TERRIBLE Avi problem? PLEASE HELP

[andythelad]

Woe is me, for I am but a lowley director with half the technical skills needed to do what I do, but ususally that just means things take longer. Anyway, here goes:

Hi, this problem started about a year ago, but i have not really had a project to work on since then so I am just now in real need of a solution. I have wondows XP and use Premiere, though i dont THINK this is even a premier problem. everything worked fine for months after i got my computer and then suddenly video files stopped playing correctly. they wont play correctly in any video player or in premier, the sound and audio are terribly choppy. The same thing also happens when trying to capture now. but this is not any video file, seems that only DV quality files do not work. I have already formatted my hard drive once, and installed more RAM (1.5gig total now) to try and fix this. I also have pentium 4 processor, though I notice the CPU jumps up to 100% when I play files (but my friend who is much more technical says that may be normal).
I have no idea what to do now please help me.
-Andy

[andythelad]

nobody? = (

[dr_stupid]

Well, I'm no expert either, but if you have adequate hardware (P4 and 1.5 gig RAM should be PLENTY of processing power) it sounds like it may be a problem at the codec level. Codec is a shortened term for enCODEr/DECoder -- it is the algorithm that converts video to its compressed format for storage in a file, and then decodes that compressed info when you play the file back.

When you capture video from a camera or create/export a video file from premiere, a codec is used to compress the video into a file. Any program that you use to play that video file then uses the codec that created it to play it back. So if both the capture and the playback seem to be screwed up, and they are screwed up regardless of what program you are using, the common underlying element is the codec. The only thing is, the solution would be to uninstall/reinstall codecs, but if you formatted your whole hard drive and put everything back already, you already did this.

Also, I'm not sure I fully understand how DV encoding works; I think it basically happens in-camera via hardware encoding, then you basically transfer the info directly without recompression or loss of quality via firewire, but I'm sure there must still be a software "decoder" involved on the other side when you go to play it back. I'm just not sure whether this happens via a true 'codec' like the various windows media codecs, or whether it is sort of built in to programs that can handle DV files.

If no experts will chime in to relieve our ignorance, one thing you could do in the meantime is a few experiments to try to isolate the problem a little better and pin it down. For example, do you only have problems playing back files that you yourself have captured? What if you download a DV clip, or capture it on someone else's computer and burn it on a CD -- can you play it on your computer? Can you capture files from a different DV camera? You obviously want to make sure your camera isn't the problem! Can you isolate the problem just to DV files? Try capturing with a different codec, such as one of the other .avi codecs supplied by Premiere (I'm only using 6.0, but for me they come up as choices in the "Capture Settings" dialog box -- e.g. Cinepak Codec by Radius, various microsoft codecs, etc.) Doing that is not ideal for your video, but it might help you isolate whether DV encoding is the problem. You can also try uninstalling / reinstalling Premiere and/or individual codecs. I forget how to get to the codec files in Windows XP -- I'm at work right now on NT machines. You should be able to find it via the control panel under audio settings or video settings or something like that (audio uses codecs too...).

Anyway, that was probably completely unhelpful, but at least you had that brief hopeful excitement of a reply! :)

[soarprod]

Can you play back properly in windows? Try running some of your clips in windows media player - does it play better? Did you go to windows xp service pack 2? Sometimes that can cause problems. Is a camera or deck connected to your computer? That could be causing a problem where premiere is struggling to playback on the computer and the dv device at the same time - you can also have it only play to one. What version of premiere? If 1.5, make sure you go to the adobe website and get the 1.5.1 patch - there are a few fixes there.

[Raytracer]

While modern computers are very powerful and more than capable of handling complex video processing tasks, they can only do so if they aren't already trying to do too many other things.

Nearly every peripheral, piece of hardware and software package you install insists on installing a component that runs every time you boot. None of these things are necessary. Look in your system tray, at the bottom right of your task bar. If you see anything but the clock and the speaker icon, you should go about removing all of them.

From "run" on the start menu, type msconfig. Click on the "slective startup" setting and go to the startup tab and remove everything that doesn't absolutely need to be there - that should be nearly everything.

Also, go into the control panel, under "administrative tools" open up services and check to see what services are starting automatically. For example, if you don't have a wireless networking adapter, you don't need the wireless networking auto configuration service to run - using up CPU cycles and memory - every time you boot. Here are a couple of guides as to what services are necessary and what are performance robbing crap: http://is-it-true.org/nt/utips/utips76.shtml http://www.theeldergeek.com/services_guide.htm

I liken this to buying a Ferrari, and then loading it up with sacdbags, and tools, and empty fast food trash, and dirty laundry.... so much unnecessary trash that the damn thing can't get above 70 mph on the highway.

Get that computer cleaned out and it ought to run like a Ferrari. Just be sure you've got a good radar dectector.

Joe

[Sirius_Doggy]

Try defragging the harddrives.

[BLUESPIDER]

Are you using the internet on the same computer?

Try downloading this and installing it..

http://www.free-codecs.com/download/Codec_Pack_All_in_1.htm