Upgrading RAM size

[Edward Troxel]

[Actxiom] “I have been fighting skips and out of sync video/audio”

On the timeline? During Previews? Outputting to tape? Once you get to the DVD? WHERE???

Edward Troxel

[Actxiom]

Thanks for the reply, Ed. Sorry I was not more specific. The skips and out of sync conditions I mentioned occur sporadically on DVDs I create. These occur on DVDs played on some DVD players and not on others. In my home I can play my project burned to both DVD+Rs and DVD-Rs on a new Philips Portable player just fine and then I can go to my main TV with an older Panasonic player and both formats will skip.

I need to produce these DVDs to be playable on as many people older machines as possible and so I am trying to decide what format and what else I need to do to improve the quality for the masses. My thought was that at least going to 512 meg of RAM might help as by one of the GEEK squad at Best Buy suggested. Another expert on Pinnacles message board said the opposite. Just increasing RAM was not necessarily going to improve the quality.

So that is my confusion. My guess is that improving RAM, upgrading the video card, and making sure I have all the latest Microsoft upgrades to my Windows XP SP2 will be the most logical moves I can make. Also, of course, I think that moving to Vegas will also be a big help because frankly Pinnacle has been 10 months of torture.

Dave

Creativity is the ultimate passion

[Actxiom]

I still did not fully answer your question Ed. Let me try again. The skipping occurs at certain points in the movie consistantly.

At first I thought it had something to do with the sensitivity of my new Pioneer DVR-A08 DVD/CD recorder – like the amplification of some strong wind sounds was causing the jumping. But there were other areas which were out of sync and had no associated volume spikes. So I ruled out that theory.

I went back and eliminated some of the clips that seemed to exhibit the problem thinking my New Sony miniHandy cam might also be causing the problem. Either the battery was low, possibly, or the pickup device might have been dirty. I did eliminate one problem area by starting over and rerecording that section. It could be, now that I think more about it, that my SONY DVR-HC21 is the possible culprit.

But then why do I have no problem when viewing these DVDs on my new Philips Portable DVD machine?

Got my retired brain in a real stew. I just hate to send out a product and have half of them returned.

Dave

Creativity is the ultimate passion

[Edward Troxel]

How are you rendering the MPEG2 file? What bitrate are you using? What format audio are you using (pcm or ac3)?

Sounds like it might be possible that your bitrate is too high causing some players to stutter.

Edward Troxel

[Steve]

Some things to consider when creating DVD’s are that you don’t have the bitrate too high for the video. 8k would be as high as you should go using VBR and if your audio is PCM, even lower for the peak setting.
Some older DVD players have a hard time reading burnt DVD’s and if the bitrate is to high it can cause sync problems.
I’ve also seen the overuse of motion graphics in menus to cause problems with playback on some players.
Good Luck
Steve

[Gary Kleiner]

[SteveT] “I’ve also seen the overuse of motion graphics in menus to cause problems with playback on some players.”

Thats’ strange since the menu page exists as a on-piece rendered piece of video.

Gary Kleiner

Learn Vegas and DVD Architect

http://www.VegasTrainingAndTools.com

[Mdg_nl]

Dave,

Are you having problems with DVD burning in Vegas too, or are you refering to problems in Studio 9.

Pinnacle studio is (in the Netherlands at least) famous for its strange behaviour in respect to synchronisation on DVD’s. I also was a Pin-fighter for 3 years. Since I’m using Vegas I am only concentrating on the video contents instead of “work around” the Pinnacle habbits. Sometimes it is even a bit boaring to use Vegas due to the lack of issues….

[Actxiom]

Thanks to all of you for your responses – MdG_NL, Gary Kleiner, SteveT, and jeditdv.
Bit rate is one of the issues that I am most unfamiliar with, so I will study up on that.
Glad to hear that there is some confirmation re:Pinnacle’s synchronization problems. Perhaps their new bosses at AVID will straighten things out. That one comment helps me justify switching.

Happy New Year everyone. I am away to study up more. Am doing upland bird hunting and how-to-train bird-dog films. It is real hard to get a steady shot in the field. Also very hard to anticipate the bird being flushed and in flight.

Dave

Creativity is the ultimate passion

[Actxiom]

Just Pinnacle. I haven’t gotten started in Vegas only to upload one video event.

Creativity is the ultimate passion