[tinners]

My brother who is not good with computers wants to copy some VHS camcorder tapes to DVD on his PC.

What do you think is the easiest solution for this, bearing in mind he is a PC novice ?

I thought maybe an external card like this would work
http://www.ebuyer.com/UK/product/8976 or
http://www.ebuyer.com/UK/product/74755 for stereo

Do they capture in AVI and thus need encoding to DVD ? How big would a typical file size be for a 1.5 hour wedding video ?

And what software for burning ? Nero ?

Cheers

[MarkE19]

Originally Posted by tinners

My brother who is not good with computers wants to copy some VHS camcorder tapes to DVD on his PC.

You might find this gets more advice from the people in the 'Camcorders & Video Editing' forum. But I'll see if I can help and I'm sure others will chip in anyway.

Originally Posted by tinners

What do you think is the easiest solution for this, bearing in mind he is a PC novice ?

I thought maybe an external card like this would work
http://www.ebuyer.com/UK/product/8976 or
http://www.ebuyer.com/UK/product/74755 for stereo

These USB devices do work but tend to not offer the best quality. But as you are starting from VHS you may find it to be good enough. One problem though is the sound and video can often go out of sync and can be a nighmare to get back.
Another option is to use a digital camcorder that has AV-in (most don't though). If you already have a camcorder with AV-in then you just plug the VCR into the analogue inputs and the camcorder into PC via firewire. Use any editing software to capture directly to the PC, just make sure you disable 'Device Control' within the capture settings of the program else it will try to play the tape in the cam. Or you could record to camcorder tape first before capturing to PC. This is a good option if you already have the required camcorder, but expensive option if you buy the cam to do this job.
There are also some higher quality, but expensive capture devices such as the Canopus ADVC converters. But they start from around £100 and are only worth while if you have a lot of tapes you want to get onto DVD and at the highest quality.
[QUOTE=tinners;4439350]Do they capture in AVI and thus need encoding to DVD ? How big would a typical file size be for a 1.5 hour wedding video ?
It depends on the software and the setting used. I would think that they will either capture to MPEG-2 or .AVI files. 1.5 hours of MPEG-2 video will be anything around 4.7Gb (size of a single layered DVD) depending on the bit rate used. AVI files will be about 21Gb for 1.5 hours of video.
Even if captured as DVD complient MPEG-2 you will still need a DVD authoring program to make the video playable by a standard DVD player. If starting with .AVI the authoring program will do the file conversion as well.

Originally Posted by tinners

And what software for burning ? Nero ?

Cheers

Nero is a good enough program for this, and can do the authoring as well. Another program that I use and is very easy to work with is Ulead DVD MovieFactory and costs around £30 to buy. The chances are though that if you get the USB device you linked to it will include all the software to get a final DVD, so no other software should be required.

HTH,
Mark.

[tinners]

Thanks for that

Didnt think of the camcorder route.

[jaymac]

most straightforward beg borrow or steal a dvd recorder then worry about getting it on the pc and editing.At least once you have all your tapes on dvd you can then sort out an editing programme

[rickyt]

I totally agree with jaymac with the exception of .....stealing a DVD recorder... :-) , the easiest way is to transfer directly from VHS to a DVD recorder .You could actually edit it "on the fly" , but I prefer to use a PC .Anyway once on a DVD it is generally an easier task to put on to a PC without the need for a TV card or other device to capture . DVD recorders can be bought quite cheaply nowadays and are worth having along side your TV setup.

[senu]

I agree with the above posters
I have a DVD recorder with HDD and ( 2 or 3 PCs with various editing software)
1 or 2 of the software have external breakout boxes which make analogue capture a doddle.
I must say that I find recording to the settops HDD , editing there, then putting them on DVD by far the least hassle free and the quality comparable to PC especially coming from VHS.
The very good PQ from DV is certainly best preserved by PC and clever editing software. Unless extensive editing is desired I cannot really see using the PC as a more beneficial method for VHS

Im sure Jaymac used the word "steal" tounge in cheek but it is true that DVD recorders are more affordable, those with HDDs extend versatiliy in editing and footage off DVDs can be edited on a PC ( if you must)

[jaymac]

Damn it Senu you'll ruin my Street Cred