The more I read the more confused I get.

[roadster3043]

OK. some people say that the ADVC-100 is good for almost every type of capture including analog. Others say ATi, Matrox, Hauppauge or (insert card name here) capture cards are better. Some of the reviews for each product are good and bad, so I'm even more confused.

I just want to be able to do simple but good VHS captures to DVD, and perhaps earn a little money doing that simple conversion until I learn more and can make menus and such later on.

I have a decent P4 3GHz with 1GB RAM,a 40GB and a 200GB HDD. All (I think) I need right now is a good capturing device/card, a good/decent vcr(which?), some good cables(which?) and good software(which?).

OT question: for that simple conversion how much do you think the customer should be charged, the media used plus what?

Thank you for your time, help, and understanding.

[Forum Troll]

Lordsmurf is the resident expert on video conversion. I'd recommend seatching for previous threads he's posted in, or even PM or email him about it.

[guns1inger]

The ADVC-100 converts to DV as it captures. Some people prefer to capture to a lossless compression (eg. Huffy) which can be done by these other devices. DV is pretty good for many sources, as the compression, if done well, doesn't leave many artifacts. It is also a very simple codec to deal with in most desktop editing software.

[jimmalenko]

OK. some people say that the ADVC-100 is good for almost every type of capture including analog. Others say ATi, Matrox, Hauppauge or (insert card name here) capture cards are better. Some of the reviews for each product are good and bad, so I'm even more confused.

I just want to be able to do simple but good VHS captures to DVD, and perhaps earn a little money doing that simple conversion until I learn more and can make menus and such later on.

Pardon the novel, but the following explains how I came to purchase my ADVC-100 - there might be some things you can relate to so I'll go full-detail mode

2 years ago, I had the dream of VHS to DVD. Unknowingly (before I knew about this site), I took some advice from an employee at my local computer shop while I was purchasing a new system, who recommended a Pinnacle DC10+ as an analog capture device, as it was the only one they sold. I never could quite get it to work to an acceptable standard, constantly fighting dropped frames and all the other pitfalls that one could experience. Lesson learnt there, I can assure you

6 months ago, I was where you are now. At the crossroads, knowing what I wanted to do but not exactly sure on what I should use to do it, and how I was actually going to do it. I'd played around with the DC10+, posted a number of threads here and done a lot of searching for people experiencing the same grief I was. I ended up making the decision to cut my losses and start again. I scoured and scoured the forums here and looked up a number of reviews etc, but was still a bit mesmerised by it all.

I'd heard that quite a few people here who I trusted and rated as "knowing their shit" were using the ADVC-100, and the reviews here certainly indicated quite a lot of success, with the odd hard luck story, seemingly hardware-based. So I closed both eyes, bit the bullet and handed over the hard-earned. After a minor hiccup to start with (I got a faulty power supply - well-documented issue on the canopus forums at the time), I can honestly say that tossing the DC10+ in favour of the ADVC-100 was the best move I ever made.

I currently have a digital cable box and my xbox hooked into a VCR, which hooks into the ADVC-100, which outputs back to the TV as well as into the computer. I use the VCR as a free-to-air TV tuner also. So I have the capacity to capture both free-to-air and Pay TV, VHS and XBOX. I was fortunate enough to get plenty of assistance in the early days from John Coleman (aka FulciLives), who PM-ed me a step-by-step of how he did it, and helped tremendously when I asked all those questions that noobs ask. His PMs later turned into this guide.

So where I am now is that I use Windows Scheduled Tasks to co-ordinate the starting and stopping of capturing using scenalyzerlive, follow the guide for editing and "cleaning up" of the signal, encode using TMPGEnc Plus and author using TMPGEnc DVD Author.

I'm one happy camper

[nelson133]

I second jimmalenko, except my experience with the canopus box goes back 1 & 1/2 years. I, too, use it for both vhs captures and also have it hooked intio my digital cable box. The major plus is the simplicity and ease of use, including no synch problems and macrovision removal.
I wasted my money on a couple of other devices first and they ended up in the trash. While I have no doubt that it is possible to get good results with other devices, they all seem to have a learning curve and are more difficult to use. Other seem to find that the DV codex gives them a less that favorable result, frankly, having compared source to output , I can't see any dropoff.
To get the best results from vhs in any case may require the use of Virtualdub or Avisynth to clean up the output, mainly because videotape is not the best video source.
WinDv is an excellent program for Dv capture and it is free. It's major failing is that it doesn't have a timer, once you start it it runs until you stop it. On the plus side of that, I have sometimes ended up with an unintended show from cable that turned out to be a good one i would have otherwise missed. Nyah Levi

[vhelp]

I agree w/ all the possitive comments on the ADVC device

I also found some new understanding (when it comes to VHS) and
this device.

In short.. my findings were like this ...

For VHS sources, when I recorded *my own* stuff to my VCR (has s-video)
from even my noisy Antenna (WB11) in the following recording modes:

* SP
* EP

Both came out great. Even my EP recording (thanks to another thread
that I was reading, and decided to embark on a theory of my own)
.
As I was saying.. The EP mode turned out great too.
.
So, what was the problem I was experiencing w/ VHS source materials ?
They were commercial tapes. It must be in the way they transfer
the video to the tape, that givens the ADVC-100 a headace, (and bad grainy
look) that I started to recommend that you *not* use the advc with VHS tapes.
I was wrong. Cause, the majority of peoples here are using their capture
devices ( including the ADVC-100 ) for pre-recorded tv shows and
other such videos to tape.
.
When I recorded a tv show (last night) in EP mode (worse mode recording, but
people use it to get the 6 or 8 hours recording from their tapes) I captured
it w/ my ADVC and proceeded to encode this to my usual (non-standard) DVD
MPEG-2 format, and play it in PDVD (and burned to DVD-RW disk) it was a
beutiful (ok, same) output recording as I made from the tape in EP mode.
Well, I did (I do) use 9000 bitrate CBR in my encodes, because I want quality,
not longivety. Anyways.. I was quite happy w/ the results and now have a
new chapter in my ADVC-100 's use to add in my wisdom.. and sometimes,
helpful advice. So now I revise my previous comments (past threads, etc)
about the ADVC-100 and VHS tapes. Just don't use it w/ commercial tapes
thats all ..anything else, VHS'wise, and you're good (or great) to go :P
..so far.

Anywasy, but for those that have tons of EP recorded tapes that they
want to get onto DVD's, this device is THE BOMB for it
.
Some day, I'll post a GUIDE, but for the moment, I'm still BETA testing all
my theories and techniques and other things.., and until I'm *for sure* w/
the above, I'll reframe from sculpturing such GUIDE(s) for now.
But, some guides I'd like to receipe with are: (VHS; and IVTC and a few others)
Anyways..

Cheers,
-vhelp