Thanks, Scott. I'm rendering as AVI right now, and just downloaded a trial of TMPGEnc from their website and I'll give that a try.

I did run "repairs" on both 3.0 and 4.0 with no luck. I'm reluctant to uninstall/reinstall 4.0 because it was a (ahem, cough, cough) Kazaa download and I can't seem to find it anymore on Kazaa and I'm afraid I won't have it at all then.

Thanks for responding so quickly . . I have to have this done today and I'm panicking!!

:) Donna

Donna, that probably explains your problems right there. The Kazaa download was a pirated copy without a legal and valid serial number. Unless you register the software properly with SonicFoundry you'll have lots of problems using MPEG-2.

Chienworks -

Thanks for your reply. However, the problem I'm having with MPEG rendering is with my legally purchased 3.0 version, not the Kazaa 4.0.

Any idea how I can get the MPEG templates back into 3.0?

Thanks very much,
Donna

Donna,

> Any idea how I can get the MPEG templates back into 3.0?

Perhaps your Kazaa copy of Vegas 4 clobbered your legal copy of Vegas 3. I would uninstall both and then just reinstall your legal copy of Vegas 3. There is no way of knowing what crap the Kazaa copy has inside and it would be foolish to reinstall it. Get a legal demo version of Vegas 4 if you want to check it out. Using pirated software is just asking for trouble.

~jr

Donna, i agree with JohnnyRoy's suggestion. The only warning i'll add though is that if you saved your project .veg file in Vegas 4, you won't be able to open it in Vegas 3 anymore. Hopefully you either didn't save it in 4 or you kept a backup copy somewhere.

Thanks to both of you, Jonny & Chienworks. I agree with you both. I was able to render the file as an AVI in 3.0, then I rendered THAT as a MPEG in 4.0 (so I was able to keep the video effects). I will now remove both from my system and reinstall my legal version of 3.0 (lesson learned). My only concern is that 3.0 will still not have MPEG rendering capability and then I'll have no way of making a DVD in the future. But I guess I have to take that chance.

Thanks again. And Chien - I must give a special thanks to you - you are always so helpful (you helped me out last year with Star Wars scrolling effects). It's nice to know there's a place to turn for guidance.

Best to you!
Donna

Update - Uninstalled both versions, reinstalled 3.0. All seems to be well. Thanks again for your help!

Crack can kill. Lesson learned I hope.

Ok, y'all can stop beating me up now. I've already stated (and restated) that the lesson has been learned. It would be much more helpful if you offered advice rather than berated someone who's already admitted making a mistake.

No, what you admitted to is theft.

John

Actually, charging another $400-$500 to upgrade a product that I already spent over $600 on just to fix things that don't work correctly in the original version is theft in my eyes. Perhaps if Sonic charged a fair price to loyal customers for upgrading to new versions, miscreants like myself wouldn't be tempted to illegally download. However, I take full responsibility for what I did, and will not do it again. In all honesty, my intention was to see if the newer (upgraded) version would solve the problems I was having, since I was getting no advice from Sonic customer service other than to "purchase the upgrade and hopefully that will fix your problems". And then if it did, I was going to (believe it or not) purchase the upgrade (but most likely from a software outlet at a less expense price than Sonic charges directly). While what I did was wrong, thank goodness I did it and saved the money just to find it wouldn't work on my machine.

I have no interest in furthering this debate. I'd like to once again thank those that were genuinely helpful to me (despite my felony status!). I wish you all the best.