I'm using an ATI All-in-Wonder 9600XT with Multimedia Center 9.06. When I play back a homemade, taped off TV, live action VHS the picture will get distorted and lose color when there is a flash on the screen or when the color on screen is particularly faint. I see the problem when watching or capturing the play back in MMC. I don't see it when simply watching the play back on my TV. I've seen it for a couple different tapes but not for any animation.

Reading posts on this forum it sounds like an anti-copy thing but I used the Macrovision hack and that didn't seem to help. Can you check out the screen captures and help me identify the problem? Admittedly I don't have the best playback equipment and cabling. Is there anything I can do to minimize this without buying new equipment? If I'm looking at investing in hardware what's the best bang for my buck?

Frame immediately before the problem:
http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/uplo...r0/vidcap1.jpg

Distortion:
http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/uplo...r0/vidcap2.jpg

http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/uplo...r0/vidcap3.jpg

Can you try this with another VCR plugged into the capture card?

It appears to work better on another VCR. Do you happen to know what this is a symptom of? Is this something that's correctable? Dirty or damaged heads or something.

Alignment issues, damaged heads, dirty heads (this is least likely).