Hi,

I am extremely new to this so please bare with me.

My ultimate goal is to convert my VHSs over to DVD. I plan on getting a Canapus DVDC-100 to do the conversion since I have read rave reviews about it here on this site. In the meantime though I wish to use what hardware/software that I have to learn more about the process and to produce results that I can later compare to when i have the DVCD-100.

I have a MiniDV camcorder and a computer with a firewire card and Vegas Video 4.0 (trial). I transfer my dv footages to my computer via the fireware card using the Vegas's capturing software. I then use Vegas Video to render the AVIs to Mainconcept mpeg2 with the best quality selection. I don't change any settings at all since I don't know enough to do that. I then use DVD Architect to prepare the DVD and burn it. The result is very good. I don't know if this is the best since I don't have anything to compare to but if this is the best I can do then I am pretty happy. Keep in mind that I did all this without really understand what it's that I am doing.

I have read that many people have gotten great results from capturing from an analog source through the camcorder's pass-thru feature. Unfortunately, my camcorder doesn't have a pass-thru feature. I also believe that people have also gotten great results from recording the analog source first to dv. This is what I have tried. I recorded a small clip from a tv to my camcorder to dv. I then tried the exact same procedure that I described above. The results are bad, really bad. I don't understand why? Can someone please explain to me why I am getting completely different results from basically the same procedure. I understand that the sources are different. Could that be the reason why? How are people getting great results from doing what I am trying to do.
Do you really get the same results from capturing via the pass-thru feature and from recording the source first to dv?

Keep in mind that I am not planning on converting my vhs to dvd using my camcorder but I do want to know why i am not getting good results.