C3PX said:
I thought it was cool, but I didn't feel it was worth the money, especially since I already owned a good sized library of VHS tapes.

Know what had me sold? This was in 1999. On one of my first DVDs (it might have been my first one), the first thing I did was pause the movie during a scene. I was treated to a perfectly still, crystal clear image. Contrast that with the standard VHS "shakey" pause. I was instantly sold. After that, scene selection, the extra features, every movie was available in widescreen (only later did I find out that Anamorphic was a different animal).

All of those things had me hooked on DVD from the moment I hit play. I actually didn't invest heavily into VHS because movies were rarely available in widescreen.