Copying DVDs to VCD format will always be an inferior solution. The video data on the DVD (in VOB format, I think) has to be decrypted, uncompressed, then converted to the mpeg format used by the VCD, recompressed (in a much more lossy, unappealing way) and written to the VCD. As Voodoo said, other stuff like Dolby Digital, alternate languages, commentary tracks, menu systems, etc are not supported. Why bother to do this if you're throwing away the best things about the DVD format? Namely, the high quality video possible with a good transfer, and the multitrack audio....

When you can stick a DVD in one drive, and a blank DVD in your DVD-R drive and hit copy, then I'll be interested. That's not possible now due to the copy protection and encryption built into the DVDs.

 

Oh just buy them! Why waste your time trying to copy them? They're only 10-20bux anyway

 

I have a buddy that rips them all the time with free s/w and then converts them to mpeg4, which is then dumped to a cdr... easily the equal of vhs.

go buy an apex DVD player download the f/w iso image burn it, play on your new dvd player... wala instant end to macrovision... copy straight to a vcr. There are a lot of sites devoted to APEX and other brands of DVD players. Do a search.