I agree with the part about the Hollywood Plus pass-through cable blurring your monitors picture. This is why I have never used the pass-through cable, but I still use and like the Hollywood Plus. It works without the pass-through cable. Where it shines is using a DVD ripper program to rip the DVD to your hard drive and then output to videotape via the Hollywood Plus. Clad DVD ripper will also remove macrovision. This means I can rent DVDs and make excellent (better than store-bought VHS) copies to VHS or SVHS. Try that with the crummy video-out of almost any display card!
The Hollywood plus isn't about getting good DVD to your computer monitor, which almost all current computers and display cards do just fine, it is about getting good output to your TV or VCR.
BTW, when I want to view DVD on my computer screen, I use Power DVD. When I want to output to tape, I use the Hollywood Plus and DVD Station.