It's a horrible misnomer that the Canopus ADVC (or any mere card for that matter) would substitute for a TBC or have any real powerful proc amp inside. Things like that, if they existed in the card, would be mere afterthoughts and not really that good.
B&H salesman say things like that all the time, the whole "TBC is ADVC" thing. I don't doubt that the 300 has "something" but surely not a replacement for hefty dedicated a TBC and proc amps. It'd be more like a "lite" version.
Canopus is a great company, but a lot of their recent products are overpriced by leaps and bounds. For that much money, turn your head over to Matrox. Find a good Matrox RTX100 or RT2500 on
eBay for $300-700 instead, and use that for the capture card. Again, no playback corrections, it's just for capture. I have an ATI AIW only because I cannot afford the more hefty Matrox RT2500, but I'm saving for it very very slowly, as my future will involved more editing and less converting.
You're on the right track otherwise, in terms of video hardware, capture card excluded. $1000 is a good starter budget that can buy a nice desk full of equipment.
That SONY TBC is a bit more than I'd use. And unless I'm having a case of bad vision, it looks to have specialized wiring needs, not the typical RCA/s-video/coax type connectors. Some of those TBC's are beyond my knowledge, though I've seen them in use in studios of various sorts. Not for the home user, in my opinion, if not because of cost and difficulty alone.
Now the DataVideo TBC-3000 you mentioned is a nice device. Now then, MOST people will not need something quite so hefty. If you're only after a clean signal processor and stabilizer, then the DataVideo TBC-1000 will do you. You can always control color, hue, brightness, etc in the capture software. The dual-channel feature should work great, but you've said nothing to make me believe you'd need that feature. It's for workign with two sources together and editing on the fly.
The proc amp you're looking at is nice, but I'd go for it last, in a future purchase. I want one of these too, but I cannot justify buying one to be honest. I deal with a lot... a LOT... of bad source, but even then I don't have tapes that would require work to this tedious of a level. (Although last week, it would have been nice, about 3 months before that I was in a similar situation. I made do with software filtering.)
The unfortunate side effect of restoring video is you can buy stuff and buy stuff and STILL not have all the devices you need for any given situation.
Also, don't forget the wiring. S-video, rca, etc... go buy MONSTER cables, you won't regret it, leave a $100-200 budgeted for those monster-priced, yet monster-quality cables.
Last but definitely NOT least .. in fact probably MOST important, is the playing VCR. My restoration guides should cover more of this soon, but the brief is that the earlier you tackle the error, the more likely it can be fixed absolutely. The JVC is the top-level line of defense in removing the errors, and the DNR (digital noise reduction) algorithms in the TBC do amazing work, almost borderline miraculous at times. If you're going to get one of these, the JVC is honestly the best of them all, as they invented the format and seem to keep on top of it pretty well. The 9000 series (9600-9900) is almost a must. If you're going to do it, then goo all the way if you can afford it. The 7800-7900-SRV10U units are runners up. You may be able to find 9600 or 9800's online, the best of them all in my opinion, and I can also acquire them for $450 each (though the supply is almost fully depleted). I may be able to find 7800-7900's for $350 each.
I'm not sure what kind of card you currently have (if any) and if you'd have a future budget. You could squeeze by with good results on an ATI AIW card for now for about $50 on
eBay. Then I'd opt for the JVC 9800 and the TBC-1000. Then make you next goal the PA-100 proc amp you mentioned, or upgrade the capture card to the professional Matrox card. I've actually bookmarked that Pa-100 page, as it looks more interesting that the other one I was considering (though I probably won't be buying one anytime soon).
The JVC 9800 and TBC-1000 and good wires, along with potential software filtering of minor things like color tweaking and nose removal, would get you set. Anything beyond that would be either REAL nitpicking of quality -OR- working with just pitiful source that would be painful to work with.
I hope this has helped in some small way.
FYI: I'll shoot a e-mail to one of the other guys I have as a site supporter, see if he can toss in his 2 cents too. He's got the lesser 7900 setup and a Matrox Mac card, and aside from some dropped frames (caused from not having dedicated TBC or even a weak one), he's happy with his system from all I've heard.
