It just took three years? Hmm, strange...yeah, maybe it's just gotten too much usage.
I currently have two VCR/DVD combos that I use for capturing and they both work fine. I did have a third one that I originally used when I first got Elgato in 2014, but the VCR's heads have kind of given out, and the DVD drive doesn't properly work anymore. And even though the current two play decently, one of them I think was having a bit of warbly audio, so I'm kinda switching back and forth between the two machines to see what captures better.
And yeah, they're all unsurprisingly by Sony.