I don't know how much Dazzle has improved, but I bought
their Digital Video Creator (DVC) USB version years ago
(prior to Pinnacle buying them). It is no longer
compatible for capture with XP (edit video only). This
product was not all it was hyped up to be. Lots of
problems seen on the message boards depending on what
system you had (DirectX Version, memory, etc). To get your
analog video onto the computer, I suppose you could say it
worked. But as an editing tool to post movies to a 'web
theatre' for others to see or to copy back to tape, it was
junk. Each upgrade or patch affected some systems but not
others. Some would lose the ability to do transitions,
some had the video wiped out after putting it in the
timeline, etc.
I recently bought a SONY-TRV460 ($400 minus 10% at Best
Buy with 18 month zero % financing) which is Digital8
format but is backward compatible with 8mm and Hi8 tapes.
I was able to re-import my analog video from 8mm tapes
using this camcorder via USB stream with greater ease than
my old product, plus I can stream video as a webcam.
Making a movie of this import with WMM2 was a snap. I
also bought a firewire card/cable for about 35 bucks from
Amazon for my future digital imports.
Yes a new digital camcorder will be an expense, but might
be more worth it for the better quality of digital than to
spend half as much on some A/D converter. Also depends on
how old your analog camcorder is. Mine was pretty old and
the quality not so hot. Plus if you get one like I did
that is backward compatible you'll have the tool for
importing built in.
Just my $.02, hope it helps
Steve
