[Norman Black]

You can probably also use Avidemux, or similar, to simply remux the files into an MP4 or MXF file format and Vegas could read that directly with its own internal decoders. Vegas supports XDCAM EX in the MP4 format.

[Norman Black]

If you want a high quality intermediate type format that Vegas has out of the box you can try XAVC Intra so long as your projects are at least 1080.

[Norman Black]

[Gary Oláh] “When I try to put M4V files in the editor, it shows green screens instead of the videos.”

What is the info from the free MediaInfo utility program say about your problem file(s). An M4V is an MP4 file and can contain just about any video codec in existence and Vegas does not support everything.

[Norman Black]

I believe you need the Quicktime MPEG-2 component installed for that.

I found it here. It is not free, so you will want to make sure this will give you what you want somehow. Or convert it with some utility that handles the file.

https://store.apple.com/us/product/D2189Z/A/quicktime-mpeg-2-playback-component-for-windows

[Norman Black]

If you can post the information listed from the free MediaInfo utility program, then maybe we can get an idea what type of file(s) you are trying to use in Vegas.

[Norman Black]

[Dave Osbun] “On a side note- why would you install a codec package when your Sony software has a full, professional, codec suite included?”

Sony does not install any codecs into any codec subsystem on Windows. Video for Windows (Vfw), Directshow or Media foundation. They are all separate and unique. Vegas codecs can only be used by Vegas and nothing else. Vegas goes directly to its own decoders and encoders outside of AVI. Vegas supports Vfw (AVI files only) but not the others. Quicktime is also unique and separate from the others and Vegas supports that subsystem. Vegas bypasses Quicktime, using its own decoders, for typical DSLR/Digicam MOV files which are AVC video and PCM/AAC audio.

[Norman Black]

[Steve Rhoden] “Adding it at the end of project as John mentioned is best.”

People should send a feature request to Sony to add project preference, and/or application preference for what color “nothing” is. Right now it is always 0,0,0 and filters like Broadcast colors, levels and such can never affect this. They only affect “real” pixels.

[Norman Black]

[John Rofrano] “That processor is not multi-threaded. So you have 4 cores and 4 threads. The Core i7 is multi-threaded so it has 4 cores with 8 threads. That means a processor upgrade to an i7 should double your processing power with 8 threads vs 4 threads.
“

I disagree. The extra logical threads only give you 0-35% better performance. It varies by application. In can be negative!, but in this situation, typically at most 1 percent slower.

In a hyper-threaded processor two separate logical threads share the physical resources of a single “real” CPU core. Therefore each thread really only runs at around half speed on that core. You can get better performance than that since the CPU core has more execution units than a typical single thread can fully saturate. Also, a given thread pipeline will stall due to memory access and for that period of time the other thread gets full access to the CPU core execution units.

So how can it sometimes be slower? Most commonly due to cache thrashing.

[Norman Black]

[Scott Simpson] “My board is an Asus P7P55D-E — it’s an 1156. “

I might have an 1156, i7 860 CPU collecting dust somewhere.

[Norman Black]

[John Rofrano] “. I’m guessing that the empty track with it’s opacity changed may have the negative results you are experiencing. “

That is were nice Audit tools like in Ultimate S or Vegasaur can help find quirky things like that.