Hey Todd, thanks for your help.
No, it does not play smoothly.
After further research I have pinpointed the problem to the Mercury Playback Engine. My CPU does not have a video card that supports use of the Merc Playback Engine. Am I right in saying that this is the major problem?
In the past week I have tried upgrading to 8gb ram… and it was still choppy. I am not interested in setting up raid 0 on my machine as I cannot afford it.
If I get the MPE to work will that allow me to edit my native dslr footage smoothly? Even if it is 1/4 resolution and lowest settings… I just want to be able to have smooth playback, which I know CS5 is supposed to be capable of doing.
Thanks for any replies!