There has been quite a lot of interest in the ad's by Ambery Corporation for their external capture unit with built-in MPEG encoding and TV tuner. Details can be found at http://store.yahoo.com/ambery/exusb20tvtuv.html.
I ordered one of these units and received it within the imte frame that was promised. It is well built, and operated correctly straight out of the box. Although I have just begun using it I have to say that it appears to do everything claimed for it and quite well. I did need to adjust some of the settings that affected the display on my monitor but that may be because I am using an LCD flat panel monitor and not one with a tube.
The software provided is adequate although nothing special. So far, I am pleased with my purchase and believe it will serve me well, saving quite a bit of time.