD's. Heres a basic guide on how I do it http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_jump.cfm/365772/2173972
I just plug in my Digital Camera into the TV and record away. Anything viewed on screen will be captured to DV tape. At that point I import it into the PC via firewire. I know, my way of doing it is a little slower. But heck, I don't have to spend any money on capture cards...
Pinnacle 10.5 you can dazzle your friends with great looking home movies and titles transations music with jpeg pics you will need a breakout box or pci card to run your vcr tapes to your pc from there you can edit them untill the cows come home Pinnacle is a pain to work with untill you get the hang of it.
Thanks to everybody who has responded and if anybody else has any ideas please post them. I'm learning something new every day. Thanks again.
I'd go (I have) with the standalone (the're cheap these days) over any capture cards. Much easier, more consistant, and you can also record TV. I have an older Pioneer (avoid the Lite-ons and ILO's) and it does a nice job and has a few settings to tweak pic quality. I also finish in NeroVision Express (tick 'enable smart encoding').
