New products for 2009 to convert your old VHS to DVD

Stilton Company – As we now enter a purely digital age in America, one of the problems which remains is what to do with those boxes of old 8mm and VHS family movies.  One option is to buy one of may television based VHS to DVD recorders which copy the tapes directly to DVD, but these options do not allow for digital modification such as adding titles, fancy menus or cleaning up the video images.

There are hundreds of VHS to DVD recorders available, each one with its own unique feature sets and options, but if you want to turn your old VHS and 8mm movies into modern digital masterpieces, you’re going to have to buy a software package for your PC or Mac computer and the necessary adapters cables for your computer.

One of the highest rated solutions to copy those old tapes to DVD and even for storage and playback on your computer is the Roxio Creator 2009 Special Edition with VHS to DVD Adapter.

Roxio Creator 2009 Special Edition with VHS to DVD Adapter
If you’re like me and want the absolute best quality transfers from your VHS tapes to DVD, here’s the steps I took to get the desired results. I’m not writing about how to setup your VCR to your computer; only the settings within the VHS to DVD capture video options.

1) When you launch the capture video option in RC09, always select DV as your quality option. Note that a full 2 hour VHS tape will create a 25 or so gigabyte AVI file, so make sure you have a large capacity hard drive with plenty of free space.
2) Unless the tape is too light or too dark, I would leave the custom video adjustments alone. Your call on these settings.
3) Once the VHS tape is captured, launch the application SYNC IT! within the Roxio Creator user interface. Locate the settings options, and make sure it is set to MPEG2 output (this is set by default, but still check). Now locate the AVI file created by RC09. Drag and drop the file into the Sync It!”eye”. The conversion usually lasts around two hours, so go take a break.
4) Once the conversion is complete, you will have a new MPEG2 file around 4.75 to 5 gigs in size. This file is now ready to be trimmed, polished up and made into a DVD.

Roxio has become somewhat of a standard for home pc disc writing because many OEM manufacturers now include Roxio with new PC’s.  Most Dell computers come with Roxio CD Creator installed, but you will still need to go buy a VHS to PC Converter.  These can range in price from around $15 to $50 depending on the brand you buy.

If you are a MacIntosh user, you might want to check out the Roxio Roxio Easy VHS to DVD for Mac which sells for slightly less than the PC version and like most things on a Mac, is a bit easier to configure and use.

Roxio Easy VHS to DVD for Mac includes everything you need to easily transfer video from VHS, Hi8, V8 or analog camcorders to DVD. Perfect for digitizing and protecting home videos on outdated media. Easy VHS to DVD for Mac supports most analog camcorders, VCRs and even DVD players. Capture video at full DVD-quality resolution.  You can add Hollywood style menus and chapters for impressive results. Edit your captured movies in iMovie to add titles, transitions and other edits. Great for transferring videos to iPod or PSP too! Post finished videos to YouTube or your favorite social networking sites.

If you are looking for a more affordable solution on your PC, another popular VHS to DVD transfer software to look at is VHS To DVD 4.0 Deluxe which sells in the $65 price range and includes all the necessary hardware and software components necessary for the DVD transformation.

VHS to DVD Deluxe  includes a USB 2.0 Video Capture Device, a USB cable and software to convert analog video to digital, or reformat digital video, for recording on DVDs. PC users can either use the capture device interface or connect their digital video cameras and players to their PC to store the video. The VHS to DVD Deluxe  software formats the video for DVD players, Blu-ray Disc players and recording devices. It also supports converting HDTV quality video formats including: HDV, VHS, C-VHS, Beta and other video and audio formats to DVD and Blu-ray DVD.

There are many ways around this problem, and while the conventional hardware recorders do the job, they do not allow for any high tech editing and custom menu creation found in the computer software packages.  When buying a VHS to DVD recorder of any kind be sure to go online and research the product before you buy.