Dazzle them with your creativity
Written: Dec 04 '00 (Updated Dec 04 '00)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: easy to use, easy to install
Cons: price
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| scully3249's Full Review: SmartDisk Digital Video Creator |
One thing I like to pride myself on is my creativity. Here lately I have been lacking the very creativity that is such a wonderful release for me. I guess you could say this is why it has been well over a month since I have written my last epinion. Well last week I decided I wanted to make a music video with some of the home movies I have. I pulled out my ZipShot (similar to Dazzle but doesn’t offer the option to record sound) only to discover that it was broken. Devastated, I moped around the house for a day or so until my husband decided it was time to take me out and buy me another ZipShot. Unable to find another ZipShot, we stumbled upon the Dazzle Digital Video Creator.
Now I can hear some of you out there asking me “What in the world is a Dazzle?” (Yes I have bat-like hearing ;-)) Well a Dazzle is external hardware that is approximately 8 inches tall and two inches wide. It allows you to record video, audio, and still pictures from your VCR, DVD player, and your computer. So lets say you have a home video of your latest family reunion. You can take that home movie and transfer it to your computer and then record it on a CD.
Installation
The installation of the Dazzle is extremely easy. You just install the software and then plug the Dazzle into the back of your computer. Setup time for us was less than 5 minutes.
Extras – Things you might need to buy
When you buy the Dazzle it comes with all the necessary cords that one will need to hook up to a TV or VCR. However the cords are not very long so if your computer is not close to your TV you will have to go and buy longer cords. I had to buy 2 12 ft cords so that I could connect the Dazzle to the back of my VCR.
We also had to buy a USB Port Hub. If all of your USB ports in the back of your computer are currently being used, you may want to consider buying a USB Port Hub. The Hub that we bought has four additional ports and allows us to have all of our USB items plugged in and the cost was $29.99.
One final thing, if you want to put home videos on a CD, you will need to have a CD Recorder.
Additional Software
While I have not had the Dazzle long enough to explore all of it’s features, I have had to have additional software to create the music videos that I wanted to create with my home movies. The software that can put the video clips/pictures and the music together is called Video Framer. Video Framer uses video clips in the form of AVI's however Dazzle does not create AVI’s (to my knowledge) it creates MPEG’s. So now you will need a converter. I have used Blaze Media Pro to convert the MPEG’s to AVI’s. Both Video Framer and Blaze Media Pro are fairly easy to use and both are available as shareware however you must register both products in order to use them past their expiration dates.
(You can find the shareware versions of the software mentioned above at download.com)
System Requirements
*Pentium 133 MHz or higher
*Windows 98 (I am unsure if it will work with Windows 95)
*32MB of RAM
*At least 400MB of free disk space
*USB port
My success with the Dazzle Digital Video Creator
I have had great success with the Dazzle Digital Video Creator. Everything that I have wanted to do I have been able to accomplish with the addition of various software. I have been able to transfer a home movie of a trip to Washington DC to a CD. The quality of the video on the CD is about 95% of the same quality as it is on the videotape. Even the sound comes though on the CD. I am completely impressed with the Dazzle and I would recommend it to anyone.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
scully3249
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Location: Virginia Beach, Va
Reviews written: 22
Trusted by: 12 members
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