Alternative to a vcr.?

Question

my mom´s vhs vcr died after 17 years of use.

she likes to record tv shows, and i need a way for her to record them.

some pople have suggested recordable dvd, but like everyhitng else , its inpractical since sooner or later another format will come.

is there an easy way to record it in a laptop im teaching her to use?

what choices do we have?

tivo is our of the question since that does not exist in my country.

Answer 1

cable and satellite both provide DVR's

Digital Video Recorders BUT should the hard drive go bad you just lost all your movies. A DVD recorder is the best option and now are very reasonably priced

Answer 2

Get another VCR. If you can't find one in any store or a yard sale, try ebay.

Answer 3

If her laptop is of resent vintage, it fairly easy to set it up to record TV programs. All you need is a USB TV tuner and some software. Some operating systems like XP Media Center have the software built in to them. Make sure that the USB tuner is compatible with the TV system used in your country and whatever OS your computer uses.

Many people don't like tying up their laptop to record & play back TV programs. There are other options:

1.

Find a good used VCR. These are about $10 max in the US. You didn't say how old your mother is but my experience is that really old people do not like change.

2.

A DVD recorder is fine. All formats disappear eventually, but DVD compatable players and drives will be around a long time. Blu-Ray drives are backwards compatible with DVD disks.

I suggest you look at DVD recorders with hard drives. Once you  start recording to the hard drive you probably won't use the DVD recorder much anyway.

3.

Some people build or buy a computer specifically to run as a DVR. I'd build one myself except my TIVO is sooo nice.