I know when I installed PD7 it was taking over 6 minutes to load up. I'd see the loading splash screen and just have to wait but it would eventually load.

I had to change the shortcut to run under Windows XP compatibility mode (I'm running Vista 64) and now it loads up in seconds

Works for me without doing anything special (Vista x64).

Just a couple of ideas:
-Maybe your security software has PD7 restricted from doing something at startup. If your security software is not just Antivirus software and also includes a firewall. For example, in Kaspersky Internet Security, the module that contains rules for every application is called "Application Filtering"
-Maybe for some reason you need to run PD7 as the administrator

It's more than likely that it's something specific to your system and not the product.

It may be trying to connect to the internet and a firewall could be blocking it. Just a guess.

Easy enough to try. Turn the firewall off and then try to load. Win8 64-bit Pro Retail
Intel i7-4770
16GB DDR3 1600 8-8-8-24
MSI Z87-G45 Motherboard
ASUS GTX 660 Direct CU II OC 2GB GPU
1 TB RAID 1 (mirrored) Drive Array
Several scratch drives for video, TMP, pagefile.

Hey - thanks guys for your ideas. I really appreciate that.

Walker - I did as you suggested (using TrendMicro Internet Security Pro) - changed the settings to allow PD7, but it didn't make any difference. Then I turned off the firewall completely and had another shot. Still the same. NO GO!

Walker - you are absolutely right. It is something specific to my system. I installed it on my Vista laptop and it runs fine.

So - even though I haven't conquered whatever it is yet, I do appreciate your reponses. I'll keep battling away but if anyone can suggest anything that would be great - yeh yeh - I know - work on the laptop! Tread gently and you'll hear the daisies grow...

The one thing that will probably fix whatever is really wrong (if you can't figure it out), is an OS re-install. OS re-installs are time consuming though in a big way.

Here's where Norton Ghost or True Image come in. All you need is a burned bootup CD. I still only use a burned Ghost 2003 boot CD myself.

If I had the problem you are having right now, in about 40 minutes I'd know if it was something with the system itself, or something messed up further down the road. Most people just use System Restore, which is a joke and I always turn off.

-Keep a seperate partition for your OS
-Keep that partition as lean as possible by storing documents, pictures, etc on a separate partition - as well as game installs and such
-Create a FAT32 parition about 50 to 200GB. The boot CD will only be able to write to FAT32 (maybe that's changed now - I'm still on old software). This partition is for images.

-Install your OS fresh.
-The second the OS install finishes, MAKE AN IMAGE (001)
-Install all OS updates, while tweaking the GUI to your liking and then MAKE AN IMAGE
-Optional: Sometimes I install core software that I rarely change versions of, like Microsoft Office and MAKE AN IMAGE
-Install chipset and GPU drivers. Install software and then MAKE AN IMAGE
-After a couple of days of use where you've probably made some more modifications to installed programs and GUI setup MAKE AN IMAGE

Now what you've got is a set of fallback images. At this point you can do things like:
-Image your current system
-Restore fallback point 002
-Install and try to run PD7
-When done, restore the image you just made.
(you've just checked something on a clean install of your OS and gone back to the way it was in just a few minutes).

Depending on how fat your OS partition has gotten, this can take as little as 15 minutes to do (XP). Vista is a lot fatter OS than XP so images just take a lot longer by default. Also, lets say something goes very wrong with your OS install. In just a few minutes you can have an image restored and deal with having to re-install the OS from scratch.

Every couple of months I download the lastest drivers and software versions for everything I have and then restore the image I made before installing drivers and software (a clean OS is a great thing). And, when you are really having a problem that you can't pin down - just restore an image. It's all about keeping your OS partiton lean and not keeping much that needs to be backed up before an image restore on the OS partition.

It's really worth the time investment.

Walker - You're a great guy to have on a case. If I had a tenth of your knowhow, I'd be as happy as!

You'll be pleased to hear that - almost by accident - I solved it. After trying all the suggestions you guys made, I went into the error database and found that NVIDIA nView was showing up a lot.

I disabled it... started up PD7 - and - WOOHOO - it's flying.

Once again - thank you so much for taking the time to help me out. If I ever need advice again, I'll know who to call. Walker - you're a star. Tread gently and you'll hear the daisies grow...

That's a multi-display application. I guess Power Director was trying to access the second screen and glitched with that software?

I have a spare 22" LCD. I've always meant to hook it up to use as the preview monitor. I know have no idea if PD7 supports that though. I know Vegas 8 and Premier both do.