Playing these types of files is very CPU intensive. Can you post your computer specs and what build of PD are you using (Directors chair --> help--> about)?

Have you ever installed ffdshow? Ffdshow is a codec pack which will make your PD experience much better.

Try a search on this forum and you will find a lot of resources for similar questions.

Q9300 2.5 GHz
4 GB Ram
Nvidia 9800 GT

Hi.
Thanks.
I installed ffdshow, but it doesn't help.
I'm using PowerDirector 7 trial version build 7.0.2521.
My computer specs are:
Windows Vista Home Premium 32-bit Service pack 2.
Processoor: Intel Core 2 CPU 6400 2.13GHz,
2 gigs of RAM,
Nvidia GeForce 7600 graphics card.
Any ideas?
Thanks.

Increase your Windows page file size and see PC specs :
OS Windows 10.0 Pro
MB - AS rock Z77 extreme 11
Intel 3770K @ 4.0 Ghz OC
Gskill 32 GB RAM 1800 Mhz
6 TB HDD, SSD bootable
nVidia ASUS GTX 660 Ti
BenQ 22" LCD monitor 1920x1080

Quote: Increase your Windows page file size and see

Hi. I don't exactly understand what you mean by that.
What's a Windows page file size- and how to increase it?
Thanks.

Your CPU or video card may be causing the problem. A dual core at ~2GHz is pretty much on the cut line. Also, your system would also benefit from a video card update (at least a nVidia 9500 GT or even better a 9600). Neither one of those cards is particularly expensive and their are also plenty of cards even better than those for more money.

I can edit AVCHD on my 2 GHz dual core laptop with 2 GB of RAM, but I have to set the preview settings to low. In my case installing ffdshow made an improvement.

You can also try dropping the clips into the timeline and waiting about 10-20 minutes to do anything. PD will do some background processing during this time to make editing more manageable. You should also make sure your HD is defragmented before you use PD. Q9300 2.5 GHz
4 GB Ram
Nvidia 9800 GT

In my experience .mp4 file format does not play well with any video editor I have tried such as corel sony and edit pro, so what I do is convert them into mpeg format with format factory and than use these mpeg into pd7.
Remember mp4, avi and mpegs are really containers only, not the actual recording format.
It took me two weeks to figure out crashes on pd7 as I was using this mp4 files off flip ultra hd which were encoded with 3ivx codecs.
Therefore my suggestion is to convert them into standard compliant container format to use in pd7