Quote ...I was intending to use Audacity to edit audio, then add back in. After re-linking the audio and video segments, all the editing options are gone. I have to keep the audio and video portions unlinked to perform any further editing.
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Any recommendations? Anyone else seeing this? I don't recall having this issue on PowerDirector16 (may reinstall and try this later today)

Unfortunately I see this issue with PD17, and the same behavior occurs in PD13 and 14 as well. Apparently, the developers are strongly biased against Frankenstein clips since they won't allow them to enjoy the same editing rights as "naturally whole" clips...

In fact, the only "acceptable" ways of editing the audio clip that I can see (where PD will allow the relinked version to be editable), are volume adjustments and trims, and each requires that both A/V parts remain exactly in sync.

In other words, I'm free to trim the length each segment independently and then rejoin them - as long as I don't move one left or right with respect to the matching section. However, if I move the audio track 1 second to the right of the video track, then trim the ends of each clip so they are each 1 second shorter but with both edges perfectly aligned, PD will not allow editing after relinking.

Since this seems to be a longstanding issue, the only workaround I can think of is the one I've been using this whole time, which is to not relink the clips after processing the audio.

If you're doing work with audio-only clips or video-only/images on the same timeline track, and you don't want to risk any of those edits causing PD to shift the video of your clip out of sync with the new audio, then linking will prevent that and you'll just have to remember to unlink to make any edits to it. Sorry that it's such a pain to deal with!

I'm not sure if there are intentional reasons why PD has treated separately-edited sections like this, but it certainly seems like a bug. You can file a support request to report this issue from this page, and be sure to paste the link to this forum thread in your description of the problem. Then post the CS # back here once you've submitted the form.

EDIT: I noticed that you also posted to an older thread, and the workaround I suggested there, which is to use the Produce Range to create a new "whole" version of your clips, is another viable option.