Hardware capture cards - info, reviews, purchase?

[TheInformer]

I've seen several hardware capture cards (MPEG-2 and MPEG-1) talked about on the various boards here at VCDHelper, including

Dazzle DVC II
TrueBlue
AIW Radeon
etc...

I know there are many mpre capturing boards than the few listed here. My question is this: where would I go to read about them? See reviews? Purchase? Something was mentioned about a Pinnacle DV500 plus (or something similar) some time ago. Is that a good board? How much?
I'm not looking to spend alot, but I know this can easily get into the thousands of dollars for the higher end solutions.

I'm currently thinking about getting a Dazzle DVC II card or AIW Radeon to help capture video. Somewhere there was a Dazzle Hollywood (?) unit that let you connect your composite cables into it, and converted the analog video from an external source to DV. This unit cost a little more than a DVC II. Would that be a better solution than the DVC II?

So many questions, so little time... ;^)
TIA

[humdinger]

try browsing the 'capture cards' section to your left there. it doesnt contain any professional reviews, but it does contain comments an opinions from ppl who use them on a day to day basis, and a good web shop price compare (only useful in the US though)

[thxkid]

DV500 Plus best out there but will run around $600.
watch on the dazzle products if you are using AMD Duron or Athlon, their web site warns that it not work with these processors.

[Hiei]

Buy the Matrox RT2500 all the way don't waste your money on Radeon or Dazzle.

[numbnuts]

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>
On 2001-10-04 09:17:07, Hiei wrote:
Buy the Matrox RT2500 all the way don't waste your money on Radeon or Dazzle.




</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>Can you explain Why?