Re-Launch Contest #4: Pinnacle Dazzle Video Creator Platinum

[Jason Dunn]

Here's our fourth giveaway, courtesy of <a href="http://www.pinnaclesys.com" target="_blank">Pinnacle</a>: one <a href="http://www.pinnaclesys.com/PublicSite/us/Products/Consumer+Products/Dazzle/Dazzle+Video+Archiving/Dazzle+Video+Creator+Platinum.htm" target="_blank">Dazzle Video Creator Platinum</a>, valued at $89.99 USD. Here's a bit about the product:<br /><br /><em>&quot;You can archive footage directly to DVD or produce movies using the simple, yet powerful editing tools. You can trim videos and add great-looking effects, transitions and background music. Movies can be burned to DVD or made ready for viewing on portable media players, such as the Apple iPod or Sony PSP. The device&rsquo;s hardware encoding produces high quality results without tying up your precious system resources.&quot;</em><br /><br /><img border="0" src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com//dht/auto/1205185577.usr1.png" alt="" /><br /><br /><strong>Here's how to enter:</strong> just post a message as a reply telling me what how you'd use this. What kind of old VHS footage to you have? Or would you capture video from another source? What's the <a href="http://www.pinnaclesys.com/PublicSite/us/Products/Consumer+Products/Dazzle/Dazzle+Video+Archiving/Dazzle+Video+Creator+Platinum.htm" target="_blank">best feature this product has</a>? There's one post per person allowed, and three winners will be randomly chosen. The contest will stay open for entries until April 7th, 2008.<br /><br />Special thanks to Pinnacle for their donation of this hardware!

[Cold Flame]

I could use this to transfer old VHS tapes to digital formats, as well as old home movies too. Plus it will go REALLY well with the new video camera I'm hoping to win in this contest. *winks*

[Heatwave316]

I'd love to use it to clean up my VHS collection. They are taking up space and creating dust. Plus, I could use it for making videos for my Zune!!!

[Neil Enns]

I would totally use this! I have an old ADS gadget thingy (I think I even reviewed it a couple of years ago for the old DMT site) that works reasonably well, but the quality isn't quite there. I'd use it to grab amusing video from my TiVo, which I can't really do any other way.

[ptyork]

I've got a pretty massive laser disc collection. You know those old, dinosaur sized DVD's. Some of them are classics like the last special edition releases of the Star Wars trilogy before they "improved" them with cartoon Jabba the Hut and the like. I've been pining to get these copied to a more modern format before my laser disc player dies. I've tried to do this using my old video card's AVIO capabilities, but I lose a lot of video quality, the audio drops to mono, and it is unreliable because my system grinds to a halt and I end up with choppy sections. So Pinnacle's USB AVIO capture solution with onboard MPEG processing would be an ideal feature. The easy splice features would also be great for getting rid of those disc flips and swaps that are the bane of an otherwise good (if now completely irrelevant) media.

That and of course my just-turned-one year-old daughter's home videos that are sitting precariously on DV tapes would make this a GREAT product for preserving memories and actually being able to view and share them. I've actually got it on my wish list of products, so winning it would be a real boon!

Thanks!

[cmchavez]

Dropping video directly to DVD will be greatly appreciated by the wife. She is always worried that we will lose some family videos using the current copy to the hard drive, then copy to dvd via authoring software. This could empower her to get involved with the archival process of older home videos too! :) (meaning less time for me to spend doing it)

[zeke009]

If I were to win one of these I'd drop this off at my parents right away. My mom has been on my case for years to convert old tapes of family trips and events to DVD, but I never had the time or the cash to do so.

If this device is truly this simple to use, then it is definitely ending up at my parents place.

[jlafount]

I would convert some old VHS tapes I have stored before they begin to fail

[Bob Christensen]

I've been making home videos from trip slides, but I'm still using just Windows Movie Maker. I need something like this to include movie clips and upgrade my product!
The hardware encoding looks like a great feature... would love to see how that works.

Thanks for the contests.

[makicr]

3 children, boxes of old videos. Bring their childhoods into the digital age.

[stan]

I'd use this to record from my ps2 and upload them on youtube:D

[kbpcman]

I would convert my wedding video and videos of my kids from VHS to DVD.

[mcwilliams132]

I have a ton of baby videos on a slowly dying Sony Hi-8 camcorder... This'd be great to offload that into digital format!

[Dyvim]

Make DVDs from our Sony video camera footage to send to family memebers. This has got to beat the included Sony software.

[Reid Kistler]

Yet another vote for the high appeal of being able to convert kid's videos over to DVD - although would include those Home Movies they have made themselves as a major part of the appeal...

rkistler / SE MI

[Joel Crane]

I could plug this into my laptop! The capture card in my desktop is very, very old. I also don't have any good video editing software. This would be perfect.

I'd probably convert all the VHS tapes, as well as capture video of the old 8mm videocamera to make videos.

[dshep2020]

Lots of VHS and Hi8 videos that I need to convert.

[supreme_one3]

I would convert old videos on VHS.

[itsjustme]

Wow, I would do so much with this. My mother taped over 1,000 movies with her VCR and I am who inherited her collection :) Unfotunately they are taking up a lot of room in our small house and I am afraid that they will stop playing soon. This is just what I need to convert them to DVD.

I would also use it to make our wedding video. To cut down on the cost of the wedding I was going to ask certain guests to video it with their camcorders and edit it to make our video. Again this would be perfect for that.

[darinu]

My kids are always making their own movies to post on YouTube. With this they could get cut scenes from my VHS movie collection

[dunneldeen]

I have a bunch of VHS movies made by my parents, and a few made some years ago by me, that I'd love to convert to DVD. I like that it does the hardware encoding.

[follick]

Fun to Share -

Send your movies to portable video players, such as Apple Video iPod, Sony PSP, and video phones.

[mv]

too many old 8mm tapes... this would be great!!!

[mmidgley]

I would use this to re-edit my wedding video, which I currently only have on evil vhs.

m.

[DocGolden]

My wife has a huge collection of old movies on VHS. I'd love to convert them to digital for use in my Media Center

[JPD6825]

I have a bunch of 8mm analog video home movies --- rock them!

[oopl]

Old graduation and wedding videos.
Hardware encoding is great! and direc to DVD is nice.

[andrew_lee]

I'd use this to convert my old VHS collection to DVD's, and for my Zune.

[Ploobers]

I'd convert old family VHS tapes for sure. I might archive some old actual VHS movies, probably Disney, rather than repurchasing hundreds of them. Little kids won't care anyways.

[haveblue128]

Four golden retrivers over the past 16 years, 1 husband and 5 nieces and nephews. The doggie vids are by far most in need of saving.;)

[David Horn]

I have loads of short movie files knocking around on my hard disk that I've copied from various digital cameras. Windows Movie Maker doesn't cut it, so I'd leap at a chance to edit some of them down and get them on DVD.

[mamoleh]

Kids and dogs, what else is there?

[awinner]

Lots of old kids VHS tapes to move to DVD for my grand-kids.....

[txa1265]

We have a bunch of VHS-C tapes from when our kids were little ... it would be *awesome* to grab htose and turn them into something useful!

[dave_p_1]

"Or would you capture video from another source?"

Another source? Of course.

I have VHS, Beta, SuperBeta, and Video8.

Oh, and LaserDisc, although I'd hate to lose the definition. Someday I'll need to find one of the old LaserDisc players with the direct data connection to the computer and see if I can manage digital to digital.

[blang]

I would convert some old VHS tapes.

[dvlpr]

I'd love to transfer old movies to digital and also edit them!

[Jason Dunn]

Contest closed, no further entries will be counted. Please look for the winners to be announced within the next 48 hours.