Hi guys,
We've gotta laugh - we'd cry otherwise... good joke, Denby.
Now. Daffyd:
You will hardly be able to believe this, but my friend is in the absolute stone age when it comes to computers. She barely knows how to send an email, so when she said she wanted to learn PD I was gobsmacked, but willing to help - a LOT! Unfortunately because of her computer illiteracy she is still on dial-up!!!! There is no way she would go onto a forum, although I'd help her if she did. However with the snail speed of dial-up it would take a year to post and answer stuff.
After your explanation I now understand why you think you need to see the timeline etc. This stuff such as diagnostic files - what are they? I have no idea what they are and don't know how to find them!
My friend hasn't downloaded any patches for the same reason that she hasn't been to an online forum, it would take eternity to download the huge file I saw when I checked for patches. If you think it will help, I'll get my Other Half to help me put it on a thumb drive and load that on her computer.
As for your point 5, well around here some of us have better screens than others, but not everyone has the latest and best. So far, everything I've done with PD7 on normal definition has come up amazingly well on another friend's HD home theatre screen the size of the wall.
We are just making a simple demo DVD so my friend can learn the process. We've only used about a dozen or so photos and she's not done any frills as yet. We are not using the Magic Wizard stuff, just doing it all manually.
I have no idea what you are talking about in point 7... sorry.
Over to you. Thanks for responding. LadyA

I'm sorry, Daffyd,
Again I've shown up my inexperience. Since I wrote that last message, I have re-read YOUR last message and have followed the links you gave me... AND read what you have so cleary and kindly set out there for people such as I.
I will try to gather the information you need, using your instructions, but still don't think it will be possible using my friend's dial-up service. I've been trying to convince her to upgrade, but she is resisting and I can't convince her of the need for a faster service. She simply does not understand the limitation that dial-up presents. All she usually does is send and receive emails about twice a week. She says that all she wants to do is make this holiday DVD and can't see the need for a faster internet connection. Sigh... I probably won't be able to go and see her for a few days, but if I can fit it in I will go sooner and have a crack at at getting at least some of the stuff you need if you are going to try helping us.
It's been an exciting week for me as a first time forum visitor, learning about all this stuff and I'm very impressed that so many of you are willing to spend time and effort helping with this.
I still have the opinion that since we have established that there IS a problem, it's really up to the Cyberlink gurus to create some sort of patch, and I am continuing my dialogue with them.
Having said the above, is there any point in taking this any further until I've heard again from my Cyberlink contact to see if they can just fix it FOR us? LadyA

It's me again, Daffyd.
I've had time to think a bit more about this problem. You must understand that I am a simple user, I don't know much at all about this stuff. It's like driving my car: I get in, turn it on and it takes me where I want to go. It's the same with PD, I use it (with some difficulties at times) and haven't a clue what makes it or the computer, work.
I am feeling totally overwhelmed by the requests for data that you, in trying to understand what's going on, (and I REALLY DO appreciate that) are asking for. My computer learning curve has been not a curve, but vertical, this week!
I DO understand and appreciate that you are trying to sort this out and help me, and you can't do that without the technical information but, Yikes! Why ME? (Yes, I know I asked the question in the first place, but I'm really sorry I ever got into this.) I'm having a major panic attack.
Are you really sure I am the one who needs to do all this stuff? Can't you look into it without involving ME in trying to access technical data?? Maybe Denbigh, who agreed with me that he's had problems, might like to do some research too... and I'm sure he'd absolutely LOVE to go into all this technical stuff for you! Sorry, I just had to explain what I feel. If you REALLY need me to pursue this, I guess I'll have to try - you have at least given me some good instructions to follow.
I'm certainly not stupid, but have no experience or interest in doing anything other than simply use programs that do what I want - sometimes. I'm not at all interested in becoming a computer buff; I really don't want to do this!
I am thinking of suggesting that my friend swaps her PD8 for 7 and we can forget all about PD8...
LadyA

Hi Anita,

This is just a notification within your topic that I have sent you a PM(private message)

Kevin
Check out PDtoots. PowerDirector Tutorials and more! Over 5,000 Subscribers.

OK, Kevin... I'll try to take a deep breath, calm down a bit and have a go at what you suggest. It's very kind of you to take this interest and speak gently to me! I guess having young kids helps you practice this!

I have to go to my friend's place and work on her machine, since it's there that we are having the problem. I'm not sure when I can get there, but I will asap. It's only lunch-time here, so I'll see if she's home this afternoon.

Ta muchly, and I'll be back in touch when I have done it. Sleep well. LadyA

Just so you know I sent you one extra followup PM...it had one aspect that I wanted you to add to the test. And take your time...no rush...at your leisure.

Kevin
Check out PDtoots. PowerDirector Tutorials and more! Over 5,000 Subscribers.

Cap'n Kevin,
Thanks for your help and suggestions. This is to let you know I have sent a PM to tell you what happened when I tried your suggested experiment. In short, no difference; seems something else must be causing it. Sigh... LadyA

LadyA,

Thanks for your kind invite that I get my wellies on and get stuck in to this problem. I have every intention of doing so, but I am busy fighting another battle on another techy subject where software doesn't do what it is supposed to. I am building a new platform for my work and apart from finding Windows 7 so good as to be possibly better than my wife's iMac, I have a backup and restore problem where the software just does not have that turnkey behaviour one expects from stuff you pay for. Backup and restore is the most fundamental thing in computing, but this vital area can be faulty.

Do you realise that for a long time, software is sold with t&c which say there is no guarantee that the software will do what we say it will do!! How do we let them get away with it.

Denbigh

PS Can't find CyberLink's T&C i7 980x; W7 Pro; 12GB; Nvidia GTX 285; 2x300G Velociraptors in Raid 0; 2x1.5TB Barracuda in Raid 1; 2TB WD Studio Ed.II (eSATA); NEC SpectraView Reference 2690 + MultiSync EA232

Sorry I dobbed you in, Denbigh... but although I did, I was under no illusion that you were idly sitting around admiring the scenery! We all have other stuff to do each day besides sit at a keyboard. Please could you avoid using TLAs?? What's a t&c?? Since I have been on this forum I have been amazed at the time and trouble people are willing to spend sorting stuff for we newbies. It's really appreciated. I agree about PD7, and have absolutely no intention of upgrading in spite of frequent online blandishments to do so.
I fully agree with Denbigh that computer gear/software are about the only products sold in the free market place that don't come with full guarantees. They get away with it because... we can't do a danged thing about it! To be fair, I will say that the Cyberlink help people, although not always grasping the problems I've asked about, DO respond reasonably promptly and I do feel that someone IS at the other end of the electronic link.
To keep everyone up to date, I have just sent off my friend's DxDiag file to my Cyberlink guru and they're going to take a look. They will have to spell out any further steps very simply, but I am confident that now they know what I don't, they'll do so.
Dafydd, I know that DxDiag process was part B of your online help pages: did you want to take any further part in this, or shall we just wait and see what the guru says? I don't want to appear ungrateful and am happy to continue working with you if you think it's necessary and you have the time.
Cap'n Kevin's soothing message and help came just at the right time and was also very much appreciated; I was feeling very overwhelmed by it all - you'd never have guessed. Also, my husband had been busy at a sports club tournament all weekend and wasn't home to pat me on the head and mop my fevered brow. He assures me that he will be here to hold my hand whenever I have to do something (eek!) technical, so I should be OK now. I'm NOT usually the sort of female who needs male support, but this is one area where my abysmal lack of knowledge did allow me to become overwhelmed. It won't happen again - I hope! LadyA

t&c is a TLA for terms and conditions - thought context would make it clear. Glad you have CL (2LA) working on your case.

denbigh i7 980x; W7 Pro; 12GB; Nvidia GTX 285; 2x300G Velociraptors in Raid 0; 2x1.5TB Barracuda in Raid 1; 2TB WD Studio Ed.II (eSATA); NEC SpectraView Reference 2690 + MultiSync EA232

Arrggghhh!! You win!!! Thanks for clarifying that... I would never have guessed. LadyA

Well, I have done a little trial which did not turn out as I expected. It may be because I did it with a black and white image, as I tried something earlier which seemed to confirm my worst fears. I shall repeat the tests with a colour image, but in the meantime I thought you might like to look at the result.

Since YouTube degrades videos when you upload them, it is better that you go to my website:

www.black-sugar.net/BigFiles and you will see a folder called MyVideos. The folder contains just the one DVD video. You will need to download and play it full-screen. There are three images for about 20secs each with a pull-through transition, that is all.

I took a nice sharp-looking image (which just happened to be black and white) which I thought would show up the problem. I resized it to 720x576 in Photoshop. I saved the image three times: BMP, JPG, PNG to show the difference with the input image. I created a little video (NOT a slide-show) and you can see the result. It may be that it is pretty good because I didnt use any bells and whistles like PIP or fancy transitions, etc.

I have a feeling that making a slideshow in PD and in colour might be a bit different. I shall post my results as and when...

denbigh i7 980x; W7 Pro; 12GB; Nvidia GTX 285; 2x300G Velociraptors in Raid 0; 2x1.5TB Barracuda in Raid 1; 2TB WD Studio Ed.II (eSATA); NEC SpectraView Reference 2690 + MultiSync EA232

OK, I have now done another trial and again, it is not as I expected.

The source for the video (3 images again) is in the folder Pontrieux Fontaine Images. There you will find an original ca. 4.5MB image and three downsized versions using Photoshop, with best downsizing algorithms. In the other folder Pontrieux Fontaine Video, you will find the video, which is again just three 'scenes' all the same photo, but fed to PD8 as three different format images. All 720x576.

I advise downloading the two folders and looking for yourself. Playing the video from my site is pretty slow, ditto looking at the images.

In my opinion, with downsizing done externally, PD8 is doing as good as one can expect. The screen image is about as good as the input image. The best might just be the PNG format. Make your own decision.

Perhaps someone can do the same exercise with HD?

Feedback appreciated.

denbigh i7 980x; W7 Pro; 12GB; Nvidia GTX 285; 2x300G Velociraptors in Raid 0; 2x1.5TB Barracuda in Raid 1; 2TB WD Studio Ed.II (eSATA); NEC SpectraView Reference 2690 + MultiSync EA232

Hi all, Over the weekend and Bank Holiday, I have monitored posts and contributed to some. Unfortunately I don't seem to have had notification of posts here.

Denbigh, thank you for posting your results - I use png files.

Dafydd

I promise to make this my final contribution before this thread disappears...

Just for the record, I have made a composite of cuttings from the input images and the corresponding screen scrapes from the video. The composite is blown up (best enlargement capability in PS-CS4, which will affect all images the same). The quality in PD8 has degraded fairly significantly, I wonder why. I took some wedding photos and made a nice little slideshow, but the SS looked really poor, I suppose this composite gives some idea of why. I will repeat the test with HD quality at some point, but already I can see that this HQ image is not as good as broadcast quality. We should all remember that 720x576 is only 0.4MPixels - or am I missing something?

denbigh

i7 980x; W7 Pro; 12GB; Nvidia GTX 285; 2x300G Velociraptors in Raid 0; 2x1.5TB Barracuda in Raid 1; 2TB WD Studio Ed.II (eSATA); NEC SpectraView Reference 2690 + MultiSync EA232

Denbigh,
I am very impressed with all your experimentation, even though I don't understand half of it... I have been reading all the suggestions so far and they're very interesting, but it still comes down to the basic fact that PD8 does not give acceptable quality images with the final DVD burn, so there's something wrong with PD8.
I sent off some info to Cyberlink a couple of days ago, but haven't heard back from them as yet; I sincerely hope that they are working on it, public holiday notwithstanding!
What I think I am going to do is to go to my friend's place, uninstall her PD8 and install my copy of PD 7 in her machine. I don't think it breaches copyright because a) she has already paid good money for a product that isn't working properly, and b) it will only be a temporary situation: I want to burn the identical photo slide show we made in PD8, using PD7 on her machine and have a look at the result. Then, if PD7 gives an acceptable result... what then?? It's over to Cyberlink, I reckon. I won't hold my breath.
Thank you again for all the time and effort that has been spent in contemplating my dilemmas.
P.S.: can anyone tell me why the little avatar I uploaded a couple of days ago doesn't show on the site? Did I do something wrong? It seemed to be working the day I did it, but isn't now. LadyA

LadyA,

I would not want to suggest that you are wrong in thinking that PD8 is not as good as PD7, but you should re-read the last line above. We have to remember that although we may be using 4MB as our input material, PD8 is only producing an image of 720x576, or 0.4Mpix which is pretty low resolution. In fact, a 4MB jpg is reduced to something like 100 - 200K jpg.

You have to be sure that you are comparing like with like and side by side. These things are pretty subjective and can be affected by the subject material as well. Look at MyVideo on my site (reference is above) and because it is black and white it appears far sharper than it really is.

Good luck with your experiments, and do bring them back here.

The un-stickiness of your avatar is 'cos they were/are messing about with the Forum software. I had same problem, but my missing stuff suddenly appeared again.

SF

PS. I think putting PD7 on your friend's machine is a good idea. You will then be comparing like with like and possy side by side. i7 980x; W7 Pro; 12GB; Nvidia GTX 285; 2x300G Velociraptors in Raid 0; 2x1.5TB Barracuda in Raid 1; 2TB WD Studio Ed.II (eSATA); NEC SpectraView Reference 2690 + MultiSync EA232

LadyA

Since my last, I tried something else... I am using an HD clip (1920x1080) and made two videos from it. The first is a straightforward HD video and the second a 1018 x 576 (wide screen version of 720x576). I did a screen-scrape from each of them...

You will note how the subjective quality of the HQ seems very much better than previous images I used, and yet the HQ screen-scrape is only 144KB as against 1.56MB for the HD.

Click for full size version.
1018x576


Click for full size version and then click that image for full size.
1920x1081


i7 980x; W7 Pro; 12GB; Nvidia GTX 285; 2x300G Velociraptors in Raid 0; 2x1.5TB Barracuda in Raid 1; 2TB WD Studio Ed.II (eSATA); NEC SpectraView Reference 2690 + MultiSync EA232

Denbigh, I tried looking at your video, but couldn't get it to play. There was a download to my computer, but I couldn't open it. Maybe it was the wrong one? (I'll delete it from my downloads anyway.) I got a bit "lost" amongst your files; there seemed to be more of them than the single one you said would be there; I was probably in the wrong place. It doesn't matter, I'll take your word for it about the differences. Re your later messages, your comparisons are interesting and you've obviously spent quite some time on them. Seeing the images side by side really shows up the differences.

I will certainly make a short DVD with PD7 on my friend's machine as discussed in my last message, but I'm afraid that it won't happen until the middle of next week. Our schedules don't match very well for the next few days and I am unable to get there at a time that suits us both. We'll both be too busy this weekend, too. However, when I eventually get on to it, I will let you know the results... if this thread is still meandering along then and hasn't been chopped off.

I am relieved that it wasn't anything I did that made my avatar invisible... I was feeling pretty chuffed that I worked out how to do it!! (What's simple to the rest of you is a huge leap for me.) Hopefully someone will fix it soon. It's only a cartoony image I "borrowed" from some free graphics, but it reflects my interests (and my appearance, very vaguely). It's not important anyway; it was one more new thing for me to try just to see if I could do it. My vertical learning curve is heading towards the ionosphere and beyond! LadyA

Anita,

I moved to PD8 a few days ago because I was tired of all the crashes with WMP.

The first time I rendered the same slide show in PD8 that I had done in WMP I was surprised. The quality stunk. Both are rendered in WMV format. Even the PD8 titles turned out blurry.

Since then I have rendered this same slide show in AVC format. This took 3:38 to render a 4 minute slide show. The quality was better but the digital pictures were squished and it messed up the soundtrack.

Next, I tried AVI. Still not acceptable. But a little quicker.

Then I tried MPEG-2. Turned out great. All the imported graphics are as good as the original and the titles even come through clear.

The file size for the MPEG-2 is much greater than the WMV but well worth the quality. And, the render time isn't bad at all.

And a thought: When I heard that Cyberlink decided to sacrifice quality for time, I thought, how stupid. Sounds like something Microsoft would do. Anyone who puts a blurry video on the web isn't going to get it seen. What good is a video if no one will watch it? Anyone who is willing to give up quality for a few minutes time isn't to bright and shouldn't be catered to.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Jim, yes.... as you can see, we have already had extensive discussion on this topic. We'll add you to our list of unhappy customers. I won't be online again until Tuesday, by which time maybe there might be other comments. Thanks for sharing your experiences with us, and I await the next posting. I still haven't heard from Cyberlink, by the way, and I sent off the info they asked a few days ago. LadyA