Well, tv tuner cards are fairly cheap and can produce some pretty good results. Mine has a regular cable input (the screw on ones), and S video input, and a composite video input. Anyway, on to your question, InterVideo WinDVR is a pretty good solution; it has the ability to record in SVCD, VCD, and DVD formats (PAL,NTSC,Film) If you're looking for something free, you can use virtual dub, Media Player classic, or a variety of other free tools...