Here's something to consider, RedJeep. It's easier than ripping a bunch of DVDs. Another member mentioned getting an OTA device and recording live TV. So I just bought this, 30 minutes ago:
KWorld Hybrid TV Tuner with FM Reception and Video Capture UB445-U2 That has coax and RCA inputs, but there is also
a version for $22 that only has coax input.
I am about 1 month away from our 2,000 mile trip, so I'll start recording shows now. The trick is to not use the software that comes with it. Apparently it's buggy. Instead, I'll use Windows Media Center, which now is bundled with Windows.
That's all and good, but it makes for rather large videos. From 2 to 3GB per hour. Since I'm a bit low on space and would rather not drop another $50 on a 2TB drive if I don't have to right now, I'll use
MCEBuddy to transcode the video to a lower bandwidth. And it can transcode on a schedule, after hours, automatically watching a folder to transcode new recordings that get deposited there. All that, for free. Pretty cool.
It looks like I'll be able to get the same 1MB/minute or 60MB/hour compression as with DVDs, so a month's worth of recordings (that's 24 hours x 30 days, mind you) is 40GB. If I want to double the quality I can still carry oodles of shows in less than 100GB. Pretty neat.
