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I've pestered lots of people on lots of foums on this. The issue was how to painlessly convert about 20 hours of home movies to hard disc on the PC and have them easily accessable by the whole family. Here's how I do it - there are probably other ways of doing it too - most of them more painful:
1. Check you disc space. For 20 hours of VHS you may need 100GB od disc space. If you don't have enough, buy an external disc drive.
2. Have your tapes converted to DVDs externally (to find your local conversion facility, try something like 'VHS DVD conversion city' in Google. It may cost a bit, but for all thoses memories isn't it worth it? With the right hardware and software you can do it yourself, but for most people it probably isn't worth the trouble.
3. Download DVD Decrypter (try Google for the source) and use it to transfer the content of each DVD to your PC. Use File Mode, make sure that in Settings, the files are not split in the File Mode tab, and select only the VOB files. This will ensure you end up with one HD file from the whole DVD (which has lots of files). Be sure to change the name of each file on the HD after the transfer before you transfer the next one.
4. Download VideoReDo Plus (Google again!) and use it to join and convert the files to the MPEG format you need for your player. When you've done that, run the file through QuickStream Fix (in Tools) to clear up synchronisation problems. If you're lucky, you can convert all your DVDs during the free trial period. If you don't get it done in time, it will cost you $50.
5. Finally, download the ALShow player from ALTools and use it to create your bookmarks - them playback and enjoy! By the way, their support is fantastic - all your questions get answered, and in a way anybody can understand. A good alternative to ALShow (but with no direct support - just forums) is VLC player.
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