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<font size=3>Leila,<br><br>
In MY experience: the easiest procedure for me by far has been a good DVD
recorder with a large internal HARD DRIVE (my brand is Panasonic, good
quality). The recorder takes any input: TV, VHS, analog or digital
camera... Once the recording is digitalized in the DVD-recorder hard
drive, you can then edit it, create chapters, etc., in order to burn
individual DVD's. When possible, choose the best output quality (up to 1
hour in a regular, one-layer DVD). If a single event is slightly
longer than the DVD storage capacity, you may compress it slightly,
rather than slicing it.<br><br>
Then you copy/convert these DVD files into the computer with any of a
number of freeware utilities. I don't work with MAC, but its software
should be able to import any video format. Copy protection usually works
only for commercial VHS and DVD, not for home-made recordings.<br>
<br>
To digitalize audio, all you have to do is connect the audio player to
the DVD recorder and leave the video signal unplugged -- black image.
Then you convert the .VOB files into audio (WAV) with any utility. My DVD
recorder allows me to chose between uncompressed audio or Dolby Digital
(AC3).<br><br>
So, unless you have an excellent VHS-player - computer interface (good
card and software), I would really not attempt to digitalize large
segments directly in the computer. First, there may be noise (audio and
video), coming from the computer's internal circuitry. Second, the
computer is useless or it slows down while you digitalize video in real
time, which is very CPU-intensive. Third, the hard drive gets occupied
with large files. Fourth, TV/Video cards handle faulty input (such as
that of old video tapes) much worse than DVD recorders. Fifth, if
electricity or anything else fails in the computer, you may lose the
entire recording (while the DVD-recorder may be buffering and recording
it -- if electricity fails, it is as you had pressed the STOP
button).<br><br>
In a few words: an external DVD recorder is dedicated -- it is MADE
specifically for this. It copies for you while you work in other
things.<br><br>
A video-DVD has this directory structure:<br><br>
AUDIO_TS (usually empty)<br>
VIDEO_TS (it contains the video, menu, and other files, with extensions
.VOB, .IFO and perhaps some others I don't remember)<br><br>
The .VOB files are the video segments. They are in MPEG-2 format,
so some video software recognizes them directly. Other software may need
conversion. Sometimes even copying the .VOB file to the hard drive and
changing its extension to .MPEG works for editing, though I would only
recommend it if direct import fails.<br><br>
DVD's made in DVD recorders may have a protection system by which they
cannot be directly duplicated, in order to avoid massive copying. But
this is easy to circumvent: You just copy the .VOB and other files into a
VIDEO-TS directory created in the hard drive, add an empty AUDIO_TS
directory and that's it:<br><br>
MY_DVD:<br>
-- AUDIO_TS (empty)<br>
-- VIDEO_TS (with .VOB and .IFO files)<br><br>
Now you have the DVD structure that you can re-copy and
re-burn.<br><br>
One piece of advice, if I may: Also buy an EXTERNAL hard drive for
back-up of all your digitalized files.<br><br>
Another thing you should consider: What use are you going to make of
these DVDs? That is, are you going to convert them to other formats?
(MOV, for example). If so, you should take into account the output
resolution of the MPEG-2 file of the DVD-recorder. For example, my
Panasonic outputs in 704 x 540 (PAL system), which is a somewhat odd,
older resolution (720 x 540 is more common). The video editing program
should handle these specifications in order to avoid distorsions in the
output (for MOV, 640 x 480, for example).<br><br>
Now, if you only want to "mount" the MPEG-2 files in DVD's with
a menu (no subtitling or editing), then your video software program
should be able to import them directly without converting them -- less
quality loss.<br><br>
One last point: If your university can do the digitalizations to DVDs for
free or for a reasonable fee, let technicians do it ;-) .<br><br>
-celso<br><br>
At 15:27 14-05-2008 -0600, Leila F. Monaghan wrote:<br><br>
</font><blockquote type=cite class=cite cite><font size=2>What is the
best way to transfer old VHSs to DVDs? I have a new Mac and a
clunky VHS and TV but nothing to make them talk to each other.<br><br>
all best,<br><br>
Leila</font></blockquote></html>