Dropping frames

EPsymp wrote on 9/27/2003, 2:05 PM

I know this is a rather common question, but i did a search and no one really seemed to give a solution. Once I upgraded to vegas 4.0a I have not been able to capture video without dropped frames. I can capture with window's default editor with little problem, and captured flawlessly with 3.0.
I'm running XP
Pentium 4
2.5 Ghz
512 MB
Vegas is installed in C and recording to D-80 gig

Does anyone know what the problem is, or how to solve it?
Thanks
Elias

Comments

BillyBoy wrote on 9/27/2003, 2:25 PM

Is "D" only a partition of your root drive or a physically different hard drive?

Its a common mistake. A different drive letter is no help because both your OS and the capture routine are using the same IDE controller. While some systems can handle it, others can't. Something has got to give, usually its dropped frames.

So... things to look at.

1. do you have a seperate drive you're capturing to?
2. could be your firewire card, all are not created equal.
3. have any application running in the background?

bobojones wrote on 9/27/2003, 9:26 PM

Elias,

The first thing you should do is verify that your IDE drives have been defragmented and are operating with the DMA Transfer Mode. If they are, then you should:

2) Terminate unnecessary background processes;
3) Reduce, or close, the preview window;
4) Set the display bit depth to 16 bpp; and
5) Increase the capture process priority.

HTH,

Bob

RonR wrote on 9/27/2003, 10:29 PM

Elias,

I started a thread just a few weeks ago regarding the exactly the same problem and I had many detailed suggestions of what may be the problem. Also, a number of fixes were suggested. You could conduct a search to "Dropped Frames With VV4", or if that doesn't work Search for User Name RonR. I tried all the suggetions that I could but nothing worked for me. I resorted to Capturing in VV3, which worked perfectly fine, then importing all the clips into VV4 and edting there. But then I found another problem. VV4 would not Print to Tape, so I rendered the complete video as an AVI file, and then Imported it back into VV3. That worked fine also. I would just use VV3, except I need some of the editing features in VV4.

We are not the only users to complain of this problem and I have concluded that there has to be a subtle difference between VV3 and VV4 that makes VV4 incompatible with some computer hardware, software or setup, that is proving difficult for a computer non-expert, such as myself, to fix. I am hoping that Sony look deeper into this and come up wth a solution.

EPsymp wrote on 9/28/2003, 12:45 PM

Thanks,
BillyBoy, It's a physically different drive, my os and vegas are installed on C.
Bobo, What is the DMA Transfer mode? That could be the problem, as for your other suggestions, my system resources are quite plentiful so I don't think those could be the problem.
Ron, I read your thread, nothing seemed to help me there, I guess I'll use VV3 for my capturing until I can figure this out. (By the way, I have been able to print to tape just fine)

bobojones wrote on 9/28/2003, 9:35 PM

This site has a step-by-step procedure you can follow to verify and, if necessary, reenable DMA transfer.

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/hwdev/tech/storage/IDE-DMA.mspx

JohnnyRoy wrote on 9/28/2003, 10:01 PM

> Once I upgraded to vegas 4.0a I have not been able to capture video without dropped frames

Did you really mean Vegas 4.0a? Have you tried downloading 4.0d which is the latest version? Perhaps 4.0a had a capture bug that 4.0d fixed.

~jr

RonR wrote on 9/30/2003, 12:41 PM

Let me answer a couple of questions as they apply in my case. I use a dedicated computer for editing only on which I keep my application files on the C drive, and all the work files on the D drive. This also means that in order to download upgrade files I have to physically take the drive from one computer and put it the other computer for the download, and then swap them back again.
I have consistantly had the dropped frame problem on both the "A" and "D" versions.

jetdv wrote on 9/30/2003, 1:18 PM

This also means that in order to download upgrade files I have to physically take the drive from one computer and put it the other computer for the download, and then swap them back again.

WHY? My editing computers are NOT connected to the internet. I get updated files to them via CD. I just download the files from the fastest connection I can find, burn them to CD, and then use the CD on these computers.

RonR wrote on 9/30/2003, 2:59 PM

I have only one CD burner and it is in the computer that I use for editing.

JohnnyRoy wrote on 10/1/2003, 6:14 AM

RonR, I didn’t go back and read your previous threads but have you contacted Sony support? Unless you open an “official” problem with them, they might not even be aware of it. These forums are for peer-to-peer support and not an “official” vehicle for bug reports. It sounds like you have uncovered a bug since VV3 works for you.

~jr

RonR wrote on 10/1/2003, 12:57 PM

JR. Yes, if you go back you will see that very early on I indicated that I did make an official complaint to Sony, but at more than a week later I had heard nothing from them. Interestigly, very shortly after that posting there was a posting from one of the SoFo guys saying that they had not changed anything from VV3 to VV4 that would cause my problem. My question remains. If that is so, why is it I can do everything with VV3 (capture, edit and Print to Tape) without a hitch, but when I go to VV4 (a or d) without exception I get lots of dropped frames, and cannot print to tape? This is all with exactly the same equipment and settings and the same section of tape, and done within a few minutes of each other. I have done everything I can to incorporate the suggestions made on the original thread, and also to keep evrything the same when testing in VV3 and VV4. The only difference is the two versions of Vegas Video. It has got to be something there.
RonR

Curtisf wrote on 10/6/2003, 3:42 PM

I'm a new user of Vegas using a brand new PC (Pentium 4, 3GHz, 1GB RAM, etc.)

I drop frames if I capture to any disk *OTHER* than my system drive. That's right, capture to the system drive (where Vegas is installed) appears to work flawlessly, but if I try to capture to either of my other two drives it consistently drops EVERY THIRD FRAME.

System drive is a Seagate Baracuda 80GB
Drive 2 is a Western Digital Caviar 120GB
Drive 3 is a Western Digital Caviar 200GB

All three drives are 7200rpm, all three have 8MB cache, all three drives are DMA enabled. System drive and Drive 2 are on the same controller, while Drive 3 is on it's own add-in contoller card.

It's very strange that capture works to the system drive and not the others ... it should be the other way around. I submitted this question to technical support today, but though I would post this to see if others get this same strange behavior.