I'm running Win XP Pro on a 2.66 gig Pentium 4 machine with 1 gig of RAM that has one, or possibly two open PCI slots, but no AGP. I'm now trying to select the hardware I need to transfer VHS to DVD, capture live broadcasts and do PVR type stuff. After reading through posts here and listings in the capture card section for several weeks I still don't seem to find a definitive answer.

I have pretty much settled on the Canopus ADVC-100 (or maybe 300) to do the VHS to DV conversion. As I understand it, no "capture card" is necessarily needed beyond that since DV can just be pulled into the PC via Firewire with the appropriate software, resulting in an AVI file.

It would be handy to have the option of doing a hardware conversion to MPEG-2 during the transfer so I have looked for a card that provides that option through a Firewire port as well as providing a TV tuner. It seemed that a couple of cards would fit the bill and at least one of them looked to be highly recommended; the Leadtek WinFast DV2000 and the V-Gear DV Pro TV. I don't seem to be able to find anywhere to purchase these in the US and think it's possible that they have been discontinued or are not suitable for the US market.

Any suggestions based on personal experience that will help me find a quality card, for use here in the US, with a Firewire port that does hardware MPEG-2 and includes a TV Tuner would be greatly appreciated. You may also be able to suggest other/better options given my limitation of a max of 2 available PCI slots and no AGP. Thanks in advance for your help.