Rating: 
Summary: Works for me
Review: I started with Roxio software that came with my TDK DVD burner. It worked fine, but it didn't seem to have the flexibility I wanted for high quality in and output. So I picked up VideoStudo 7 (used on ebay). I might add that you can download a fully funcional trial version if you like. I did, and it worked fine. I used it while waiting for my ebay order to arrive. Of course, it's large, so only do it if you have high speed DSL.I have had no difficulty with it. I had the fairly humble goal of transfering my family movies from tape before they deteriorated. I've archived two family movies already, transfering them through our Sony Digital8 TRV120 camera. The first DVD I did was originally filmed on the digital camera, and the quality was excellent. I ran everything at maximum quality, minimum compression. On the second, I copied an older tape originally filmed on an analog Sony 8 mm camera. The quality again was good--no loss from the tape itself, I don't think. Imagine the relief of getting those memories preserved--now copied multiple times and archived in safe places. As you can tell, I am no expert on these things. I figure if you have good hardware and are reasonably smart, the rest should be easy. It was. The software is fairly intuitive. I only checked the manual a couple of times for reference. If your system is powerful enough and you have the patience to play with it, you should be fine. It hung up on me once or twice, but only when I tried to ask it to do something stupid in the middle of another function. I can't say it has ever acted weird on me when I have not acted weird on it. I'm using a Dell 600 notebook with 1 Gig of RAM and a 1.4 Pentium processor. I have 40 Gig of space on my D drive, but I also got an extra 80 Gig external drive. I think you'll find ample hard drive space and plent of RAM to both be important. I really wouldn't want to play with this at the minimum specs the software claims.
Rating:
Summary: Works for me
Review: I started with Roxio software that came with my TDK DVD burner. It worked fine, but it didn't seem to have the flexibility I wanted for high quality in and output. So I picked up VideoStudo 7 [...]. I might add that you can download a fully funcional trial version if you like. I did, and it worked fine. I used it while waiting for my [...] order to arrive. Of course, it's large, so only do it if you have high speed DSL. I have had no difficulty with it. I had the fairly humble goal of transfering my family movies from tape before they deteriorated. I've archived two family movies already, transfering them through our Sony Digital8 TRV120 camera. The first DVD I did was originally filmed on the digital camera, and the quality was excellent. I ran everything at maximum quality, minimum compression. On the second, I copied an older tape originally filmed on an analog Sony 8 mm camera. The quality again was good--no loss from the tape itself, I don't think. Imagine the relief of getting those memories preserved--now copied multiple times and archived in safe places. As you can tell, I am no expert on these things. I figure if you have good hardware and are reasonably smart, the rest should be easy. It was. The software is fairly intuitive. I only checked the manual a couple of times for reference. If your system is powerful enough and you have the patience to play with it, you should be fine. It hung up on me once or twice, but only when I tried to ask it to do something stupid in the middle of another function. I can't say it has ever acted weird on me when I have not acted weird on it. I'm using a Dell 600 notebook with 1 Gig of RAM and a 1.4 Pentium processor. I have 40 Gig of space on my D drive, but I also got an extra 80 Gig external drive. I think you'll find ample hard drive space and plenty of RAM to both be important. I really wouldn't want to play with this at the minimum specs the software claims.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting Product...
Review: This product, while slightly expensive, is one of the better options out there. I have used ArcSoft Showbiz, Windows Movie Maker, and MGI Videowave. This software is quite comparable with them. While you'll need a big hard drive to store all those movies (4 minutes=875 mb or more), it is quite easy to use. No frames are dropped {I use a Canon camcorder and Firewire (IEEE1394)}. I have not yet explored the VCD end of the software, but I suppose it works well. Adding audio is a snap, and there really isn't much you can't do with this. One thing, however: you can't take the audio track off and make an audio CD out of it. I have yet to find the software to do this...
Rating: 
Summary: At least it's stable
Review: This software, unlike the many titles out there will not crash your system! That's about the only benefit I can think of. This program is not user friendly--in fact it appears to do everything in its power to exasperate, exhaust, annoy, enrage, and otherwise destroy the weary, bleary eyed user whose humble goal is to produce a watchable DVD of home videos. It might be a humble goal, but as I've found it isn't for the faint of heart. Videostudio is supposed to take you from capture to burn with nary a hassle, BUT after about three days of wrestling with the program the DVD I did burn was mysteriously missing half the tape filmed, and was terribly glitchy. I would like to have searched the help file for a little instruction, but the help file was in a cumbersome PDF formula and frankly it wasn't much help. Overlaying titles was a HUGE pain. I could find no way to standardize the font and effects across the board, so for every title I had to re-enter the information. The same goes for the chapter headings. Also, inserting bookmarks for chapters was more torture than any human, aside from Saddam Hussien, should be subjected to. Instead of allowing you to pick scenes from the scene changes you've already established you had to use a slide bar that was so sensitive the slightest touch catapults you 15 minutes past your target scene! There are many other problems with this program--it's very cumbersome, not easy to figure out, and involves for to many steps for most tasks. Pinnacle is much easier to use, but it's so glitchy you can't run it for more than five minutes without crashing your system. I'm still looking for a servicable program to burn my video to DVD that won't land me in some sort of asylum.
Rating: 
Summary: A poor engineered software
Review: Ulead's products are easy to use with a pretty good workflow design. However, poor engineered with lots glitches. The products all require high cpu and memory usage and frequently lock up.
Recommend it but do not go close to the limit.
Rating:
Summary: Sneak preview
Review: When it comes to user friendly video editing software these folks have done it well. This version especially is exceptional and fits any and all video editing needs.
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