Basic needs of editing

[Anonymous]

Hey, I bought a Sony Hi8 TRV128 model camcorder and would like to begin making movies and editing. I have Pinnacle Studio 9 and the connections for my camcorder, which includes a Dazzle Digital Video Creator 80. My computer is a recent Compaq and I have Windows XP. However, I am not sure this is enough. The very first time I tried out Pinnacle, it worked fine, but then when I was trying to transfer a short video to DVD, it froze and it has not been working correctly since. First of all, when I go on to Pinnacle and try to capture video, the preview screen remains blank, though the time shows its capturing video. When I move to editing, there is then no video to work with. I believe I may need something more. Can anyone help and tell me what more I may need to buy, what that thing is and what it does, and about how much it would cost? This is really beginning to frustrate me.

[Endeavor]

There should be a big warning on the top of the forum that says “DONT BUY PINNACLE EDITING SOFTWARE!”

[Anonymous]

Let’s get this straight: it’s not the brush that made Leonardo!
So if you’re a good videomaker, you can do miracles with Windows Movie Maker, or on the other hand you can crash a Hollywood editing suite or not even get it to work at all and say it’s crap.
Don’t blame the software until you’ve tried everything, including a fresh reinstall of your operating system. It’s also important that you download and install all the patches provided by Pinnacle, e.g. version 9.4.3 seems more stable than 9.3.
So reinstall Windows and everything and then post back if you have any more problems and we’ll try to sort it out.
And in case you’re wondering, yes, I am a moderator of a UK Pinnacle forum. But I’m not taking their side, I just want to help YOU get this sorted out so that you don’t spend more money on another software.
Good luck!

[SFChuck]

And make sure your system meets Pinnacle’s recommendations, not just the minimum requirements. When I increased my DDR memory to 1 GB, it eliminated many of my problems. Most of the rest are the result of my less-than-optimal graphics card…which I can’t do anything about and will have to live with.

[Author]

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