Tips, Tricks, Techniques for Pinnacle Studio

[barnum42]

Alright! Now I know that Pinnacle is causing the problem. It's NOT the DVD burner.

How? Well, I captured a test video in Windows XP Movie Maker, and burned it with Sonic DVD. I quick test (at 4:30 am this morning) on a cheap DVD player, showed that it did work.

So I guess I have to remove and reinstall Pinnacle ?

Always worth a try. Otherwise contact Pinnacle directly (assuming you have a legit. copy) you are entitled to free online support via their website

 

[donaldduck1967]

Alright! Now I know that Pinnacle is causing the problem. It's NOT the DVD burner.

How? Well, I captured a test video in Windows XP Movie Maker, and burned it with Sonic DVD. I quick test (at 4:30 am this morning) on a cheap DVD player, showed that it did work.

So I guess I have to remove and reinstall Pinnacle ?

Thats 1 reason i've stayed away from pinnacle. one day you can burn and play a dvd one day you can't. one day you burn a dvd with no audio sync problems the next day you can't. the pgm is just to bug ridden for my liking.
good luck tac i hope you get it all worked out.

 

[barnum42]

Thats 1 reason i've stayed away from pinnacle. one day you can burn and play a dvd one day you can't. one day you burn a dvd with no audio sync problems the next day you can't. the pgm is just to bug ridden for my liking.
good luck tac i hope you get it all worked out.

I've yet to burn a project with Studio 9. Though I still have issues with it (sound adjustments and scene transitions) as yet it has proven to be more stable than Studio 8.

 

[imagineer99]

My question is regarding Adobe's Premiere...

If anyone out there has it, please give me your opinions. I know it does a lot, but I need it to do a whole LOT more than pinnacle to warrant the extra $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$.

 

[barnum42]

My question is regarding Adobe's Premiere...

If anyone out there has it, please give me your opinions. I know it does a lot, but I need it to do a whole LOT more than pinnacle to warrant the extra $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$.

Drop RU42 a PM - he uses Adobe Premiere.

 

[donaldduck1967]

I've yet to burn a project with Studio 9. Though I still have issues with it (sound adjustments and scene transitions) as yet it has proven to be more stable than Studio 8.

Let me know how you make out with Studio 9

 

[barnum42]

Let me know how you make out with Studio 9

So far the big improvement is that is has not crashed once on me, and I have racked up a lot of hours on it doing my Festival of the Lion King project. The full screen preview has proven quite useful also.

Altering the volume of a single clip is still a pain though.

 

[imagineer99]

The full screen preview seems like such an obvious improvement...glad they finally stuck that in there.

 

[barnum42]

If they have not already, they will also suggest you completely uninstall then reinstall the whole program. So, try that, tell them that you use the program after running EnditAll (which I do when burning) and by all means try reducing the burn speed. Even at it's slowest it is still the fastest part of the process.

Then give their techinical support a chance to get back to you. If you still can't get any joy from them let me know and I can dig out the email of the Technical Support Manager. But rather than just charge straight at him, you would have more ammunition if you can show how many times you have tried to get support.

Ok gang...

I upgraded to Studio V9.

I still cannot burn a DVD that will play in several DVD players. I have the latest patch(es) for V9. I even checked to make sure my DVD burner is compatible with Pinnacle Studio, which it is. I'm using a Optorite DD0401, which according to this link: http://www.pinnaclesys.com/docsupport1.asp?division_id=1&langue_id=7&product_id=1501&product_name=Studio%20version%209%20&page_id=653&recorder=O my burner is listed (4th from the bottom).

I have tried burning a test disc with Movie Maker, and that worked ok. It played in every dvd player I've tried. So, I know that a) the burner is ok b) the media is ok. So that only leaves the software. :fork: Should I slow down the burn speed ? Crazy thing is, I don't get any errors during the burn process. I've emailed Pinnacle, but it takes a day for them to respond. The first time was a canned response. The second time it said "you didn't respond correcly" so I had to resend it. This is getting ridiculus. I downloaded and ran "EndItAll." No go. If I don't get this working by the end of the week, I am going to demand a refund.

Any suggestions, help, appreciated.

Tom

:wave:

 

[donaldduck1967]

TAC .... have you poked around Pinnacles support forum, there might be some info there. Also do you have DSL or cable modem? If so do you turn the modem off while you're burning? I don't know it does any good but I usually power off my cable modem while i'm burning a dvd. Let usw know how you make out.

 

[imagineer99]

TAC, I really hope everything works out! Keep us posted.

Barnum, a quick question about Pinnacle Version 9. Does it support GIF-images?

 

[imagineer99]

Tac, I burn using TDK (and they work fine). If that helps.

 

[barnum42]

Barnum, a quick question about Pinnacle Version 9. Does it support GIF-images?

Just tried - it does not support GIF. You will have to continue converting them to another format.

 

[barnum42]

Here's another laugh from Pinnacle support.

I have two calls open with them:

1.The inability to change the volume of a single clip without it affecting every clip in the timeline after it.

2.The wish to place transitions on only the picture or sound, that is have a two video clips dissolve between each other without have the sound do the same or leave the video alone, but use a short dissolve on the sound to smooth out any clicks or jumps in volume.

I received an email today closing number 2 and asking me not to raise duplicate calls. I guess that's one way to reduce their calls unresolved statistics.

Needless to say I have reopened call 2 and used easy to digest words to point out why!

 

[imagineer99]

Just tried - it does not support GIF. You will have to continue converting them to another format.

DOH! That's annoying. You think that this wouldn't be that hard to implement.

 

[donaldduck1967]

TAC

I hope you're doing all this testing using rewritables. Are you using a seperate drive for your for your videos? Also Tech support will probably tell you to turn off system restore options off on the drive so that is something else you might check. IMO this is an awful lot of work one needs to do to get pinnacle to work. G/L

 

[barnum42]

That's it. I quit. Barnum was kind enough to supply me with a contact name at pinnacle. I emailed him, explaining the problem. He replied, asking me some questions. I emailed him back with the information he wanted. Now, it's been a week, and NOTHING. No emails, nothing. I emailed him (the guy that barnum gave me) late last week just asking if he got my email and are they working on the problem. Nothing. I emailed him yesterday. Nothing.

Tech support? What tech support ?

:fork: :fork: :fork: :fork: :fork:

I have two calls with them that are still growing mould.

I've not done so with Pinnacle, but with other companies I found sending multiple copies of the same email, along the lines of "why are you not responding to my emails. It's been X days/weeks since I last heard from you". In the end I had to crank out 200 copies of one email (this was to an online DVD store) before they finally replied.

 

[barnum42]

I installed an ATI video capture card/TV tuner last week. Lo and behold, packaged in the driver software is a pinnacle studio version 8.4 I figure 'what the heck,' unstall v9, and install v8.4 It won't even run. It says something about an 'internal problem' and to reinstall the software. I tried that, 3X, no go. Typical.

Maybe I'll try Adobe or the Ulead software.

Reinstalstion of the whole shebang was suggested by Pinnacle in the past. But it seems their uninstall program leaves things in the registry. They supplied the following instructions to get around this: Note it includes info relating to my DC10 capture card that will probably not be applicable to you.

, uninstall all Pinnacle software and run a program called Regdelete: (You can download regdelete here:
ftp://ftp.pinnaclesys.de/driver/pc/extras/RegDelete.exe. )
(or www.pinnaclesys.de/uk -> Support -> Studio DC10+ -> Tools)

When running this program, please tick “All Pinnacle Products” and “Remove all video capture drivers” If the message: “All registry entries have now been removed” does not appear, then first click only ‘Studio 8’ and press Clean, and then tick Studio DC10+ then Clean.

When the Windows registry has been cleaned, please restart your PC and install Studio 8 from your Studio 8 CD.

 

[barnum42]

Just noticed that Pinnacle have closed one of my calls for the second time despite the fact that they have done all to solve it.

Time for more emails.

 

[barnum42]

How do you know they closed one of your calls ?

Also, Barnum, do you know where the contact that you gave me resides? I mean, where are pinnacle's tech support offices? Over in the UK or somewhere here in North America?

I think they have offices in the USA and on the European Continent, so we may technically have to deal with different people. My original contact was the only one I could find on their webiste - she deals with PR, so it's not even her responsibility to handle tech support, but she passed details on to the appropriate management.

As regards the status of a call - if you have logged a call with their "support" department you should have received an email that will include a link to allow you to update said call. This will let you log in to a history of all your questions under a tab called "My Stuff". To log in you will need the user ID and password you used to register the software.

There is probably also a way to log in via the Pinnacle website.