Crash on render and playback.....Help!

Sr_C wrote on 8/21/2002, 12:55 AM

I recently cleaned out my system (reformatted hard drives, reinstalled all software etc...) I did this because I am trying to build a decent video workstation and I wanted to start from scratch. After I did this is when all my problems began. Vegas worked perfectly before but now anytime I render, my system crashes and I have to reboot. Also if I preview video from the timeline for more than a couple minutes, my system crashes and I have to reboot. The funny thing is, it only happens when I have video in the timeline. I know that sounds odd, but I just happened to do some work on a generated media only project (with audio) and I had no problems with preview or render, but if I were to throw a 5sec clip in the middle of that project and try to render, crash. I reinstalled vegas and same thing. I know for certain that this is not a Vegas problem because it worked perfectly before I went and tried to make my system better;) Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

BTW my system:
AMD Tbird 1.3Ghz
512 MB Ram
Matrox Milleneum G450 Dual head AGP
40G 5400 HD for OS and Program files
80G 7200 HD for Video and Audio files
Running 98SE right now (soon to upgrade to XP)
Soundblaster Live
56X CDrom
32X CDRW

Comments

Sr_C wrote on 8/21/2002, 7:37 PM

no suggestions?!? Please Help

Tyler.Durden wrote on 8/21/2002, 10:41 PM

Hi Sir,

What software did you re-install, and in what order?

Any other apps running?

Display hardware accelleration?

Oh yeah, did you make any hardware changes?

Might be some clues there.

HTH, MPH

Sr_C wrote on 8/21/2002, 11:24 PM

"What software did you re-install, and in what order?" I reinstalled 98se, loaded all drivers then installed Vegas, Acid, Cakewalk, Office 2000, Winzip, Audiograbber, Fruity loops, Nero and players (WMP, Rwal Player, Quicktime)

"Any other apps running?" I brought it down to none and same problem

"Display hardware accelleration?" Full

"Oh yeah, did you make any hardware changes?" The differences in Hardware since I had Vegas working is I added a 2nd hard drive (80G 7200).

haydenj wrote on 8/22/2002, 12:07 AM

Is your second hard drive on primary or the secondary IDE channel? Does it share with the CD drive? Are you using ATA100 for the hard drives and have the right IDE cable? Is DMA turn on? Did you tried to disconnect the CD drive to see if there any improvement?

haydenj wrote on 8/22/2002, 12:09 AM

Last how big is your power supply?

Sr_C wrote on 8/22/2002, 12:25 AM

my new Hard drive is set as a slave with the first and on the same cable. I have DMA turned on. i have not disconnected any cd drives because they both are on a separate channel from my HD. I do not know off hand the size of my power supply. How do I check that?

Stiffler wrote on 8/22/2002, 1:27 AM

Hay, Shon.

If you open your computer, there should be a sticker on your power supply that states the watts.

Hayden probly brings this up because Athlons run hot, and can cause instability (from what I have read). I think AMD says you should have at least a 300W power supply.

Sr_C wrote on 8/22/2002, 8:59 AM

I checked and the power supply is 300Watts.

Another bit of info:

It crashes on preview after about 1.5 minutes. In other words. The project I was working on was 3 minutes long, if I play it for one minute, stop, continue for 2nd minute, stop then finish the 3rd minute, its fine, no crash. But if I try to play it all the way through, crash. weird

Sr_C wrote on 8/22/2002, 10:00 AM

I also transferred all the data files for that particular project from the 2nd hard drive to the first and redirected the .Veg file to read the clips off of the other HD. Still crashes. I think this eliminates the possibility of a problem with the new HD. Should I try reinstalling Vegas for a third time? Should I reinstall the OS?

Tyler.Durden wrote on 8/22/2002, 10:07 AM

The first thing I would try is turing off HW acceleration on the display card.

HTH, MPH

SonyDennis wrote on 8/22/2002, 1:12 PM

When you PC is not "busy", the CPU goes into wait states that cause it to draw less power. When it is busy rendering, it uses full power and heats up more.

My Sony VAIO tower at home has a variable-speed fan, and when I do video renders, I can definately hear it speed up a short time into the render. It doesn't slow down until after the render has been done for a little while.

If your CPU is "on the edge" temperature-wise, doing a render is going to put it over the edge. It is also going to stress the power supply if it's near it's limit.

If a CPU goes overtemp, or a power supply dips below it's rated output voltage, a crash can result. One of these might very well be the problem, and adding the new drive contributes both to temperature and power supply stress.

Did you say to crashes just playing from the timeline? What if you create a short loop region and play that, does it still crash?

///d@

Sr_C wrote on 8/22/2002, 1:33 PM

Yes it crashes while playing from the timeline after about 1.5 minutes of playing through. I don't know about the loop region but I will try that. So should I upgrade my power supply, CPU fan or both?

SonyDennis wrote on 8/22/2002, 4:25 PM

You could do some tests to find out. Shut down and disconnect the new drive and see if it's still a problem, if not, then it's probably your power supply. If so, it's probably your CPU overheating. Since it used to work before you added a drive, I'm betting it's your power supply. But, I'm not a PC builder, so I'm just guessing here.
///d@

Sr_C wrote on 8/23/2002, 1:08 AM

My nights will now involve sleep!!! I turned off HW acceleration and bam, perfect playback and render! In fact I now get close to 30fps on preview (which I never had). Thanks Marty for that specific advice and thanks to the rest of you for all the suggestions, Seriously if I didn't have this forum I would have probably given up on NLE long ago.

Next question: I know I'm showing my ignorance here but what is Hardware accelation for? Am I going to run into problems with it turned to none? Can I call that a fix or was it a test to indicate where a real problem might lie?

haydenj wrote on 8/24/2002, 12:26 PM

No it will cause any problems to leave the Hardware accelation to none. Just that some fuctions may run slower. It usually indicate a driver issue. Make sure your video driver is up to date and check your Direct X drivers by using system tools in WIN98SE. I find that direct X can mess up easily. We have not rule out physical problems yet. Leave the covers off on the computer to see if more cooling makes a difference. I have 300 watts power supply with my Intel P4 with all slots loaded and when I upgrade the CD drive to a DVD burnner my computer became unstable at times and will reboot. I upgraded the power supply to a 430 watt unit that has two fans in it. No problems. More troubshooting on your part and you may find the problem. Are you sure that you did make any changes software wise when you added the second hard drive?

John

PhilinCT wrote on 8/24/2002, 5:11 PM

I am having the same problem with my AMD1.5, Win-xp machine. Works fine until I play pack anthing over a few minutes, crashes when I render........

I will try turning off hardware acleration too!

My problems also started when I added a second drive!!!!!!!!

I think I have a driver problem as well, but have not been able to find it!!!!
New User Phil

haydenj wrote on 8/25/2002, 5:17 PM

Phil,

If you are a game player you may not like hardware accelation off. What patch level are you on with Video Vegas? What video card and the driver version is? What OS are you using? What direct X version are you using and does it pass all tests using the diagnosis under system tools if you are using WIN98SE. Keep us in the loop.

Lajko wrote on 8/26/2002, 3:05 PM

If using FireWire, check the drivers. I found the TI 1394 drivers cause nothing but trouble (I installed them as per the suggestion of the SoundBlaster manual when trying to resolve a playback problem). Removing them and using the MSDV drivers made everything stable and reliable. For more details, see my postings in the "Problems printing to Tape" message thread.