There are a lot of CD-R burner programs, that let you make your own VCD, but you have to be patient, because the processing time to get things together is quite long and it does involve at least a PC with some hardware to record video data onto your hard drive. There is a lot of information about this topic on this website http://www.vcdhelper.com/vcd.htm. There are easier solutions to the problem: A few VCD recorders are available now from different sources. The Terapin from Teraoptix does look like a sea turtle. It's capable of recording videos in real time onto a CD-R or a CD-RW. Just plug in audio and video cables, put in a fresh CD-R or CD-RW and you can record a video up to 80 minutes long (infact it's only 79.38 or 79.28 minutes, depending on the CD-R you're using). Here's a picture of the Terapin:
In case you don't like the Terapin's shape (it does look fancy, available in three different colors, but you can't put anything on top of the unit), there is another solution.The Serial Systems (Hong Kong) Ltd company produces the Serial STORM 8688 VCD recorder. It's basically the same unit as the Terapin (it uses the Teraoptix MPEG-1 encoder, too), but it does look much better than the Terapin and it has some unique features like playback capability for MP3 CDs and it's the only VCD recorder on the market capable of doing an un-finalize of a CD-RW disc so that you can add some videos later after you've finalized the CD-RW. You have to finalize every CD-R or CD-RW to make it playable on your computer or DVD player (finalize and un-finalize does take 2 minutes each). And it does play back the so called S-VCDs, too (better S-VHS-like resolution, MPEG-2 encoded, but only half of the playing time of a CD-R, S-VCDs can't be recorded with either the Terapin nor the STORM VCD recorder). Here is a picture of the STORM 8688 (sometimes called MAXX-888. But it's the same unit):
Both of the machines do have the same connector feature sets: S-VHS in/out, cinch audio in/out (stereo), cinch video in/out, coax digital in/out, optical digital in (Toslink). The Terapin has some of the inputs hidden under the front panel, the Serial has everything on the back panel, which is much more useful if you're planning to connect the unit to your rack based home cinema system. There is a pause of 4 seconds before the recording begins, after you've started it. But that's ok if you're aware of it. The Serial's users's manual does not mention the possibility to record onto a 80 minute CD-R or CD-RW, but it's possible and it does work. You can't add another recording, if you've stopped at 74 minutes to add a new track, but if you're recording over the 74 minutes, it goes up to the previously mentioned 79 minutes and 38 seconds.
A VCD recorder does not have a tuner or a timer. It's also recommended to check wether your DVD player can play back CD-R and/or CD-RW media. CD-R media playback is more likely than CD-RW playback.
Ah, I've almost forgot: The VCD recorder can record audio, too. You can make some compilations using your favorite CDs as a source material (but as I said before, for personal use and backup only).
There is an new one of this breed available now in Europe: The TrekStor VDR-2216 (more info about this really capable product can be found here: www.trekstor.de, it's in German only). What makes the TrekStor a good choice: It has two CD-RW burners inside, so you can duplicate CDs or VCDs, has RCA and XLR input, does come with a 100V-240V autoswitching power supply and can record more than 80 minuts of material (after finishing recording on the first CD-RW burner, the 2nd one kicks in and records another 80min, pretty cool). And the firmware of the recorder can be updated via CD-ROM. Here's a picture of the new machine:
The supported formats include: CD-ROM Model 1 & 2CD-DA CD-ROM/XA, Video CD, Karaoke CD Game CD, Mix Mode, Multisession HFS, CD Bridge, Photo CD, CD Extra. There are two VCD quality settings available, STD and HIGH. The HIGH setting allows for a little bit more video bitrate, 1246 kbit/s instead of 1118. The audio sound quality is reduced from 256/s kbit to 128/s kbit with this setting. And of course, the machine records both NTSC and PAL video standards :-).