Capture problem, dropped frames at DVinfo.net

Colin Rayner · July 9th, 2004, 06:26 PM

Howdy all,
I am just starting out in the Vegas universe and am having a few problems with dropping plenty of frames during capture. I suspect it is a settings problem, but need help.
In 20 secs of footage, 9 dropped frames with a definite click on the audio as well. tried with different cameras, tapes etc same problem with all.
Vegas 5, Footage shot as PAL, capturing with firewire, to laptop, 2.2 Gig CPU, 448RAM, Win XP, I defraged the hard drive immediately before starting capture. Someone suggested it might be spindle speed of my hard drive, but I can't see why that might be a problem during capture.......a video card perhaps?
Any ideas. Am dying to use the program, but until I get the capture sorted I can't go any further.

Edward Troxel · July 9th, 2004, 08:37 PM

First thing to check: Make sure DMA is active on your hard drives.

Guy Bruner · July 9th, 2004, 08:40 PM

Go to Device Manager and make sure DMA is enabled on your hard drive. Shut down all background programs including virus checker. You can do that by CTRL-ALT-DEL to Task Manager and checking the applications tab. IF anything is running, stop it.

The speed of your hard drive could be a problem. It needs to be at least 5400 rpm and 7200 rpm is better. Also, the hard drive needs to have plenty of available space. You would be better off with a second hard drive for capture...like a USB or Firewire external drive.

Colin Rayner · July 9th, 2004, 09:05 PM

Yeah, that fixed it. 6 frames lost in 3 minutes of capture now. Is that acceptable?
Boy, am I green!

External hard drive is at the top of my "to get list".

Edward Troxel · July 9th, 2004, 09:22 PM

My goal is ZERO per HOUR.

Mike Moncrief · July 10th, 2004, 05:40 AM

Hey Colin,

The best thing to do is to get an external Firewire drive to use for all of your footage.. That will be the answer to you dropping frames.. no doubt..

Mike m.

David Jasany · July 10th, 2004, 06:55 AM

Colin,

I always capture 60 minutes without any dropped frames. When I upgraded from V4 to V5, I experienced about 9 dropped frames druing a 60 minute capture. I didn't think my disk needed it, but I cleaned up all temp files, cookies, etc, and defragmented my hard drive (internal dedicated to Vegas projects). Since then I haven't had any frames dropped during a 60 minute capture.

Colin Rayner · July 10th, 2004, 06:09 PM

Thanks for the advice, a external hard drive is my top priority right now. Most are USB 2.0 now a days, since it's faster than firewire. Is there any reason to get one with firewire connection over USB 2.0?

Glenn Chan · July 10th, 2004, 06:45 PM

Firewire is actually slightly faster than USB2 (in terms of real world performance).

Performance also depends on what controller you are using. With firewire all the controllers are pretty much the same. With USB2, this is NOT the case. USB2 will likely be slower on:
old Macs
built-in controllers on your motherboard that are from the off-brands.

2- I believe lots of people are editing fine with both kind of drives, and I don't know how they compare.

David Jasany · July 10th, 2004, 07:06 PM

Before you purchase an USB external drive, you might want to check out this site: http://www.everythingusb.com/usb2/faq.htm.

There's still a fair amount of confusion as to how manufacturers are labeling their USB equipment. The USB 2 spec includes three speeds and they are Hi-Speed, Full-Speed and Low-Speed.

High-Speed goes up to 480Mbits/second. Full-Speed goes to only 12Mbits/second.

The web site goes into much more detail.

Andre Andreev · July 15th, 2004, 11:21 AM

They have an internet special right now and sell the 250 GIG 8mb cache, 7200RPM maxtor for $129 (no rebates). I bought this drive for $180 and am very happy.

Combine this drive with a good external firewire or USB 2.0 enclosure and you have 250 Gig video capture/editing space.

Here's the link:

http://www.compusa.com/products/prod...ct_code=302225

or go to compusa.com and search for 302225

Note that this might be a temporary sale - the regular price is $179 but at the time of this post the price is $129. Also,
I am not associated with compusa and the link does not include any referral codes - just showing you a great deal.

Good luck.

-- Andre

Dennis Vogel · July 20th, 2004, 10:23 PM

<<<-- Originally posted by Glenn Chan : Firewire is actually slightly faster than USB2 (in terms of real world performance). -->>>

Firewire also uses a different data transfer protocol which is better for video capture than USB.

Dennis Vogel

Marcia Janine Galles · July 22nd, 2004, 10:22 AM

Arghhh! OK, am home for three days and wanted to check some footage from production. But I'm getting constant dropped frames where I only rarely did with Vegas 4. Reading this thread, I can honestly say I've tried everything you guys suggest, or I should say, I already have these settings in place and have already tried these checks, eg. DMA is active, I've tried an external firewire drive (7200, of course), no other apps are running when checking cntrl>alt>delete (though a lot of "processes" come up), and my processor is a 3 GHz with 1 1/2 gig of RAM.

But here's what I'm curious about...

Out of frustration I downloaded, from Tucows, a little program to try, called "Security Task Manager." It shows a boatload of things and I'm wondering if they're "running in the background" even though cntrl>alt>delete doesn't show any of them as active. And if they are indeed running, and "quarantining" them might help for getting things captured w/o dropped frames, what are the minimum programs I need running that it lists, other than, for example, Windows Expolorer?

(sigh)

I'm totally frustrated. Any feedback would be great.
Marcia

Patrick King · July 22nd, 2004, 10:42 AM

I can't answer directly what minimum list of processes you need running, but I narrowed mine down by reviewing guidance at:

blackviper.com

Scroll down to the "Popular Content" section and select "Windows XP Service Configurations". This is detailed content and is not a simple checklist of things to turn on or off. But its a very thorough treatment.

Also available in a less thorough but easier to read treatment is:

http://www.videoguys.com/WinXP.html

The WinXP Tips & Tweaks page.

Sorry for only pointing you places instead of giving the magic button you're looking for. I'm not enough of a geek to know without research.

Glenn Chan · July 22nd, 2004, 02:53 PM

re: blackviper
The only services worth tweaking IMO are indexing service (may hurt performance) and messenger service (should leave this off, it lets other people spam you if you aren't firewalled).

Processes:
Most of the processes under your user name you can kill via Crtl Alt Del. Don't kill Vegas of course.

Now if you have adware, spyware, or viruses on your computer, they may be programmed so that they're harder to kill. Some of them run as system services and show up in windows task manager under the user name "SYSTEM".

A safe thing to do is to google the name of each process. If you have adware/spyware, search for removal instructions on sites like pchell.com.

3- How full is your hard drive?

July 9th, 2004, 06:26 PM	#1
Colin Rayner Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Geraldine, NEW ZEALAND Posts: 88	Capture problem, dropped frames Howdy all, I am just starting out in the Vegas universe and am having a few problems with dropping plenty of frames during capture. I suspect it is a settings problem, but need help. In 20 secs of footage, 9 dropped frames with a definite click on the audio as well. tried with different cameras, tapes etc same problem with all. Vegas 5, Footage shot as PAL, capturing with firewire, to laptop, 2.2 Gig CPU, 448RAM, Win XP, I defraged the hard drive immediately before starting capture. Someone suggested it might be spindle speed of my hard drive, but I can't see why that might be a problem during capture.......a video card perhaps? Any ideas. Am dying to use the program, but until I get the capture sorted I can't go any further.

July 10th, 2004, 05:40 AM	#6
Mike Moncrief Major Player Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: orlando florida Posts: 426	Hey Colin, The best thing to do is to get an external Firewire drive to use for all of your footage.. That will be the answer to you dropping frames.. no doubt.. Mike m. __________________ Mike Moncrief mikemoncrief@gmail.com www.themikemoncrief.com

July 15th, 2004, 11:21 AM	#11
Andre Andreev Regular Crew Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Los Angeles, CA Posts: 98	250MB drive for $130 - Awesome deal from compusa They have an internet special right now and sell the 250 GIG 8mb cache, 7200RPM maxtor for $129 (no rebates). I bought this drive for $180 and am very happy. Combine this drive with a good external firewire or USB 2.0 enclosure and you have 250 Gig video capture/editing space. Here's the link: http://www.compusa.com/products/prod...ct_code=302225 or go to compusa.com and search for 302225 Note that this might be a temporary sale - the regular price is $179 but at the time of this post the price is $129. Also, I am not associated with compusa and the link does not include any referral codes - just showing you a great deal. Good luck. -- Andre

July 22nd, 2004, 10:42 AM	#14
Patrick King Major Player Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Enterprise, AL Posts: 857	I can't answer directly what minimum list of processes you need running, but I narrowed mine down by reviewing guidance at: blackviper.com Scroll down to the "Popular Content" section and select "Windows XP Service Configurations". This is detailed content and is not a simple checklist of things to turn on or off. But its a very thorough treatment. Also available in a less thorough but easier to read treatment is: http://www.videoguys.com/WinXP.html The WinXP Tips & Tweaks page. Sorry for only pointing you places instead of giving the magic button you're looking for. I'm not enough of a geek to know without research. __________________ Fear No Weevil!

July 9th, 2004, 08:37 PM	#2
Edward Troxel Sponsor: JET DV Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Southern Illinois Posts: 7,953	First thing to check: Make sure DMA is active on your hard drives.

July 9th, 2004, 08:40 PM	#3
Guy Bruner Major Player Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Ashford, AL Posts: 937	Go to Device Manager and make sure DMA is enabled on your hard drive. Shut down all background programs including virus checker. You can do that by CTRL-ALT-DEL to Task Manager and checking the applications tab. IF anything is running, stop it. The speed of your hard drive could be a problem. It needs to be at least 5400 rpm and 7200 rpm is better. Also, the hard drive needs to have plenty of available space. You would be better off with a second hard drive for capture...like a USB or Firewire external drive.

July 9th, 2004, 09:05 PM	#4
Colin Rayner Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Geraldine, NEW ZEALAND Posts: 88	Yeah, that fixed it. 6 frames lost in 3 minutes of capture now. Is that acceptable? Boy, am I green! External hard drive is at the top of my "to get list".

July 9th, 2004, 09:22 PM	#5
Edward Troxel Sponsor: JET DV Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Southern Illinois Posts: 7,953	My goal is ZERO per HOUR.

July 10th, 2004, 06:55 AM	#7
David Jasany Major Player Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: North Carolina Posts: 313	Colin, I always capture 60 minutes without any dropped frames. When I upgraded from V4 to V5, I experienced about 9 dropped frames druing a 60 minute capture. I didn't think my disk needed it, but I cleaned up all temp files, cookies, etc, and defragmented my hard drive (internal dedicated to Vegas projects). Since then I haven't had any frames dropped during a 60 minute capture.

July 10th, 2004, 06:09 PM	#8
Colin Rayner Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Geraldine, NEW ZEALAND Posts: 88	Thanks for the advice, a external hard drive is my top priority right now. Most are USB 2.0 now a days, since it's faster than firewire. Is there any reason to get one with firewire connection over USB 2.0?

July 10th, 2004, 06:45 PM	#9
Glenn Chan Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: Toronto, Canada Posts: 4,750	Firewire is actually slightly faster than USB2 (in terms of real world performance). Performance also depends on what controller you are using. With firewire all the controllers are pretty much the same. With USB2, this is NOT the case. USB2 will likely be slower on: old Macs built-in controllers on your motherboard that are from the off-brands. 2- I believe lots of people are editing fine with both kind of drives, and I don't know how they compare.

July 10th, 2004, 07:06 PM	#10
David Jasany Major Player Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: North Carolina Posts: 313	Before you purchase an USB external drive, you might want to check out this site: http://www.everythingusb.com/usb2/faq.htm. There's still a fair amount of confusion as to how manufacturers are labeling their USB equipment. The USB 2 spec includes three speeds and they are Hi-Speed, Full-Speed and Low-Speed. High-Speed goes up to 480Mbits/second. Full-Speed goes to only 12Mbits/second. The web site goes into much more detail.

July 20th, 2004, 10:23 PM	#12
Dennis Vogel Major Player Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Hillsborough, NC Posts: 409	<<<-- Originally posted by Glenn Chan : Firewire is actually slightly faster than USB2 (in terms of real world performance). -->>> Firewire also uses a different data transfer protocol which is better for video capture than USB. Dennis Vogel

July 22nd, 2004, 10:22 AM	#13
Marcia Janine Galles Major Player Join Date: May 2003 Location: Camarillo, CA Posts: 340	Arghhh! OK, am home for three days and wanted to check some footage from production. But I'm getting constant dropped frames where I only rarely did with Vegas 4. Reading this thread, I can honestly say I've tried everything you guys suggest, or I should say, I already have these settings in place and have already tried these checks, eg. DMA is active, I've tried an external firewire drive (7200, of course), no other apps are running when checking cntrl>alt>delete (though a lot of "processes" come up), and my processor is a 3 GHz with 1 1/2 gig of RAM. But here's what I'm curious about... Out of frustration I downloaded, from Tucows, a little program to try, called "Security Task Manager." It shows a boatload of things and I'm wondering if they're "running in the background" even though cntrl>alt>delete doesn't show any of them as active. And if they are indeed running, and "quarantining" them might help for getting things captured w/o dropped frames, what are the minimum programs I need running that it lists, other than, for example, Windows Expolorer? (sigh) I'm totally frustrated. Any feedback would be great. Marcia

July 22nd, 2004, 02:53 PM	#15
Glenn Chan Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: Toronto, Canada Posts: 4,750	re: blackviper The only services worth tweaking IMO are indexing service (may hurt performance) and messenger service (should leave this off, it lets other people spam you if you aren't firewalled). Processes: Most of the processes under your user name you can kill via Crtl Alt Del. Don't kill Vegas of course. Now if you have adware, spyware, or viruses on your computer, they may be programmed so that they're harder to kill. Some of them run as system services and show up in windows task manager under the user name "SYSTEM". A safe thing to do is to google the name of each process. If you have adware/spyware, search for removal instructions on sites like pchell.com. 3- How full is your hard drive?