Since I use Sound Forge for all my 2-track editing I may not be much help. However, since these video tapes came from different people I would capture, edit, and render each tape separately as their own AVI. Then I would create a new Vegas project and bring each previously rendered AVI onto the new timeline in the order you want using whatever transitions, titles, etc. you want. You might also want to create a DVD chapter for each different tape so that your mother can go to a particular one if she wants.

On the audio side in Vegas, I would use the audio plug in for your audio tracks and would at least utilize the EQ, Compressor, and Gate processors. If Wave Hammer is a part of Vegas (I have it in Sound Forge, so it shows up in Vegas) that mignt help your audio levels quite a bit. I also have Sony's Noise Reduction as well as Virtos Noise Wizard, both of which are invaluable to me when it comes to eliminating (or at least greatly reducing) unwanted noise.

Once you have rendered each video segment and brought them into a new project you can insert a Volume Envelope to equalize the audio levels of each of the segments so that one is not a great deal louder or softer than another.

By the way, in my opinion, the audio is more important than the video as the eyes forgive more than the ears do. The message comes much more from the words that are being spoken to your mother than it does from the video. My mother will be 90 in April and is hard of hearing but can see pretty good. She doesn't complain about lousy video on her TV but wants to hear (and understand) the audio. And speaking of understanding what is being said, you will want to boost the upper mids as older people tend to not hear those and higher frequencies very well.

Hope this helps and wish your mother Happy Birthday for me this Sunday! I know she will love the DVD you are making her.

David

I think you should rather brutally remove much of the bass information below - say 300. Use the paragraphic EQ, forget about the default three audio FXs.
Lift a little (up to 5 dB) around 900 - 1200kHz. Experiment with each clip to get the right point.
Add several instnces of the EQ if you need to.
if there's a distinct hum or stable noise, try the stacked filter preset (also paragraphic EQ) and experiment to find the best posish. Just reset all the prametres to the optimal point. You do not get Noise reduction with Vegas.

AFTER that, use the graphic dynamics ad set 2:1 or 3:1 compressor. This will not make for pretty audio, but should make it "readable".
Tor