Is anyone aware of a combo unit that will copy VHS protected tapes to DVD? I OWN many old tapes that I want to preserve onto DVD - and most combo recorders can't get past the VHS tape (Macrovision?) copy protection. I'm not doing anything illegal - I purchased ALL of these VHS tapes want to make a copy for myself.

It used to be pretty easy to find "video stabilizers" which was a codeword for "macrovision remover" - no idea if that's still true. You might try Dealextreme or eBay. You will need an external VHS player to route its output to the box and then into the inputs of the DVD writer.

No idea if this one is legit, but the shortest to find on Google was:
http://www.xdimax.com/dvd/dvdredpro.html#BUY

You might also look into whether you can find a composite-to-PC input solution that ignores MacroVision; a quick googling shows a LOT of discussion of these and while it eats up more time than just hitting play on one and record on the other (or just "dub" on a combo box) most modern PCs (possibly even some Netbooks) can keep up with SD DVD video coming from a USB port just fine - pretty often these days basic MPEG2 compression can get done on the external card/box, which cuts down a LOT on how much goes to the USB port, CPU and disk - and burning to disk is pretty easy.

You only think you purchased the VHS tape to do with what you please. The movie studios think differently.

Or, you could let a professional do it for you. These guys converted a bunch of tapes for me. While most were home videos, they did one commercial VHS tape (that was never released on DVD). Many output options (DVD, MPEG4, etc.), good quality. Very happy with them.

I've been using Corel ULead DVD Movie Factory 5 BD version. Just bot it last month so not an authority on it yet but it's pretty straightforward.

http://video-editing-software-review...ry-review.html

Let a pro do it. Even the Hi8 to VHS was an issue for my family and getting it into DVD is something I would not do myself.