Problem With Cineform and Vegas7.0

Zion wrote on 10/4/2006, 1:49 PM

Vegas 7.0a comes with a cineform 2.5 codec but it will only alow you to use Connect HD With Vegas 7 only. So I uninstall the one that comes with Veags 7 and installed the one I purchased from Cineform which is version 2.1 I put a large Cineform avi file on the time line and after the page file memory gets full Vegas crashes.

To reproduce: After you install Vegas 7 Uninstall the cineform codec
that comes with Vegas 7 uninstall Connect HD, then reinstall Connect HD, and Vegas should now be using the codec that comes with Connect HD, put a large cineform avi on the time line maybe something thats at least 20 minutes long open the windows task manager and watch the page file go up until it reaches the max and Vegas 7 will crash.

Has anyone else notice this?

Comments

Jay-Hancock wrote on 10/4/2006, 1:59 PM

Version 3.2 of Connect HD is compatible with Vegas 7 (as shown on the Cineform website). Older versions apparently are not. Read threads from the last month and you'll see various reports about this. Or just search for "Cineform" and especially view threads from 9/12 to present. Then you'll get the details.

Zion wrote on 10/4/2006, 2:02 PM

I sent a ticket to Cineform this is what they wrote back.

ZION

I spoke with our programmers and they said that Sony changed the way CineForm files are handled in Vegas 7 so we had to write a patch. Unfortunately the patch is only available in the latest version of Connect HD 3.x To use this version you'd have to upgrade from your current version.

Why should I have to pay? I think a patch should be made for the older version also or at least remove the restriction and alow me to use the codec in other apps.

Jay-Hancock wrote on 10/4/2006, 2:29 PM

Don't get me wrong - I don't work for Cineform - but you might want to take a look at all the enhancements and new features they've put into their latest Connect HD. Like, for example, you can make AVIs that allow "smart render" in Vegas. This is a huge time saver. And you can resize video (SD to HD, etc), deinterlace video, and more. Look at the site and decide if it's worth the upgrade price for you and your needs.

Regardless, the AVIs perform better in Vegas 6 than they did in Vegas 7. We are all hoping this will get improved in Vegas 7b (whenever it comes out). If you don't upgrade Connect HD and you need it for other apps, you might want to stick with using .m2ts in Vegas 7.

Zion wrote on 10/4/2006, 2:57 PM

Removed

Zion wrote on 10/4/2006, 3:01 PM

Just got this reply

ZION

You should contact Sony, because they're the ones who made the change in their software. We made the patch for version 3.x to fix their error, but we're not going to go back and re-program older versions of our software. 2.1 is going to stay the same forever. All our efforts are put into the current versions of our software (Connect HD 3, Aspect HD 4 and Prospect HD 2). Make sense? Sorry, but Sony did this to you. Not us. I'd like to help you but upgrading to 3.x is really your best choice right now. It's only $99!

So what happens with the next major change?

winrockpost wrote on 10/4/2006, 3:22 PM

......to fix their error,
Hmm, thought it was a Sony change ? An error eh, what do ya say Sony ,,,, Makes no difference to me I dont use cineform cept whats built in vegas,,
But an error , stir it up !!

Jay-Hancock wrote on 10/4/2006, 3:42 PM

The MT2 playback in Vegas 7 is out performing connect HD in any version.

No doubt. But there are still situations with very compelling reasons to not use MPG2 on the timeline. Read this thread for examples / explanations.

I've already found ample reason to do the renders with Cineform AVI. I have a project that I ran everything thru Deshaker (a plugin for VirtualDub, all free) to rescue some shakey video. The very act of rendering and re-rendering would have imposed generation loss on the .m2ts, which I avoided using CFDI (Cineform Digital Intermediate). More importantly, VirtualDub doesn't even allow you to use MPG as your source media.

One solution I am seriously considering is to do my editing with .m2ts and my rendering with Cineform AVIs (i.e swap them at render time). That way I get the best of both worlds.

Serena wrote on 10/4/2006, 3:49 PM

Sony didn't bother to keep Cineform in the loop on Vegas 7 and decided to make programming changes that weren't compatible with HD Connect. Had Sony included Cineform in beta testing this problem could have been sorted before release of 7, and probably even ensured that older versions of CF continued to work. These problems and that CF doesn't work as well in 7 as it did in 6 is down to a Madison bright spark.

Yoyodyne wrote on 10/4/2006, 7:13 PM

Boy, I'm surprised they are not working with Cineform more on this - at least some kind of Beta involvement. The new version of Cineform helped goose my playback in Vegas 6 but V7 is not near as good. Hopefully this gets worked out soon - would love to jump on board with V7.

dreamlx wrote on 10/4/2006, 9:54 PM

ZION:

Well they say it's only $99. For my case now: I have 2 Vegas licenses and use 4 machines for rendering. For 2 I have a cineform license, for the other ones I use the cineform version that came with Vegas 6. So an upgrade of cineform would cost:

2x cineform upgrade: $198
2x new cineform license: $398

I think $597 is a bit expensive to get cineform working. So I will have to pay the double of the price for 2 vegas licenses only to get cineform working. So I am seriously considering alternatives to cineform. For example lagarith. This is a free lossless compression algorithm, the files will probably be 5 times bigger then cineform but for $597 I also get a couple of 750GB harddisks.

Laurence wrote on 10/4/2006, 10:04 PM

I'm pretty sure that all you have to do is install and uninstall the latest cineform demo. The latest codec will be available on your systems and will work fine from within Vegas.

Zion wrote on 10/5/2006, 3:23 AM

"I'm pretty sure that all you have to do is install and uninstall the latest cineform demo. The latest codec will be available on your systems and will work fine from within Vegas."

Thanks Laurence!

Problem Solved.

dreamlx wrote on 10/5/2006, 3:44 AM

Problem might not be solved !

I did once install latest demo and uninstall on a Vegas 6 version, the cineform component was upgraded in Vegas, but after 30 days, I could no longer render to cineform using Vegas. An error message with something like "Your demo version is expired, please buy ConnectHD". I asked Cineform support what to do. I needed to uninstall and reinstall Vegas in order to get the version shipped with Vegas back. Unless this has been changed in the recent versions of Cineform, you risk that the same will happen to you. It might be worth asking Cineform support about this. Please post your findings.

Jay-Hancock wrote on 10/5/2006, 7:18 AM

I was thinking of giving him the suggestion of "install Connect HD 3.2 demo" but didn't say it, for exactly the reason you just stated. Plus he said he uses CFDIs for other apps, which would all be no longer working after the trial period.

For me, VirtualDub is a great app outside of Vegas to be using the CFDI. Saves the trouble of messing with some other codec (like uncompressed AVI or Huffy, etc.).

I would have to agree that Sony really dropped the ball on this one. And how did the beta testers miss this one so completely? Were they not using Connect HD on the same machines wth Vegas 7? Maybe the problem-causing code changes were added a short time before the release date, but who knows?

David Newman wrote on 10/5/2006, 8:16 AM

I must appologize for the terms used in our support teams response. Frustrations over the support calls generated from the change in Vegas 7. Sony did thorough testing against the shipped CineForm conponents and assumed we were testing with Connect HD versions (only we didn't get the beta notice -- by accident.) Once that issue was discovered we issued a patch in a few days. We are hoping for future Vegas versions will help address this, including older Connect HD versions. However many changes to Vegas 7 are very good, you can't always look backwards when making the next generation product.

David Newman
CTO, CineForm

Zion wrote on 10/5/2006, 11:16 AM

Thanks Dan for responding!

Question? will the work around Laurence suggested time out?

Zion wrote on 10/5/2006, 11:55 AM

dreamlx is right I set my clock ahead two months and tried to render and it timed out and ask me to purchase 3.0.

MarkWWW wrote on 10/5/2006, 12:19 PM

I don't know if it still works this way, but in the past when I downloaded the demo version of ConnectHD (ready for a camera I eventually decided I didn't have enough cash for after all) it timed out after 30 days and asked you to either purchase it or uninstall it. I chose to uninstall it and was then given the further choice of uninstalling everything, or of just uninstalling ConnectHD and leaving the updated codec installed so that Vegas could continue to use it.

Mark

Zion wrote on 10/5/2006, 1:08 PM

It will keep the 2.7 DEcoder but not the ENcoder. So you won't be able to render using the 2.7 codec unless you go with Connect HD 3.x