Software : Dazzle DVD Recorder (PC)

Rating: - Excellent piece of kit - simple and quick!
This is, in my opinion, an excellent purchase. The Dazzle is effective and does exactly what it says it does. I found the software quick and easy to install, and there was no need for any "patches" on my system (Vista), unlike (I think) on some older versions of the program.

The software itself is perfectly simple and effective - it takes you through step-by-step, and allows you to customise the menus of the DVDs with the included templates or your own images. It's slightly limited if you wanted the DVDs to look more professional, but for my uses it was quick and easy. It also allows you to add music and alter the fonts/layouts of the scenes. It's slightly annoying having to play each tape at normal speed, but that's to be expected and you can watch the video playing in the corner of the window, which is nice to check that it's still running properly.

I would have liked it to be possible to manually change the layout of the scene icons on the DVDs but, as it specifies, it's meant to be simple and quick. Another slight problem is that the software shuts itself down if the screensaver comes on or I lock the computer. At least, that's what I find with mine! It also eats up memory like there's no tomorrow - on my computer (2GB memory) it's hard to run anything else without the video jerking!! Other than that, I've had no major problems apart from a few issues (it had a "burning error" after hours of work, though that may be my burner). You should also be aware that the quality of the DVDs is only as good as the VCR - any issues it has are carried over and probably amplified on larger screens, but there's probably no problem with newer video players.

I really like the design of the hardware - it's quite large but looks very modern and only has a few ports so it's easy to hook up to the VCR. I had to buy an adapter lead for it to work with our VCR but that was easy to get hold of and it does the job. You do always need an adapter lead so bear that in mind before buying this so you know it's easy to find (and that it works!) before you make the commitment of buying the Dazzle.

I would definitely recommend this as it's easy to install and use, and it's really good value for money and for my purposes, the software doesn't need to be advanced. The simple options available are plenty for most users I would have thought. I'm very happy with my purchase, and I hope that it continues to work this brilliantly!

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Rating: - Decent Product. Incomplete Software
I bought the product because I have converted to a notebook and I cannot use the PCI cards Pinnacle makes. What I knew but still find odious is that the Dazzle DVD Recorder doesn't come with a basic software to do some editing and give you an option to upgrade to the more superior editing software packages. Otherwise the product does what is said on the tin. I have an extremely powerful machine so its no surprise that it crunched the video and spat it out without the blink of an eye.
The editing software though would have helped me complete the job. I don't want to spend loads of money and several third party applications to do some basic editing when Pinnacle could have bundled their own like they do on their Desktop PC video capture cards. That is not the way you grow your software business.