Choppy video when capturing with Sony Vegas 5.0

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denodigital

Member
Hello:

I recently purchased Sony Vegas 5.0 bundle. I have a new computer with tons of hard drive space, memory, a fast CPU, etc. I have a NVidia video card/128 MB DDR/4x-8xAGP/VGA-TV Out/Nview Dual Display.

When I enter into Sony Vegas 5.0, and select the Capture function, I can hook my Sony DCR TRV260 digital video camera to the USB port and watch the video streaming in and it looks just like I shoot it, smooth, and the sound is solid. But when I click on the Capture Video button, the video footage become choppy, and jerky. However, the sound is playing just fine. When I stop Capture and view what I've captured it also is choppy, jerky, the same as it was captured. Is there something in the settings that I need to change?

I tried using Video Maker, just to see if the footage would capture there just fine, but the results were the same; footage looked fine while streaming, but choppy, jerky in playback.

There's nothing running in the background (I assume) of my system. I am not using the computer for anything else except for digital music recording, which I use on a different hard drive, which has Windows 2000, opposed to the Windows XP I use on the Sony Vegas hard drive.

Help, before I loose my... Thanks. brw459@yahoo.com
 
When you say streaming do you mean you can see it fine on the LCD of the camera or you can see it streaming fine on your PC's screen?
 
USB port? There's your problem. DV is not USB compatible, I didn't even know dv cameras had usb ports. YOu need to capture your footage via fire wire.
 
Don't know if this'll make any difference for you or not, but once, while capturing some analog footage into Vegas from a camera that only had an s-video /RCA out, I had to click in the middle of the capture preview screen and tell it not to display square pixels. It was pretty strange, but as soon as I would set to to square pixels the footage would start freaking out.
 
yeah maybe your video camera is outputing some sort of wierd mpeg proxy video through the usb port that its making on the fly.. im surprised vegas would even see it. At any rate, if its playing fine on the camera screen but jerky on the computer, you might have conflicting or underpowered usb ports. I wouldnt screw with that though, just use Firewire like everyone else and it should solve your problem. If it happens on the firewire as well, try capturing it off the dvx and see if that works, if neither camera works over firewire smoothly, defrag your hard drive. Does the little capture window say that you are dropping frames?
 
Okay. I'm headed out to buy a Firewire card, which I currently do not have in my system. I do have these features on my camera:
1 x Composite video/audio output, 1 x S-Video output, 1 x IEEE 1394 (FireWire/i.LINK), 1 x USB, 1 x DC power input; Cables included A/V cable, USB cable.

Back when I was using Pennicle I used my camera's S-Video out, and plugged in my computer's USB port, which worked, I guess. But I was having problems with that software too, so maybe it's been the cable issue all along. Hummm. Thanks.
 
To answer some of the questions: Yes, a little window says I am dropping frames; Yes, I can see the vedio on the LCD screen on my camera and the same footage on my computer/via the Vegas program, which looks fine, that is, until I select capture.
 
Sony Vegas 5.0 Crapped Out (I'm leaving Vegas)

Sony Vegas 5.0 Crapped Out (I'm leaving Vegas)

Well guys, nothing has worked dus far. I bought a iLink Firewall card & cable. Installed it, tried it...got the same ole (manual said, due to me having Win XP it would not ask for drivers for the card and it didn't); I captured with the preview off/same ole; I defragmented the hard drive/same ole.

It may be an issue with my system as a whole because I tried Movie Maker before installing the Firewall card and had the same choppy/jerky problem; now, with Sony Vegas, post installation of the card, I now also get static with the sound.

I got a program called Ulead Video Maker along with the card; I might install that tonight and see what happens.

Thanks for trying.
 
I have a new computer with tons of hard drive space, memory, a fast CPU, etc. ... There's nothing running in the background (I assume) of my system.
Click to expand...
You really haven’t told us much about your system. First, unless you built this PC yourself, don’t assume anything about what’s running in the background. Manufacturers like Dell have all sorts of stuff running in the background. HP printers are notorious for loading 3 or 4 programs that run in the background monitoring things. Norton is even worse bloatware hogging your system. Likewise photo programs and card readers install software that runs in the background checking to see if you inserted a memory card. All of these may cause dropped frames when they wake up to do their checking.

So assume nothing. Get yourself a free utility like EndItAll2 and kill anything that’s running on you computer that EndItAll will let you kill (it is smart enough just to keep the essential services running) If you have any Norton programs like their firewall or antivirus, shut it off.

Next, are you capturing to a separate hard drive that is not your Windows OS drive? This is critical for smooth capture. I’m not talking about a separate partition on the same physical hard drive. I mean a physically separate hard drive on its own primary (not secondary) IDE channel or SATA channel. Windows will want to access its swap file from time to time and you don’t want that interrupting your capture because the swap file is on the same physical hard drive or on a hard drive on the same IDE channel (IDE cannot access two drives on the same channel simultaneously so one has to stop while the other is accessed) Put your OS on IDE1 Master and your capture drive on IDE2 Master (or better yet use 2 SATA drives)

Finally, are you using a fixed size swap file? You should be. You don’t need windows looking for more swap space in the middle of a capture. Allocate a fixed amount so it is always there. Windows XP usually does this but if you don’t have a lot of memory it may be swapping too much. Also make sure your drives are in DMA mode.

So tons of hard drive space, memory, a fast CPU, etc. is meaningless if the tons of hard drive space is on the secondary channel of your IDE or on the same drive as your OS and swap file. This will cause dropped frames when Windows access its swap file. We really need to understand your configuration to help you solve the bottleneck in your system.

~jr
 
Update on Choppy Video/Dropped Frames/Vegas

Update on Choppy Video/Dropped Frames/Vegas

Did a ton of troubleshooting this weekend; I found in the help index, under troubleshooting, that, because I have the Sony Vegas 5.0 installed on my 160 MB hard drive, which uses Windows XP, that I am suppose to capture/render DV video to another drive, which I did and it works (with the exception of 20 or so dropped frames, which is far less than the 200 - 300 I was getting when I was capturing to the same hard drive as the Vegas is installed); Now all I have to do is figure out why I'm still dropping frames; On the drive I a capturing to, I have installed a software that I use to record/edit digital music and that's all; the operating system for that 120 MB drive is Windows 2000; I wondering if the dropped frames is due to the differences in the operating systems (XP on the drive that has the Vegas program vs. Windows 2000, which is on the drive that is capturing the video), or is it dirty heads, or if any one has death with this whole confusing process before. Thanks again. brw459@yahoo.com
 
About my system, it was built for me; there's not a lot of progams on it other than the Win XP on one drive and Win 2000 on another; Everything that I know of is turned off in the background; your reply makes sinse; I'll try to use the info to elimiate the remaining dropped frames action.

Last night: Did a ton of troubleshooting this weekend; I found in the help index, under troubleshooting, that, because I have the Sony Vegas 5.0 installed on my 160 MB hard drive, which uses Windows XP, that I am suppose to capture/render DV video to another drive, which I did and it works (with the exception of 20 or so dropped frames, which is far less than the 200 - 300 I was getting when I was capturing to the same hard drive as the Vegas is installed); Now all I have to do is figure out why I'm still dropping frames; On the drive I a capturing to, I have installed a software that I use to record/edit digital music and that's all; the operating system for that 120 MB drive is Windows 2000; I wondering if the dropped frames is due to the differences in the operating systems (XP on the drive that has the Vegas program vs. Windows 2000, which is on the drive that is capturing the video), or is it dirty heads, or if any one has death with this whole confusing process before. Thanks again. brw459@yahoo.com
 
Last night, I went into Admin Tools and checked which programs were running in the background; I used some internet tips (from various sources) to either set programs on manual or disable it altogether; I did this for both hard drives; I retested capturing and got the same choppy, jerky video with static in the audio, then the screen would just freeze, and post an error message about an occurance while capturing; I tried the same in Ulead and got the same type result, and same type of message, which included something about the screen size not being correct (or something like that; I'm at work now, can't remember); also, both my hard drives are on the same channel (ch. 1) and my CD-Rom is on Ch. 2; I have the hard drive jumpers set so the Win XP drive is the master and the Windows 2000 hard drive is the slave; what I propose to do is disconnect the CD-Rom and connect that cable to the Windows 2000 hard drive; then I will change the jumper configuration, changing the master/slave setup; I'll leave the CD-Rom diconnected; then I'll try to capture again and see if having the hard drives on separate channels will help; do you think, now that I've tried to capture so many time, causing errors, capturing the bad footage, the freeze-ups, etc., do you think I should uninstall the Sony Vegas and reload it? During these test I've defragmented my hard drive already
 
denodigital said:
... also, both my hard drives are on the same channel (ch. 1) and my CD-Rom is on Ch. 2
Click to expand...
BINGO! That’s your problem. Remember, the IDE channel is synchronous. That means Windows has to stop accessing one drive while it access the other. You might as well be using one drive. Whenever Windows has to access the swap file, it has to stop capturing. That’s why you’re dropping frames.

Placing the second drive as Master on IDE Channel 2 is going to make a BIG difference. There should be no need to reinstall anything. If the drives change letters you can always set them to what you want in the disk manager.

~jr
 
Okay: I'm getting somewhere now. I separated my drives, which increased the capture performane a lot; also, I had not realized that I was unable to set the DMA on one of my hard drives; that it was stuck on PIO; the reason (which I found on a Microsoft help page) is due to a setting deep into the sys conf. which I was able to change; once I did that, it got better; now, i've learned that I need a patch to update my Nvidia video card in order for it to work with Vegas; I downloaded it and will install tonight; also, Service Pack 2 has a patch that is needed to fix a program that has to do with capturing video; i downloaded that and will load tonight; i am capturing to a separate hard drive (opposit the one the program is on) and the drop frame rate decrease from about 500 for 5 minutes of footage to about 30 per 5 minutes; so I must be on to something; I also bought a new firewire cable that is OCHI compliant, which I will also try tonight; man....!!! but I'm getting there. Thanks for your help. (brw459@yahoo.com)
 
Hello:

The problem is resolved and I'm so happy. Nothing like a cold beer after resolving a 3 week long software problem. This is how I resolved the problem.

I "finally" saw that my hard drive 0 was not set perminently to DMA; I had to go deep into the settings using Extreme Tech Support in order to "force DMA mode"; then I made both my hard drive masters and slaved my DVD ROM; I bought a standardized firewire cable; captured to my hard drive that don't have the Vegas loaded on it; and it worked; 10 minutes of smooth capture and not a single dropped frame (at least today); I'm sure it will do just fine from this point on.

Thank you all for your help/advice; I'm sure I'll be asking more advice as I proceed on to editing; such as:

I'm in the process of shooting a music video (my first); I want to shoot while the singer lip syncs to their song; what is the best way to do this; should I play the music on a sterio/speakers, and record it along with the video? Should I let the music play, the singer lip sync, capture it, mute the sound, then add the music? I've heard that if the singer is lip syncing to their music, then that music is muted in edit and the real recording is overlayed, then because the device that is playing the music the singer is lip sync to had a different motor speed than the computer's CD player, then the sound will be off. Or, should I capture the sound in Vegas using the same device that I used to play the music, which will play at the same speed, which should capture at the same speed? Then, also, after I have the sound in one file, and the video in another, how can I merge the two?

Thanks. The rookie editor!
 
yeah that damn DMA settings in the IDE controllers.. XP is supposed to fix that stuff for you.

nice to hear though that you got it going.
 
Glad you got it all worked out.

My advice on the lip syncing is to use an MP3 player to play the music (solid state). It will have the least amount of drift. Also record this on the video so that you have a reference. Then when you drop the actual song in Vegas, mute the video's audio track but use the wave form peaks as your reference. This should allow you to sync it up perfectly.

~jr
 
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