HUGE rendering times?

[Reg Gothard]

Still a relative newbie myself with Vegas (but learning fast!)
However…
I’ve read countless threads on several forums that bemoan Vegas render times, so I’ve learned to expect longer renders than from my previous NLE. If you’ve loaded your project up with lots of TX and FX goodies, then your render times may be longer too.
768MB of RAM is probably OK – I’m running with 1GB quite happily.
Check some of DSE’s or Edward Troxel’s posts on this and other forums for tuning tips for your machine. HDD config; CPU; multi-threading etc are all things to consider.

That said, I’ve fallen foul of a simple error a few times. I’ve inadvertantly moved the “level” slider for one or more video tracks and significantly increased render times. I know how I move the slider – I check something in the track list (e.g., Mute or Solo) then forget to hit Tab before using left arrow to space back a frame in the timeline. Result – “Level” is now 1% lower than 100 for each time I hit left arrow and render takes longer. You might want to check to see if you’ve done a similar thing.

Sorry if these ideas are basic – but hope they help a little.

[Matt Schwartz]

I have a very speedy machine 3.0 GHZ HT and it took ONE HOUR to render 5-1/2 minutes! EDWARD, WHAT IS YOUR TAKE ON THIS?

[Edward Troxel]

My take on this is he’s starting with WMV and going to MPEG2. He’s starting with a HIGHLY compressed format which requires decompressing EVERY frame and the recompressing to another highly compressed format.

My big question: WHY is the source WMV??? That’s not a good source format. Why not DV? Or HDV?

Edward Troxel

[Matt Schwartz]

This is MPEG-2 to WMV!

[Edward Troxel]

Basically the same difference. Starting with a highly compressed format. Going to a highly compressed format. LOTS of decompressing and recompressing along the way.

Edward Troxel

[Matt Schwartz]

Well sure, you’re dealing with CODECS, they’re ALL compressed, so is this the nature of the beast, is there any way to optimize this? Should I have 2 gigs of RAM plus? Sure seems so! Yes I understand, this whole process is massively CPU BOUND as they say computer wise……….
But an HOUR to do five minutes? Ooooooh!

[Edward Troxel]

Some codecs are easier to decode than others and are, therefore, faster. Plus, you have to look at what effects are being added. Some of them are faster than others as well. My guess is that more RAM would not help unless you’re also using a bunch of photos.

Edward Troxel

[Matt Schwartz]

I have to say this about sony vegas platinum – within 5-6 weeks I have become pretty proficient at using this software, it has never crashed on me, the output is consistent and the interface as a whole is excellent with so many many tools to get exactly what I want; plus I have audacity going so I can do realtime effects and manipulation in that. You can set it up / dock it any way you want. This is very robust software. obviously sony put a lot of $$ into this and for 125 bucks I sure can’t complain. Any word if version 9 is around the corner? And thanks for all your input…………….

[Edward Troxel]

Version 8 of Sony Vegas Pro has been out less than one month. The “Movie Studio Plantinum” version was released a couple of months earlier. I wouldn’t expect anything “9” for awhile.

Edward Troxel

[Terry Esslinger]

Looking at your time to render, you have not mentioned if you checked your settings. One of the big time hogs is accidentally changing the sliders in the track header from default (ie 99% opacity). One that I personally found when my renders suddenly started taking forever was that when a new track was created it was in 3D alpha compositing mode. Whyit started doing this all of a sudden I still don’t know but I found a preference setting to change the default back. Make sure everything in the track header is normal (or at least where you want it.