Capture Card with USB or Recorder under $100

So I'm new here and trying to make a decision. Buy a cheap Walmart SV recorder for $79 that I've been hearing good reviews about or get a card to use with my PC that I can just plug into the front USB port and use with my VCR and or analog camcorder . Just looking for more bang for my buck. Figure if I buy the DVD recorder I can just burn to the DVD and edit with programs such as DVD Platinum, Rescue and Shrink that I already have. Will I be able to convert to DIVX,edit,etc with these programs. The only thing holding me back from this is duplicating old videos that might have macrovision on them. With the card I don't have to worry about that. Looking for quality,something that's easy to use and in the price range of $75-$100.

I had the same problem. Wanted to copy VHS tapes to DVD before they were past their sell by date!
I went down the road of a LiteON DD A100x recorder - I'm still trying to make my mind up on this decision since I have had huge compatibility problems. The copy DVD (I tried both + and - and both RW and R) would play on the LiteON (obviously!) and also on the PC but wouldn't play in a Sony PS2 Playstation. It also wouldn't play in a Daewoo Combination VCR/DVD Player but would play in a cheap ASDA (Walmart) DVD Player! After posting on forum and being advised about cheap media etc I finally put it down to the fact that the LiteON records in DVD-VR mode which allows limited editing on the recorder.
My point is if you want compatibility across various player be careful about buying a recorder - I now wish I had bought a good capture card instead.

DVD-R / DVD-VR mode should be selectable from the menu, usually the VR mode is reserved for DVD-RW discs.

But the variability of the blank media is considerable, you just have to experiment with that, and that may be the problem.

To pull stuff off VR mode discs, use isobuster, but you have to register (ie pay) for the full functionality.

My experience with a Panasonic recorder & a Pioneer recorder is quite good in terms of compatability (with the correct discs & record mode set). And there are no lip-sync issues either. Certainly saves time messing about in the computer, which is what you'll be doing with a capture card (like lots of time!)

However, if you're source material is camcorder based, capture using a computer in avi (analogue) or DV (digital) & use a software MPEG encoder; a half decent MPEG encoder will allow the motion search distance to be increased to allow for 'shakey-cam' problems, the results are way, way better.

PN

USB capture devices can be less flexible than a recorder. I own and have reviewed an Adaptec AVC2200 here,

https://forum.videohelp.com/viewtopic.php?t=279460

The problem is that the USB driver is proprietary. The device will only work with two pieces of software, Sonic's MyDVD or Movie Mill. Adaptec changed to a different chip in later production models which did not work with Movie Mill so the only software it would work with is MyDVD. Occasional ( 1 out of 10 ) video captures would have an audio sync problem. Re-record the same tape and the sync problem would vanish. It seemed to an initial condition problem. The sync error was constant and not progressively increasing. I have never had any audio sync error with any brand of recorder in over 1,000 recordings.

The video quality was quite nice however and with MyDVD you can produce attractive menus.

Yes, that is the chipset. I will give your suggestion a try the next time I use it which is not terribly often.

I like the menus that MyDVD can create but it does have some drawbacks depending on the version. I remember an old version ( might have been 4.xx ) allowed trimming off the beginning and end with no re-encoding, then a newer version ( 5? ) would re-encode if that was done, then it went back to allowing the end trims in 6, but editing out from the middle would always re-encode the entire video. I stopped at version 6.

I bough a Cyberhome $79 DVD recorder from Compusa, and recorded with DVD-R or DVD+R/W, so far the discs plays on all the PC and players that I have.

Note : Trutech DVD recorder sold in Target looks like a re-badged Cyberhome.