[Exeggutor]

I think your memory is maxed out at 2gigs

You can get an ATI 9800 card at OWC for about $200. With this you should be able to do most jobs, though slowly.

You could upgrade to one of the new dual 7448 processors that OWC carries (not the older 7447 processor). I stuck a dual 1.7 7448 in a Gigabyte Ethernet G4 with 1.5gb that now seems pretty quick running FCP 5, which is all I need it to do. The card is an impressive boost to an old machine, but it cost $600, so that may or may not be a way you want to go.

[Exeggutor]

If you are locked into a PC, try Vegas.

[Exeggutor]

I’m not entirely sure I understand your first question, but it sounds like you are using the slip tool, so FCP is showing the in and out frames of the clip on the timeline. This is fairly handy once you get used to it. You could double-click the shot back into the source window and scrub thru it there, but you won’t be able to modify it past in or out points previously selected.

Question two: Instead of dragging shots from the source window to the the timeline, drag them over the “canvas” and hover a moment. Options will appear to do either insert or overwrite edits, with or without transitions (and some other options.) If you want to do an insert edit with transition, drop the clip into the appropriate box and the shot with transition will be added at the cusor position or in point.

Or…mark your clip in source viewer, hit F9 for insert, shift-F9 for insert with transistion, or F10/shift-F10 for overwrite edits. There’s a place to change the default transition, but I don’t recall how at the moment.

Don’t get me started on what a pain FCP can be. Vegas spoiled me.