Valvehead
Forum Replies Created
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Good monitors will definitely help. In general the more you spend the better the monitors, but there are good deals to be found.
I use a pair of Dynaudio BM6A. They are quite expensive ($1300 used), but they are worth it for my work. I never have to second guess my decisions on those.
Previously I used a pair of Mission 771. I got them for about $150. They were small but the detail in the midrange helped me make mixes that translated well to other systems.
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This method does allow you to max out the playback level without triggering compression, but it defeats the purpose of dialogue normalization. The whole point of dialnorm was to maintain a consistent average level when switching between sources or channels. I have a few DVDs that have maxed-out AC3 levels, and I find it quite annoying to have to dive for the volume control when they start playing. Ack! 😯
Here’s a helpful tutorial: Doom9 AC3 tutorial
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Check out Ed Troxel’s Vegas Newsletters. Look at Vol #1 Issue #12. Read this section: Blurring Faces a la “Cops.”
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When discussing dialnorm, the one thing that often gets overlooked is the fact that when the dialnorm level of a soundtrack is measured, it is A-weighted. This means that the midrange of the signal largely determines the proper dialnorm setting. Simply using Sound Forge or Audition to measure the RMS will get you close, but if there is heavy bass content it could give you a number too high.
Here’s a guide that has helped me understand AC3 encoding a little better: Doom9 AC3 encoding guide. It’s an older guide that refers to Acid, but it appears that the settings are the same in Vegas.
I think I read somewhere that the idea of normalizing dialog was conceived for digital broadcast. That way the perceived volume would remain consistent across programs and channels. If only something like that had been mandated for radio and CDs. Then there would be no incentive to compress the snot out of it; it would end up getting turned down in the receiver/player.
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The source video may actually be 704×480. When placed in a 720×480 project there will be thin black bars on the sides.
Can you confirm if the black bars are not present in the source video? Also, try opening the source video in GSpot. It will display the actual resolution, pixel aspect and display aspect ratio of the file.
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You might also try using a different program to burn the prepared files. I use Nero v6 because it gives me more burning options. I’ve also read that ImgBurn is good.
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According to Apple, only the 30″ model requires a dual-link DVI connection. For the smaller cinema displays a normal DVI connection will be sufficient. Just make sure that the video card supports the required resolution over DVI (the analog resolution capabilities may be much higher than DVI).
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I’m not an expert in computers (though I did build my own). I will try to help you as much as I can.
I’m not saying that using an add-on SATA adapter will inherently make your system more stable. I recommended the add-on card as a possibly more secure option than Maxblast simply because it’s what worked for me. Not knowing your system specs I wrongly assumed that it was an older system requiring the use of Maxblast to bypass the capacity limitation. From the info I can find on Maxtor’s site about Maxblast, it seems that it’s only necessary to use it if you actually encounter the 137GB limit. I’m only saying that I don’t trust Maxblast because of my own personal experience with it.
At what point did you discover that you were limited to 137GB? Did the BIOS not recognize the capacity correctly or lock up on booting? Your motherboard is fairly new, and if the BIOS and chipset drivers are up to date you shouldn’t be limited there. Go to the DFI website to see if there are any updated BIOS and driver downloads for your motherboard.
If the BIOS recognized the drive properly, did the drive not show up properly in windows? To see the capacity that Windows recognizes go to Control Panel>Adminstartive Tools>Computer Management>Disk Management. The bottom chart shows the physical drives with their total capacities in the left column. What version of Windows XP are you using? I believe that Service Pack 1 added support for drives beyond 137GB.
Did you set the Cylinder Limitation Jumper (CLJ) on the drive? This is only for older systems and will unnecessarily limit the capacity of the drive.
As far as recovering your current files, you already did what I would have recommended. If copying the files to another drive doesn’t make them readable, then you will probably need to seek help from a professional data recovery service.
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I’m really suspicious of Maxblast. I used it a few years ago with a 40GB Maxtor drive in an old 200Mz HP computer. Its IDE controller wouldn’t work beyond 8GB so I tried the Maxblast software. It worked fine for a while until strange problems started occuring. File creation dates would randomly change, and whole folders would become unreadable. I then bought a Promise PCI IDE controller and reformatted the drive without Maxblast. It worked just fine from then on.
The only reason to use Maxblast would be on an older computer whose IDE controller doesn’t support larger drives. Since a PCI IDE (or SATA) controller card doesn’t cost much, there really isn’t a good reason to trust your valuable data to a software workaround.
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Dave