I recently switched over to Sony Vegas, purchasing the Vegas Pro 8 software. The install was sucessful, and the sample projects load and perform seemingly fine. However, when loading my own footage (even just 2 short widescreen hi-def clips) the software frequently freezes (hourglass appears, and software never recovers).

Windows does not show any CPU stress. No other software is running. System specs should easily handle this. Other editing software has no problem at all.

Could you outline the various things that might be causing this that I could look into. I purchased this software partially because I heard it is far more stable than Premiere, so you could understand my surprise and frustration when it crashes with only 2 short clips on board. Obviously, something is wrong...

(I've submitted this question to Tech Support as well, but am hoping to also get some feedback from the forums)

System Info:
P4 2.8GHz
XP Pro SP2
2 Gigs RAM, loads of drive space
No other software running
Other editing/graphics software has no problem with this footage (nor projects far larger than my test ones)
Vegas has been patched to current version

Sometimes seems to be triggered by right clicking.