Thread: Newbie needs help

Hi everyone been looking at the forum and you all seem helpful guys so here goes the the question!!.

I have a vast collection of archived tv footage on VHS that i have started to convert to dvd in a manual fashion...even with a panasonic ram recorder's editing facilities this seems a bit tedious so im wondering about using the PC with the appropriate software and capture card etc..
Could anyone give me some guidance as to what to buy?.It looks like a minefield out there and advice would be most welcome...or should i just continue with the pause button??

Do you simply want to transfer to DVD or will you want to edit at all?

Thanks for replying....i would need to edit out ads and chop the recordings around into their 1/2 hr or 1hr segments from the tape...it would be nice to get a tight edit from the start and end of the programme.

OK, that changes my answer somewhat.

I know of a great card that will capture from an analogue device (VCR) straight to MPEG2 for DVD authoring. This would have save an enormous amount fo time and so (IMO) would have been worth the extra cash.

But as you will want to edit then you really just need an A2D convertor box to capture the analogue signal for editign in your favourite NLE. These ranghe from about £50 UKP up to, well, loads frankly.

Once captured then edit it and author as you want.

But, if all you want to do, edit wise, is change start and end point then do consider the Matrox RT.X100 because it will do the capture straight to MPEG2 (ready for DVD) in real time and some (if not all) DVD authoring packages allow the change of in and out point. If this works for you then the cost of this card is worth it for the time it can save you.

look at the advc110 from canopus. It is very good quality and if you look around the forums here, there are many out there that would agree.

Thanks guys..im off to do some delving now with that information and prchase what i need..ill post up how im getting on..Thanks again..