MartiWNC

In Produce choose one of the options, H.264 AVC / MP4, HD or FullHD (P) and will have better quality

see image

AMD-FX 8350 / 8GB DDR3
SSD SUV400S37240G / 2-HD WD 1TB
AMD Radeon R9 270 / AOC M2470SWD
Windows 7-64 / PD16 Ultimate

MartiWNC,
welcome to the forum.
Without getting into tech-babble, I'll just say that AVI as an output option should be crossed off your list, it's all but useless. WMV, MPEG2, MP4, just about anything other than AVI. HP Envy Phoenix/4thGen i7-4770(4@3.4GHz~turbo>3.9)
Nvidia GTX 960(4GB)/16GB DDR3/
Canon Vixia HV30/HF-M40/HF-M41/HF-G20/Olympus E-PL5.
Tape capture using 6 VCR, TBC-1000, Elite BVP4+, Sony D8 camcorder with TBC.
https://www.facebook.com/BarryAFTT

Thanks so much for the prompt replies. The only reason I chose AVI was that I knew I wanted to upload it to YouTube and I didn't see MP4 which I had used with Movie Maker. Now I see that MP4 format is generated by some of the other names (none of which I understand, but that's okay).

I had also tried producing using Windows Media format and it was very poor quality also.

The file format names are a little confusing, e.g., I could produce MP4 by clicking on H.264 AVC and then choosing MP4 underneath OR by clicking on H.265 HEVC OR by clicking on XAVC S.

I do not see any HD or FullHD (P) options. I have PD Ultimate.

In your expert opinions, what is the best format (and then extension option underneath it) to satisfy the following criteria:

- clear text/graphics
- not too large (Movie Maker MP4 size of 100MB for 18 minutes seems reasonable)
- supported by YouTube

Thanks! PD 13, Windows 7 Pro, Intel i7-6700 CPU @ 3.4GHz, 16GB RAM, NVidia Ge Force GT 730 graphics adapter

Thoughts after additional investigation:

I don't have a fast PC - didn't think I would be doing video work.

Dell Inspiron 3647
Intel Pentium G3220 3GHz
Windows 7 64-bit
4GB RAM
Onboard Intel HD graphics

Are there any custom settings I should use in Produce to make the best use of this PC? I read somewhere on the forum about turning off hardware acceleration??

I would consider buying a new graphics adapter, but I just bought the PC last year and am not going to replace it. Therefore I'm stuck with the 3GHz processor. I would consider adding RAM.

Would it be worth it for my uses described above to get a new graphics adapter (which one?) or am I constrained by the CPU?

Sigh - I thought the Produce part would be easy!! PD 13, Windows 7 Pro, Intel i7-6700 CPU @ 3.4GHz, 16GB RAM, NVidia Ge Force GT 730 graphics adapter

Me again. We may need to back up a little. I looked at just the title slide in Movie Maker vs the one I created in PD. There is a noticeable difference in clarity between the two. I didn't do anything special in either one. Movie Maker title text is Segoe UI 36 point; PD is Arial 20 point.

When I see the title page in PD Edit view, it looks sharp, although it is fairly small. As soon as I go to Produce view where the image is about 4x as big on the monitor, it is fuzzy.

If I change the PD title text to 36 pt Segoe, it doesn't fit on the page, where the Movie Maker 36 pt Segoe does - makes no sense to me. And the 36 pt Segoe in PD is still fuzzy.

I am viewing both finished outputs in VLC on the same monitor so that's not the difference. I am baffled, but I may have to reconsider using PD if I can't get a clear output.

[Edit] I THINK I am beginning to understand. I chose Windows Media with Profile Type: Windows Media Video 9 Full HD 1920x1080/30p and the text is nice and clear.

Thanks in advance for help and suggestions... PD 13, Windows 7 Pro, Intel i7-6700 CPU @ 3.4GHz, 16GB RAM, NVidia Ge Force GT 730 graphics adapter

Hi MartiWNC You're going through a lot of issues here, and maybe by going over them one-by-one we can get you through this fairly steep part of the learning curve...

Quote: ...The file format names are a little confusing, e.g., I could produce MP4 by clicking on H.264 AVC and then choosing MP4 underneath OR by clicking on H.265 HEVC OR by clicking on XAVC S.

I do not see any HD or FullHD (P) options. I have PD Ultimate.

If you look at the picture that Playsound posted, you'll see the two main profiles most people on the forum use and recommend for uploading to YT. His comments are in yellow, but you'll see all the same menu options on your computer

(Movie Maker MP4 size of 100MB for 18 minutes seems reasonable)

That's not an HD video. Full 1920x1080 runs at 35Mbps, or roughly 168MB per minute, so you must either have very little moving content in that clip or MM produced to a very low resolution like 640x480. If you had a sample you could attach, that would help us know what the details are. You can also import it into PD or look at it in Windows Explorer and right-click on the clip and choose view properties.

Dell Inspiron 3647 Intel Pentium G3220 3GHz Windows 7 64-bit 4GB RAM Onboard Intel HD graphics Are there any custom settings I should use in Produce to make the best use of this PC? I read somewhere on the forum about turning off hardware acceleration??

You don't have a separate video card, so the options to even turn on HA are disabled in PD. Your only choice is to use the GPU that's built in to you Intel CPU. Your PC isn't a speed demon for editing, but it's still powerful enough to do the job. It will just take longer to prodcue when your finished than a more powerful machine.

I would consider buying a new graphics adapter, but I just bought the PC last year and am not going to replace it. Therefore I'm stuck with the 3GHz processor. I would consider adding RAM. Would it be worth it for my uses described above to get a new graphics adapter (which one?) or am I constrained by the CPU?

A total of at least 8GB of RAM would help (if you're running 64-bit Windows) and a GTX 960 would be a very good grahics card for less than $180 these days.

Sigh - I thought the Produce part would be easy!!

It actually is, and you've gotten most of the way there

...When I see the title page in PD Edit view, it looks sharp, although it is fairly small. As soon as I go to Produce view where the image is about 4x as big on the monitor, it is fuzzy. If I change the PD title text to 36 pt Segoe, it doesn't fit on the page, where the Movie Maker 36 pt Segoe does - makes no sense to me. And the 36 pt Segoe in PD is still fuzzy...

Here's where it starts getting dificult to really understand what's going on without having what you're seeing available. Could you take a couple of screenshots of the title pages and post them? You can save the clipboard to a JPG file and either use the blue Attachments button in the forum editor, or paste the screenshot to a photosharing website like imgur.com and then post the link to the image.

Another option is to pack the project (File menu, Pack Project Materials) and save the folder to a cloud service like OneDrive or Dropbox and post the link so we can dowload the entire project and see exactly what you're talking about.

YouTube/optodata

DS365 | Win11 Pro | Ryzen 9 3950X | RTX 4070 Ti | 32GB RAM | 10TB SSDs | 5K+4K HDR monitors

Canon Vixia GX10 (4K 60p) | HF G30 (HD 60p) | Yi Action+ 4K | 360Fly 4K 360°

Yes, I'm understanding better how to see the Produce options within each of the eight general file types. So I understand what Playsound was proposing. I will try that.

I was posting when you were - I did try a change and it looks better. That was "Windows Media with Profile Type: Windows Media Video 9 Full HD 1920x1080/30p". It's about 113MB. My "video" is VERY simple: title page, graphic (continued to last through music), credits page. So no motion.

You said: "A total of at least 8GB of RAM would help (if you're running 64-bit Windows) and a GTX 960 would be a very good graphics card for less than $180 these days." Would the graphics card and RAM make my editing work faster or just reduce the Produce time?

I don't know how to take screenshots. It seems like either the option I chose or what Playsound proposed will result in a clear output. If not, I'll have to learn more, won't I??? :

Thanks so much to everyone for your patience with this newbie...



Update: Both the WMV 1920x1080 and the H.264 1920x1080 produced a clear result. The WMV is 113MB and the H.264 is 292MB, so I will probably go with the WMV. Then I have possible PC upgrades to consider, but I feel so much better - that I didn't make a terrible decision buying PD. PD 13, Windows 7 Pro, Intel i7-6700 CPU @ 3.4GHz, 16GB RAM, NVidia Ge Force GT 730 graphics adapter

I'm glad you're feeling better and more confident about editing. It can be a very daunting subject if you get too far out of your comfort zone, and I hope you'll visit the forum anytime you have questions or need ideas.

As for your question of graphics card and RAM speeding up editing and producing, the answers is yes and no, depending on the specifics of your projects. Large, complicated projects will benefit from having more RAM available; and anytime you use GPU-accelerated FX your add-in card will help.

I should mention that without an add-in card, you won't be able to use some features that would otherwise be available, but I don't know how important these 49 specific FX and an add-on program called NewBlue Titler Pro might be to you.

YouTube/optodata

DS365 | Win11 Pro | Ryzen 9 3950X | RTX 4070 Ti | 32GB RAM | 10TB SSDs | 5K+4K HDR monitors

Canon Vixia GX10 (4K 60p) | HF G30 (HD 60p) | Yi Action+ 4K | 360Fly 4K 360°

I think I'll hold off on a graphics card. I might spring for the RAM because I'm noticing everything about the computer is now slow even if I just have PD open - not doing anything with it.

And I indeed do not know what the FX or NewBlue items are, so I'll just do without them :.

I don't plan to do more with videos than I'm doing now. Of course, I didn't plan to be doing this so we'll see!

Thanks again for everyone's help: Playsound, Barry the Crab, optodata. PD 13, Windows 7 Pro, Intel i7-6700 CPU @ 3.4GHz, 16GB RAM, NVidia Ge Force GT 730 graphics adapter