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[Robert in Naples] “I was told from a friend that you should not defragment video storage drives”

Video drives should be defragged when you remove old source files and before putting new files, excessive fragmentation can cause unstable video and sometimes dropouts, I use external eSata drives, and just copy the drive I want to defrag to a clean drive, the operating system copies file by file, alot faster than trying to defrag a large disk.

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VHS can have some jitter in playback, you should use a TBC(time base corrector) of some sort, usually a Sima Video Enhancer will suffice for most to stabilize the video in most cases

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Are you going to burn the DVD from Ppro’s “DVD Layout” or Export and use another authoring program?

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If you are doing DV or HDV a firewire card is sufficient, low order analog like S-Video/Composite can be done with a camcorder that has pass through or a converter to firewire, if you are going to do more exotic like HDMI, SDI or component you will need a capture card.

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Some times the on-board sound needs to have the ASIO drivers installed separately, if they aren’t on the MoBo installation you can download them from the web, also what version of Dirext X are you using?

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[somalinis] “I’ve got dv50 footage, but as I know Microsoft doesn’t support dv50 codec”

It has nothing to do with what microsoft supports, if you want to use DVCpro50 with Ppro you need a codec plug-in, One will either come with a add-on card or you can buy a plug-in pack from someone like Main Concept: https://www.mainconcept.com/site/index.php?id=525

[somalinis] “PPRO can’t even capture dv50”
Because they are not licensing the codec you need a third party codec pack like mentioned above.

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[Chris1954] “I’m starting a small project, using stills, that I would like to create in 2 forms. One, 16.9 version which will fit 16.9 TV sets and another that will show the 16.9 format in a standard 4.3 TV set.”

Just make a 16:9 project and burn to DVD as such, most DVD players except some old ones will play the 16:9 on wide screen sets and automatically letterbox the footage for 4:3 if it doexn’t detect a widescreen.

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Ppro 1.5 needs either an ASIO 2.0 driver or a DirectX-compatible WDM driver to start. Only one of these audio drivers must be installed, its best to check your sound card installation before you go further, if your sound installation software has ASIO 2.0 drivers it best to install them, also check with your sound card manuf. and see if they have updated drivers.

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Also where are you previewing the footage? externally on a CRT? or internally on a computer monitor?

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What version of Ppro are you using?