Slow down

toobadshewontlive

Newbie Joined: Mar 27, 2017 05:49 Messages: 8 Offline

Solved by

Mar 27, 2017 06:04

Hello,

I'm on a trial version of Power Director, version 2509 is what I downloaded a few days ago. Windows 7.

My computer is an older i5 with 6gb of RAM, but I edited about 6 minutes of video with about six tracks in PowerDirector without any issues. I had real-time preview, the preview mode worked well enough on High quality and even HD. I could run it with my email and Opera open. I had a marathon session and made a nice video, and was planning today to purchase my license after a weekend out of town.

So I sat down this morning to get to work, and I can't even play the video in the preview on the lowest resolution. It gets jerky and the resource monitor of my computer says the CPU is way up, when before it was performing fairly respectably.

Between then and now, I've not done anything to the computer. No updates. PowerDirector is the only application running.

Could it be that my file is somehow corrupted?

Thanks,

Robert But then again...

Paul1945

Contributor Location: South Africa Joined: Apr 12, 2014 14:11 Messages: 327 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 06:19

Hi Robert

i think id is the speed of your PC..System/Motherboard etc please send us your

DxDiag so lots of Guys can the try to Help

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Mar 27. 2017 06:20

Pauls PC
X399 AORUS Extreme/AMD Ryzen2970WX/1xQuatro 4000 Driver:Geforce 419.67Skill V DDR4 64GB/3200MHz/Win10 prox64
Intel SSD 750/400 / Intel SSD 750/1.2Tb 1x4TB SSHD /1xSeagate 10TB pro
1xSamsung UA28D590 4k LUMIX GH5 1xLG HDR

toobadshewontlive

Newbie Joined: Mar 27, 2017 05:49 Messages: 8 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 06:22

Quote Hi Robert

i think id is the speed of your PC..System/Motherboard etc please send us your

DxDiag so lots of Guys can the try to Help

OK cool, but I don't see what that has to do with anything. It was working fine for like two days, and then suddenly it was not working fine. What could that have to do with my system? But then again...

Longedge

Senior Contributor Joined: Apr 28, 2011 15:38 Messages: 1504 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 07:01

Quote It was working fine for like two days, and then suddenly it was not working fine. What could that have to do with my system?

You are obviously not running Windows10 but nevertheless in diagnosing any problem at all the dxdiag output is the best place to start.

Carl312

Senior Contributor Location: Texas, USA Joined: Mar 16, 2010 20:11 Messages: 9090 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 08:04

Have you scanned your computer for malware?

Malware can sure slow down your computer. As can some malware scanners, if the scanner thinks your new video has Malware.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Mar 27. 2017 08:07

Carl312: Windows 10 64-bit 8 GB RAM,AMD Phenom II X4 965 3.4 GHz,ATI Radeon HD 5770 1GB,240GB SSD,two 1TB HDs.

toobadshewontlive

Newbie Joined: Mar 27, 2017 05:49 Messages: 8 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 08:28

Quote

Quote It was working fine for like two days, and then suddenly it was not working fine. What could that have to do with my system?

You are obviously not running Windows10 but nevertheless in diagnosing any problem at all the dxdiag output is the best place to start.

Yep, it's Windows 7 and it's actually a totally fresh install. I rolled back from Windows 10 to my original Windows 7 so I could get on 64 bit, since my original installation was 32 bit and I couldn't use all 6 gb of RAM.

The installation went famously and everything is great.

Thanks for your help! dcdiag is attached.


Filename	dxdiag.png	Download
Description
Filesize	39 Kbytes
Downloaded:	23 time(s)

But then again...

toobadshewontlive

Newbie Joined: Mar 27, 2017 05:49 Messages: 8 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 08:29

Quote Have you scanned your computer for malware?

Malware can sure slow down your computer. As can some malware scanners, if the scanner thinks your new video has Malware.

Hi!

It can't be malware because I literally just formatted my computer and installed my factory 64 bit Windows. But then again...

toobadshewontlive

Newbie Joined: Mar 27, 2017 05:49 Messages: 8 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 08:31

Quote

Quote Hi Robert

i think id is the speed of your PC..System/Motherboard etc please send us your

DxDiag so lots of Guys can the try to Help

OK cool, but I don't see what that has to do with anything. It was working fine for like two days, and then suddenly it was not working fine. What could that have to do with my system?

Just a reminder here, but everything was working famously. I saved the project, turned off my computer, and left for the weekend. When I came back, it was herky jerky. ;

I just rendered the project though, and it rendered 1 hour and 26 minutes of video when I have only 16 minutes on the timeline. But then again...

Longedge

Senior Contributor Joined: Apr 28, 2011 15:38 Messages: 1504 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 08:38

Can you run dxdiag again and choose the option to "Save all information". This will save everything out to a text file which you can then post. A screenshot of the first page of dxdiag doesn't really help.

What have you got installed in terms of virus/malware checkers? Do you for instance run checks for rootkits which can resist a HDD format (although that would be a worst case scenario

)

toobadshewontlive

Newbie Joined: Mar 27, 2017 05:49 Messages: 8 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 08:46

Hi Everyone,

So the beginning of the video, where I have fewer tracks, previews fine. The middle, where my tracks begin, does not preview well.

But it's worth noting that it was previewing just fine when I did all the work you see.

Maybe I moved a clip above another track just before the preview started working poorly... It has to have something to do with the file.


Filename	video editing.png	Download
Description
Filesize	60 Kbytes
Downloaded:	27 time(s)

But then again...

toobadshewontlive

Newbie Joined: Mar 27, 2017 05:49 Messages: 8 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 09:31

So I have mostly solved it by trying to get rid of anything that looked strange or that wasn't there when things were working perfectly. For people whose computer is on the edge of performance for PowerDirector, this is what I found:

Removing the chapter and subtitle tracks from the timeline

Most importantly: I had an empty track with one clip in it (not shown). #3 of 10. It was video enabled. I deleted the clip, resulting in a 100% empty track, and my problems persisted. When I deleted the empty track, the preview performance was instantly better.
- The clip itself was fine. If I moved it to the end of the timeline, it played just fine.

It wasn't the overal quantity of tracks, since I had been working with that quantity the whole time, but rather I had been moving the clips down as part of my editing process, and I ended up with a mostly empty track.

I think the mostly empty track, above several other tracks, resulted in some sort of performance bug. But then again...

Longedge

Senior Contributor Joined: Apr 28, 2011 15:38 Messages: 1504 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 11:58

Quote When I deleted the empty track, the preview performance was instantly better.

That doesn't make any sense to me at all, an empty timeline cannot have any impact as far as I'm aware.

I have to say that you look to have an awful lot going on in that partial view of your timeline and your computer is probably overstretched anyway by the sound of it. You would probably benefit from breaking down your editing into multiple stages rather than trying to do everything in one fell swoop.

toobadshewontlive

Newbie Joined: Mar 27, 2017 05:49 Messages: 8 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 12:53

Quote

Quote When I deleted the empty track, the preview performance was instantly better.

That doesn't make any sense to me at all, an empty timeline cannot have any impact as far as I'm aware.

I have to say that you look to have an awful lot going on in that partial view of your timeline and your computer is probably overstretched anyway by the sound of it. You would probably benefit from breaking down your editing into multiple stages rather than trying to do everything in one fell swoop.

Hey!

I figured it out even more based on your reply. Of course you are wrong about the fell swoop, because as I mentioned, everything was working fine and is again working fine.

But here's likely the offender. The clip that I had in the offensive track was probably clipped from the same file as some of the clips in the tracks below it. The reason the clip played fine when dragged out past the rest of the clips was probably because Power Director was not trying to render the preview of two clips from the same file on two different tracks at the same time.

This doesn't exactly explain why the jerky preview continued after removing the clip, and then was immediately fixed after deleting the now-empty track.

But regardless, deleting the empty track solved my problem, no two ways about it. But then again...

Longedge

Senior Contributor Joined: Apr 28, 2011 15:38 Messages: 1504 Offline

Mar 27, 2017 13:28

Quote Of course you are wrong

- not for the first time in my life. I'll leave it with you then

.