- Roxio Easy VHS to DVD makes it easy to transfer video from VHS tapes or analog camcorders to DVD
- Turn your home videos into striking DVDs complete with animated menus and fully orchestrated music
- Supports most analog camcorders, VCRs, and even DVD players
- Digitize your analog LPs and cassettes, automatically adding title, artist and genre information to tracks
- Convert audio and video files to play on most popular mobile devices including Sony PSP, iPod and iPhone
I bought TWO of these systems. One for an almost new HP Vista Home Premium 64 bit laptop as well as my very well maintained XP Pro 32 bit (service pack 3) desktop PC. I found it interesting that I had total failure in my attempts to install or use this packages on either computer kind of taking any validity out of the argument, "well there is obviously just something wrong with your PC." But BOTH PCs?!
Of course the next argument would be that I'm just some clown that doesn't even know how to find the power cord on a computer. But in fact I am a sound engineer by profession and have been using all sorts of computer hardware and software since 1985, including Roxio and Sonic Solution's professional line of sound restoration tools (many costing in excess of $10,000) to remaster and preserve many famous early jazz music recordings for major record labels for re-release on compact disc.
That being said, I have never had so much trouble installing or using any computer hardware and software packageeither professional or consumer grade in the nearly three decades I have been using this sort of equipment. This product is clearly being marketed to the average computer user (not rocket scientists) who just need a straight forward, no fuss method of transferring their old VHS libraries to a digital format, either DVD or hard drive. If a guy like me can't make it work, how is the "average" computer user supposed to use it?
ROXIO THECHNICAL SUPPORT TO THE RESCUE!
Obviously early on I decided to contact Roxio tech support to try to work out these problems. I very quickly discovered that the customer support phone lines were exclusively reserved for owners of their "flag ship" products, as they call them, NOT for us "EASY VHS" owners. NO, we would have to resort to the tech support email system or their user forums, unless we had a valid Visa or Mastercard ready to buy their premium phone support.
ROXIO EMAIL SUPPORT:
I have now contacted Roxio email tech support countless times. They would sometimes give me a bunch of Windows settings and parameters to check out to make sure all of my Vista files and so on were up to datea reasonable strategy. Of course they always were. So this didn't solve anything.
But I also received some really insulting emails from Roxio customer support. I always spend a very long time trying to document exactly what my problems were and very accurately describe everything I have tried to resolve my issues. I was surprised, at least at first, when I would receive a generic form letter back with some trouble shooting tips I should attempt (things I clearly described in my emails that have already been tried). But I was furious when I would get these kind of generic trouble shooting emails FOR THE WRONG PRODUCT! How are they going to help make my product work when they won't even pay enough attention to what product it is that I am using?!
ROXIO USER FORUMS:
My only other recourse was to post my issues on the Roxio user forum. I only received one response. It appeared to be from the guy considered to be the forum's "technical guru". In short, the response said that the things I described simply do not happen on properly installed and well maintained Windows PCs. He suggested that I take a harsh look at my PC maintenance practices and be more careful of "the places I go to on the internet."
Having exhausted all other options, I actually took his advice which was to completely erase the contents of my (only 2 month old) Vista Home Premium 64 bit laptop and reformat the whole thing and do a clean install of windows.
After doing this, I went through the Roxio emails to confirm every single critical Windows software component and version that had to be installed as carefully as a NASA pre-launch check list. It should be noted that I did not install ANY software other than the Vista software updated to its most current version.
Then I tried to install Roxio Easy VHS to DVD and it's updates and drivers. I was totally depressed to discover after the time and trouble I took to totally wipe clean and freshly install Windows Vista that it did nothing to solve any of the problems to installing EASY VHS to DVD.
No one seems to have any more advice to offer. I have now spent three weeks of my life trying to get a piece of software to work. Please note that this is just what I have gone through trying to install the FIRST of TWO of these systems that I bought! I have yet to even START trouble shooting the second one of these I bought for my XP pro computer! It won't work at all either.
I have been searching the internet trying to find answers that could make this product work, since the manufacturer, Roxio, can't get it to work and has no more useful suggestions.
Obviously I can not speak for anyone else's experience with this product but I think it is important to mention that I have noticed reviews of it starting to appear all over the internet. The vast majority of reviews I have found for Easy VHS to DVD are reporting identical experiences as mine. In those reviews, some customers are frustrated, other are very angry, and some reviewers on Amazon have actually reported that they have simply given up and thrown Roxio's Easy VHS to DVD in the trash.
After nearly three weeks of trying to install only the first of the two copies I bought, with no answers or resolutions from Roxio and a no returns policy on software form Best Buy, throwing EASY VHS to DVD in the trash (along with my $118) is starting to look like the only option left. I only wish I could get back the nearly three weeks of my life I wasted trying without success to make it work. "EASY" VHS to DVD?? Don't believe everything you read.I recently bought this from amazon. Quality of captured video is not so good...grainy and colors not accurate. But the most annoying issue is that as you are capturing the video, it randomly gives the "PROTECTED SIGNAL" error and stops the process. ROXIO website does not provide much help on this issue. It says this error will appear if you are capturing copyrighted video. But these are my own homemade movies I am trying to capture! What is the point of purchasing this if I cannot use it on my own home videos?? And by the way, good luck trying to get any help from ROXIO on this issue...they don't even want to acknowledge that the problem exists. I did a search on google and found that many people are facing the same issue. So unless and until ROXIO fixes this bug, I recommend against purchasing this product.
Read Best Reviews of Roxio Easy VHS to DVD Here
I am putting this in a drawer hoping updates happen, knowing that I can't return software no matter how crappy it might turn out to be. My bad for buying a new product with no reviews. Never again. It is not usable for me at the moment. I suppose it is possible that there is something I don't know that would help, but good luck finding anything out from the maker, their website, or the "manual" included with the product.The biggest problems are random hard freezes forcing computer shutdown to resolve and non-recognition of audio from VHS tapes (AFTER the program update as well).
The other deal-breaker is, as mentioned in an earlier review, random "signal protected" designation as the home video capture is attempted, aborting the capture process.
The long and the short of it is, at least on my system, this product is completely useless.
Until you hear differently, I'd go in another direction.
Want Roxio Easy VHS to DVD Discount?
Roxio Easy VHS To DVD Not the easiest software to use but the capture device works well. Good bang for the buck but be ready to spend a lot of time figuring out what is going on. As one person said "try this with low priced discs" and when you feel confident you can try the 8.5GB disc. You will burn a lot of coasters getting up to speed with this package. The software is not user friendly and support, well let's just say I received the most help from reading the Roxio Q&A information. This actually saved me a lot of grief and my first install was right on the money. The capture part is easy but the burning can be problematic. So if you have hours, (not minutes) to invest in getting up to speed with this hardware/software package and you have the patience to walk away every now and then, you can make this work. Please understand one thing though, you will not get VHS SP quality perfectly on to your DVDs but you will get quality good enough to watch and enjoy your burned DVDs. I read about a lot of trouble with setting up this software/hardware bundle and it can be. One user on the Roxio Q&A support site did this and so did I; "before you install the software go to the Roxio website and download the upgrades to the Roxio software and the upgraded drivers for the USB 2861 capture device. Then follow the instructions that came with the package. My suggestion is to install the software then the updates "ONLY" after you install the USB 2861 hardware to your computer and all connections to your VCR (power off on both computer and VCR while connecting the hardware) then boot the PC/Laptop and power on the VCR. At least this worked for me. Remember, you get what you pay for and $50 bucks for this package will give you $50 results. Please note that I'm using Windows XP Home, SP3, Intel DG33FB Mobo, with 4GB RAM, 3GB cache on the board, 800MHz FSB memory sticks, on an Intel Core 2 Duo 2.8Ghz CPU and a Western Digital 160GB SATA Hard Drive (kind of small actually), and the Intel DG33FB Mobo has the RealTek 5.1 Hi-Def audio hardware on the board. I tried this with my 5-year old AMD Anthalon 1.2GHz CPU with a Gigabyte 200MHz FSB MoBo with 4GB RAM and was whistling in the wind. One VHS capture used to take about 3 to 4 hours plus the burn. Now I'm capturing 4 VHS tapes within the same time frame (not burning, just capturing). Hope this helps.
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