Jerky Video and Garbled Sound

Adam Gold · January 6th, 2012, 04:37 PM

Unless it's an eSATA external drive, using an external is likely to slow you down further due to the slow transfer speeds of USB. Adobe and other SW mfr's recommend against this, even for Networked Drives.

Paul Kinney · January 6th, 2012, 06:51 PM

Using MSCONFIG, I ran the clips in diagnostic mode and they were still jerky. I also copied the clips to an external Seagate drive that runs at 5900 revolutions and they were still jerky. I also tried the VLC media player and got the same jerky results. Unless someone has other ideas to try I must assume I just cannot view m2ts files.

Even if I can solve my problem that my computer displays jerky ADVCH files, I can still import them into VideoStudeo. I would like to ask those viewing this post, how to create a movie I can share with anyone.

Life was simple in the old days. I had a DV tape based camcorder. I off loaded the clips via firewire to my PC and used Adobe Elements 9 to render movies which I burned to DVD and could play them on anybody's analog TV. I could share the movies and was happy.

Then my computer crashed and I bought a new one that even had a graphics processing unit with it's own dedicated memory. I assumed this was the right computer for graphics tasks like videos. Then to my dismay I learned the new computer had no firewire capability.

So I gave away the DV camcorder and sought a new camcorder with USB connectivity. Since I planned on upgrading to a flat screen TV eventually, I bought a HD camcorder that records in the following modes:

(1) 1080/60p at approx 28 Mpbs (VBR)
(2) HA: Approx 17 Mbps (VBR)
(3) HG: Approx 13 Mpbs
(4) HX: Approx 9 Mbps
(5) HE: Approx 5 Mbps (VBR)

I recorded clips in 1080/60p mode and then imported them into Adobe Elements 9 and got jerky pictures in the editing preview screen. So I threw Elements 9 away and bought Corel VideoStudio 4 Pro which advertized Proxy editing. The edit screen was less jerky. But after rendering the project,I'm still not sure how to share the resultant movie. What do I have to do to create an HD movie?

Adam Gold · January 6th, 2012, 07:13 PM

Repeat after me: AVC. HD.

All kidding aside, you can still do this with any good, recent editing program. You didn't need to throw PE away. Any NLE (non-linear editor) will likely have HD export presets you can use.

If you want real Blu-Ray Discs (BDs) then you need a BD burner, a BD player and an HDTV. You export to the right BD format as indicated by your program's help files (I use H.264 Blu-Ray, which gives you an m4v file, but you could choose MPEG2 Blu-Ray, which gives you an m2v file) and import into an authoring program. I use Encore, which links directly from Premiere Pro. But it doesn't let you burn BD files onto a regular DVD, although some other programs do, and you could do this if you had very short files (under about 20 minutes or so). Then use your authoring program to burn the discs.

If you don't care about optical discs, then you just export to any acceptable HD format, copy to a thumb drive and play with something like the Western Digital Media Player, plugged into your HDTV.

Amazon.com: Western Digital WD TV HD Media Player: Electronics

Or you export to a YouTube or Vimeo HD format (check their sites for export specs and formats, or use the presets if your NLE has them [Premiere Pro does]) and post there, and send people the link.

What you want isn't impossible, just difficult with your current hardware.

Chris Soucy · January 6th, 2012, 08:33 PM

Just as a thought............

Have you tried recording any clips using any of the lower bit rate formats? 1080/ 60i for example.

I'd suggest trying them all to see just WHAT your system can actually run in it's existing configuration.

At least you'll have a benchmark to measure any clean ups/ system upgrades against.

If 60i does the business it may be cheaper to stick with that untill you can leverage a system replacement.

If the system can't perform with any of the HD formats there really must be something seriously wrong, though you can always bump it down to plain old SD on the export and see if even that works.

Can't see you've anything to lose by giving it a shot.

CS

Adam Gold · January 6th, 2012, 09:25 PM

That's actually a great idea, especially given that BD doesn't support 1080/60p.

Leave it to Chris...

R Geoff Baker · January 6th, 2012, 10:15 PM

The other simple solution is to transcode to a format that is not as demanding of the CPU -- in the Mac world, that would be ProRes, though I don't know what Windows users would use for the same thing -- and that way you can identify whether the issue is with the CPU or the HDD ... big ProRes files are more demanding of the HDD, less demanding of the CPU.

The other distinct possibility is the format of the AVCHD files -- if they are still wrapped as MTS files it is entirely possible that none of your viewers are able to unwrap them in real time -- again, in the Mac world I'd used a program like Clipwrap that would take the MTS files and repackage them as Quicktime files. It does this without reencoding, so there is no loss of quality -- playback of QT files is much cleaner than MTS files, even though the content is the same.

Sorry I don't know what software solutions to offer for a Windows system -- but I can say that a modest Mac Core2Duo system is entirely able to play AVCHD files even from the internal 5400 rpm drive, and even in an editor like Final Cut Pro ... so I believe that once you get your config sorted, you should be able to do the same.

Look for a program that will rewrap your files as quicktime (I hope your editor can work with quicktime) or avi -- or experiment with re-encoding to an intermediate codec. I repeat my assertion that despite the concerns of many here, the data transfer rate of your HDD is almost surely good enough, as the rates are actually lower than DV ... it is CPU (and consequently RAM -- so if your system is trying to use HDD as RAM in a swap file you've got problems!) not data transfer rate that is in demand.

Cheers,
GB

Paul Kinney · January 9th, 2012, 04:10 PM

As requested, I ran a test to compare my i5 computer's ability to handle the five recording modes of my Panasonic HDC-TM700. The modes are: 1080/60p 28 Mbps, HA 19 Mbps, HG 13 Mbps, HX 9 Mbps, and HE 5 Mbps. To do this I set up a tripod and recorded a short portion of a commencial DVD movie that I played thru my TV. I recorded the same portion for each of the five modes. Using Panasonic's HD-Writer software I copied the clips to my computer where they show as m2ts files They will not play with VLC Media Player. The file created from the 1080/60p recording with not play with Windows Media Player. The other four files will play with Windows Media Player but the HA mode file is more jerky than the HG mode file, the HG mode file is more jerky than the HX mode file, etc.

Most of the consumer-level camcorders available for sale nowadays boast High Definition. How come people buy these and are happy? I'm sure they do not own super-fast computers. How do they save their clips and be view them smoothly?

Adam Gold · January 9th, 2012, 05:50 PM

I think the "happiest" users out there are the ones who have desktops that are more powerful than your laptop. They don't need to be supercomputers but they do need to have enough power. Most laptops, barring the most expensive ones, just aren't powerful enough. Lots of complaints from people who have laptops.

Many threads here about "what's the best laptop for editing" and the usual advice is: none. Unless you want to drop three or four grand on a Sager or Alienware -- basically very high end gaming machines, which have similar demands placed on them.

Remember, 1920 x 1080p60 AVCHD is at least two degrees of difficulty over HDV at 1440 x 1080i, which the laptops were just catching up to before the latest video standards.

Dave Blackhurst · January 9th, 2012, 06:06 PM

OK, there's something more going on here, those lower bitrates should not be having issues... I'm going to guess there's a improperly installed CODEC or some other conflict. Your results are as expected, the lower the bitrate the smoother the overall playback (less data through the "pipe"), but as you drop to those lower rates, it should be playing fine, yet still apparently has issues...

Hard to know what exactly is going on, but I'm suspicious that SOMETHING is causing playback to be choked off, and it MAY or may not be the hardware... While there are some potential bottlenecks as I described earlier and how to go through and eliminate them in probable order of importance, I'm really beginning to wonder if this is software related.

Was there software included with the camera, and have you installed it? Sometimes that helps, as it should install any necessary files. Maybe uninstall and re-install in case there was some glitch on installation or something got over-written along the way? Check to see if there are updates?

I'm sure there's nothing "wrong" with the camera, and I can assure you that it's quite possible to play back HD video, even AVCHD, on a moderately powered computer with reasonable smoothness. Editing is more problematic, but again SHOULD be possible with your specs (or close to them) and some patience... I'm playing back 1080 60p from a Sony P&S (28Mbps bitrate) and Handycam on some lower spec'd Dell laptops, so unless there's some really poor engineering in your ASUS (not TOO likely...), I think there's just something that needs to be "fixed", the fun is in FINDING it!

One other thing that I THINK I mentioned was anti-virus software? Those can radically slow down ANY machine, and if you've got any installed, I'd give 'em the boot and switch to MS Security Eessentials. While your computer may be designed to "multitask", if there's a buch of stuff running in the background, it will slow things down a lot - I believe it was Adam who suggested how to troubleshoot that angle. The less running the better, and most "factory" computers some with enough bloatware pre-installed to choke performance significantly.

It's sort of hard to remotely troubleshoot, you'll have to keep poking at this until you find why your computer is stuttering when from all appearances it shouldn't... these things happen, and you may need to see if there's someone who knows how to optimize a computer for video locally if worse comes to worse...

Chris Soucy · January 9th, 2012, 07:24 PM

I agree with Dave, there seems to be something more going on here, but I'm stuffed if I can figure out where to start.

One nagging question that keeps rearing its head is drivers. How does Windows 7 handle updates and is it worthwhile running whatever is required to get them up to scratch.

After that I can only suggest your local PC whizkid go through that machine like a dose of salts and figure out what gives and what can be done about it, if anything.

That aside, getting your hands on a freebie tester of whatever the AVCHD bods are using to transcode with seems like a no brainer.

CS

Dave Blackhurst · January 9th, 2012, 11:10 PM

The thing that strikes me is that even at the lowest bitrate he's apparently still getting some stutter... I don't think that will improve with transcoding, might even become worse if it's a data transfer rate issue, as the files will become even larger!

Windows 7 drivers are fairly automatic, but video is one of those specialized applications, and so I'm still suspecting a possible software issue, but this is one of those "hands on" situations that the local "whiz kid" might have a better crack at than us speculating. I don't know how good Paul is at hacking/troubleshooting, but might be worth hiring some outside help - it's not everyones cup of tea to "fix" computers!

I think we're all stumped because the specs don't look bad, the Windows Experience numbers seem more than adequate, yet it's still sputtering. SOMETHING is choking that computer off, my first guess would be "Norton" at it again, or perhaps one of the other Anti Virus programs, which I've seen cause more consistent harm for the good they do... but again, without "hands on", it's hard to know, though we've all put up some crackin' guesses! At least Paul has some things to start with!

Suddenly occurred to me to ask whether he can play back ANY 1080 video (like Vimeo or YouTube) without stutter - that might offer an additional clue...

R Geoff Baker · January 10th, 2012, 08:55 AM

I again point to the file format -- m2ts -- and the fact that the ever capable VLC player can't play them. You can wrap the source AVCHD file as an mov and expect QT to play it -- if it does, there is no point chasing imaginary hardware issues.

I have no issue at all playing 1920x1080 30p AVCHD files on my Core2Duo 5400rpm laptop -- talk of more powerful hardware requirements is, IMHO, premature.

Cheers,
GB

Paul Kinney · January 11th, 2012, 03:48 PM

I am thankful for all the suggestions contributed by the very knowledgeable contributors in this forum.
I have saved them to disk so I can refer to them again in the future.

I have been a full-time Rver for 16 years so I don't have room for a desktop setup. A super speed PC is too expensive so I must do the best with what I have.

I have discovered a new free media player called Splash which must have the right codec set for High Definition AVC/H.264 camcorder movies because, in conjunction with removal of the Aero graphics user interface in Windows 7, I have been able to smooth the raw display of HD clips somewhat.

The Panasonic software that came with my HDC TM700 camcorder automatically converts the camera's internal 1080/60p clips to 1080/60i when it off loads them into my laptop as m2ts files. The Corel VideoStudio X4 Pro editor then makes smaller temporary proxy files which display with normal motion when I have them in the editing window. Using the Create Video File option in VideoStudeo I rendered the resultant project with its full size files to a DVD quality disk file (MPEG 169) and was able to play that file on my computer with good results.

I then rerendered the same project to the follow series of Blue Ray disk file formats using the same Create Video File option in VideoStudio and was able to play those files (Transport Stream (.m2t)) as well. The Blue Ray formats are:

Blue Ray 1920 x 1080p
Blue Ray 1440 x 1080p
Blue Ray H264 1920 x 1080p
Blue Ray H264 1440 x 1080p
Blue Ray H264 1920 x 1080
Blue Ray H264 1440 x 1080

I then again rerendered the same project into AVDCH m2t files in the following formats (I'm not sure what player these file were designed for): The files played just fine using Splash.

AVCHD 1920 x 1080p
AVCHD 1440 x 1080p
AVCHD 1920 x 1080
AVCHD 1440 x 1080

So for now, my plan is to burn DVDs of my movies and share them with friends who have DVD players. I will keep the project file and burn Blue Ray disks of the same movies to share with friends if and when Blue Ray players become common. I also have decided to retain original clips on my camera, even after they have been imported into my PC and DVD is created, as long as there is adequate space on the 32 GB hard drive for new footage. By doing this I am always ready to display stunning 1080/60p video from the camera directly to my friend's TVs.

Since I can now create non-jerky movies I think the post administrator should close this post. It is terribly long and has served its purpose. If I have further problems I will open a new post.

Dave Blackhurst · January 11th, 2012, 04:48 PM

Hey Paul,

Glad to hear you've got it running - sounds to me like the Splash player had the "magic" CODEC to get smooth playback. I don't think your notebook is a slouch, and totally appreciate your reasons for using one - I've just shifted much of my "work" to a small, light laptop, the only tricky thing is video editing, and I'm right on the edge of being underpowered for that, so I'm fiddling with tweaks to make it happen! Would be nice to use my "room heater" i7 for as little as possible... I don't want to be held personally responsible for "global warming"!

Just like a good 24 hour Greasy Spoon Cafe, DVi typicallly doesn't "close"... threads are left open, leaving them for edification and eventual archiving, since it's not uncommon that someone else out there will hit the same speed bump. Threads do "pass" from natural causes, like when a solution is found, but unless somethings deemed offensive, it's left up for the greater good!

FWIW, Blu Ray is right on the cusp of becoming mainstream (about stinkin' time!), players have definitively broken under $100, and you might be able to pick up a BR burner and an external enclosure for around $100 if you shop around.

And, it is possible to burn a BR compatible (most players anyway) file to a regular DVD - bitrate has to be under 18MBps, but it's how I archived most of my older HD stuff (you'll find threads here that discuss how to do it), now I'm prepping to add BR delivery since the camera bitrates are 24/28Mbps and I'll be trying to preserve as much quality as possible, and the cost is getting pretty cheap!

Glad to hear you're running smooth, grab a cup o' your favorite beverage and hang around, DVi is a great place!

January 6th, 2012, 04:37 PM	#16
Adam Gold Inner Circle Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Woodinville, WA USA Posts: 3,467	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound Unless it's an eSATA external drive, using an external is likely to slow you down further due to the slow transfer speeds of USB. Adobe and other SW mfr's recommend against this, even for Networked Drives. __________________ "It can only be attributable to human error... This sort of thing has cropped up before, and it has always been due to human error."

January 6th, 2012, 06:51 PM	#17
Paul Kinney New Boot Join Date: Jan 2012 Location: livingston texas Posts: 6	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound Using MSCONFIG, I ran the clips in diagnostic mode and they were still jerky. I also copied the clips to an external Seagate drive that runs at 5900 revolutions and they were still jerky. I also tried the VLC media player and got the same jerky results. Unless someone has other ideas to try I must assume I just cannot view m2ts files. Even if I can solve my problem that my computer displays jerky ADVCH files, I can still import them into VideoStudeo. I would like to ask those viewing this post, how to create a movie I can share with anyone. Life was simple in the old days. I had a DV tape based camcorder. I off loaded the clips via firewire to my PC and used Adobe Elements 9 to render movies which I burned to DVD and could play them on anybody's analog TV. I could share the movies and was happy. Then my computer crashed and I bought a new one that even had a graphics processing unit with it's own dedicated memory. I assumed this was the right computer for graphics tasks like videos. Then to my dismay I learned the new computer had no firewire capability. So I gave away the DV camcorder and sought a new camcorder with USB connectivity. Since I planned on upgrading to a flat screen TV eventually, I bought a HD camcorder that records in the following modes: (1) 1080/60p at approx 28 Mpbs (VBR) (2) HA: Approx 17 Mbps (VBR) (3) HG: Approx 13 Mpbs (4) HX: Approx 9 Mbps (5) HE: Approx 5 Mbps (VBR) I recorded clips in 1080/60p mode and then imported them into Adobe Elements 9 and got jerky pictures in the editing preview screen. So I threw Elements 9 away and bought Corel VideoStudio 4 Pro which advertized Proxy editing. The edit screen was less jerky. But after rendering the project,I'm still not sure how to share the resultant movie. What do I have to do to create an HD movie?

January 6th, 2012, 07:13 PM	#18
Adam Gold Inner Circle Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Woodinville, WA USA Posts: 3,467	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound Repeat after me: AVC. HD. All kidding aside, you can still do this with any good, recent editing program. You didn't need to throw PE away. Any NLE (non-linear editor) will likely have HD export presets you can use. If you want real Blu-Ray Discs (BDs) then you need a BD burner, a BD player and an HDTV. You export to the right BD format as indicated by your program's help files (I use H.264 Blu-Ray, which gives you an m4v file, but you could choose MPEG2 Blu-Ray, which gives you an m2v file) and import into an authoring program. I use Encore, which links directly from Premiere Pro. But it doesn't let you burn BD files onto a regular DVD, although some other programs do, and you could do this if you had very short files (under about 20 minutes or so). Then use your authoring program to burn the discs. If you don't care about optical discs, then you just export to any acceptable HD format, copy to a thumb drive and play with something like the Western Digital Media Player, plugged into your HDTV. Amazon.com: Western Digital WD TV HD Media Player: Electronics Amazon.com: Western Digital WD TV HD Media Player: Electronics Or you export to a YouTube or Vimeo HD format (check their sites for export specs and formats, or use the presets if your NLE has them [Premiere Pro does]) and post there, and send people the link. What you want isn't impossible, just difficult with your current hardware. __________________ "It can only be attributable to human error... This sort of thing has cropped up before, and it has always been due to human error."

January 6th, 2012, 08:33 PM	#19
Chris Soucy Inner Circle Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Fairfield, Dunedin, New Zealand Posts: 3,682 Images: 18	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound Just as a thought............ Have you tried recording any clips using any of the lower bit rate formats? 1080/ 60i for example. I'd suggest trying them all to see just WHAT your system can actually run in it's existing configuration. At least you'll have a benchmark to measure any clean ups/ system upgrades against. If 60i does the business it may be cheaper to stick with that untill you can leverage a system replacement. If the system can't perform with any of the HD formats there really must be something seriously wrong, though you can always bump it down to plain old SD on the export and see if even that works. Can't see you've anything to lose by giving it a shot. CS

January 6th, 2012, 09:25 PM	#20
Adam Gold Inner Circle Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Woodinville, WA USA Posts: 3,467	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound That's actually a great idea, especially given that BD doesn't support 1080/60p. Leave it to Chris... __________________ "It can only be attributable to human error... This sort of thing has cropped up before, and it has always been due to human error."

January 6th, 2012, 10:15 PM	#21
R Geoff Baker Major Player Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Ottawa, ON Posts: 471	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound The other simple solution is to transcode to a format that is not as demanding of the CPU -- in the Mac world, that would be ProRes, though I don't know what Windows users would use for the same thing -- and that way you can identify whether the issue is with the CPU or the HDD ... big ProRes files are more demanding of the HDD, less demanding of the CPU. The other distinct possibility is the format of the AVCHD files -- if they are still wrapped as MTS files it is entirely possible that none of your viewers are able to unwrap them in real time -- again, in the Mac world I'd used a program like Clipwrap that would take the MTS files and repackage them as Quicktime files. It does this without reencoding, so there is no loss of quality -- playback of QT files is much cleaner than MTS files, even though the content is the same. Sorry I don't know what software solutions to offer for a Windows system -- but I can say that a modest Mac Core2Duo system is entirely able to play AVCHD files even from the internal 5400 rpm drive, and even in an editor like Final Cut Pro ... so I believe that once you get your config sorted, you should be able to do the same. Look for a program that will rewrap your files as quicktime (I hope your editor can work with quicktime) or avi -- or experiment with re-encoding to an intermediate codec. I repeat my assertion that despite the concerns of many here, the data transfer rate of your HDD is almost surely good enough, as the rates are actually lower than DV ... it is CPU (and consequently RAM -- so if your system is trying to use HDD as RAM in a swap file you've got problems!) not data transfer rate that is in demand. Cheers, GB

January 9th, 2012, 04:10 PM	#22
Paul Kinney New Boot Join Date: Jan 2012 Location: livingston texas Posts: 6	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound As requested, I ran a test to compare my i5 computer's ability to handle the five recording modes of my Panasonic HDC-TM700. The modes are: 1080/60p 28 Mbps, HA 19 Mbps, HG 13 Mbps, HX 9 Mbps, and HE 5 Mbps. To do this I set up a tripod and recorded a short portion of a commencial DVD movie that I played thru my TV. I recorded the same portion for each of the five modes. Using Panasonic's HD-Writer software I copied the clips to my computer where they show as m2ts files They will not play with VLC Media Player. The file created from the 1080/60p recording with not play with Windows Media Player. The other four files will play with Windows Media Player but the HA mode file is more jerky than the HG mode file, the HG mode file is more jerky than the HX mode file, etc. Most of the consumer-level camcorders available for sale nowadays boast High Definition. How come people buy these and are happy? I'm sure they do not own super-fast computers. How do they save their clips and be view them smoothly?

January 9th, 2012, 05:50 PM	#23
Adam Gold Inner Circle Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Woodinville, WA USA Posts: 3,467	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound I think the "happiest" users out there are the ones who have desktops that are more powerful than your laptop. They don't need to be supercomputers but they do need to have enough power. Most laptops, barring the most expensive ones, just aren't powerful enough. Lots of complaints from people who have laptops. Many threads here about "what's the best laptop for editing" and the usual advice is: none. Unless you want to drop three or four grand on a Sager or Alienware -- basically very high end gaming machines, which have similar demands placed on them. Remember, 1920 x 1080p60 AVCHD is at least two degrees of difficulty over HDV at 1440 x 1080i, which the laptops were just catching up to before the latest video standards. __________________ "It can only be attributable to human error... This sort of thing has cropped up before, and it has always been due to human error."

January 9th, 2012, 06:06 PM	#24
Dave Blackhurst Inner Circle Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Apple Valley CA Posts: 4,874	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound OK, there's something more going on here, those lower bitrates should not be having issues... I'm going to guess there's a improperly installed CODEC or some other conflict. Your results are as expected, the lower the bitrate the smoother the overall playback (less data through the "pipe"), but as you drop to those lower rates, it should be playing fine, yet still apparently has issues... Hard to know what exactly is going on, but I'm suspicious that SOMETHING is causing playback to be choked off, and it MAY or may not be the hardware... While there are some potential bottlenecks as I described earlier and how to go through and eliminate them in probable order of importance, I'm really beginning to wonder if this is software related. Was there software included with the camera, and have you installed it? Sometimes that helps, as it should install any necessary files. Maybe uninstall and re-install in case there was some glitch on installation or something got over-written along the way? Check to see if there are updates? I'm sure there's nothing "wrong" with the camera, and I can assure you that it's quite possible to play back HD video, even AVCHD, on a moderately powered computer with reasonable smoothness. Editing is more problematic, but again SHOULD be possible with your specs (or close to them) and some patience... I'm playing back 1080 60p from a Sony P&S (28Mbps bitrate) and Handycam on some lower spec'd Dell laptops, so unless there's some really poor engineering in your ASUS (not TOO likely...), I think there's just something that needs to be "fixed", the fun is in FINDING it! One other thing that I THINK I mentioned was anti-virus software? Those can radically slow down ANY machine, and if you've got any installed, I'd give 'em the boot and switch to MS Security Eessentials. While your computer may be designed to "multitask", if there's a buch of stuff running in the background, it will slow things down a lot - I believe it was Adam who suggested how to troubleshoot that angle. The less running the better, and most "factory" computers some with enough bloatware pre-installed to choke performance significantly. It's sort of hard to remotely troubleshoot, you'll have to keep poking at this until you find why your computer is stuttering when from all appearances it shouldn't... these things happen, and you may need to see if there's someone who knows how to optimize a computer for video locally if worse comes to worse...

January 9th, 2012, 07:24 PM	#25
Chris Soucy Inner Circle Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Fairfield, Dunedin, New Zealand Posts: 3,682 Images: 18	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound I agree with Dave, there seems to be something more going on here, but I'm stuffed if I can figure out where to start. One nagging question that keeps rearing its head is drivers. How does Windows 7 handle updates and is it worthwhile running whatever is required to get them up to scratch. After that I can only suggest your local PC whizkid go through that machine like a dose of salts and figure out what gives and what can be done about it, if anything. That aside, getting your hands on a freebie tester of whatever the AVCHD bods are using to transcode with seems like a no brainer. CS

January 9th, 2012, 11:10 PM	#26
Dave Blackhurst Inner Circle Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Apple Valley CA Posts: 4,874	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound The thing that strikes me is that even at the lowest bitrate he's apparently still getting some stutter... I don't think that will improve with transcoding, might even become worse if it's a data transfer rate issue, as the files will become even larger! Windows 7 drivers are fairly automatic, but video is one of those specialized applications, and so I'm still suspecting a possible software issue, but this is one of those "hands on" situations that the local "whiz kid" might have a better crack at than us speculating. I don't know how good Paul is at hacking/troubleshooting, but might be worth hiring some outside help - it's not everyones cup of tea to "fix" computers! I think we're all stumped because the specs don't look bad, the Windows Experience numbers seem more than adequate, yet it's still sputtering. SOMETHING is choking that computer off, my first guess would be "Norton" at it again, or perhaps one of the other Anti Virus programs, which I've seen cause more consistent harm for the good they do... but again, without "hands on", it's hard to know, though we've all put up some crackin' guesses! At least Paul has some things to start with! Suddenly occurred to me to ask whether he can play back ANY 1080 video (like Vimeo or YouTube) without stutter - that might offer an additional clue...

January 10th, 2012, 08:55 AM	#27
R Geoff Baker Major Player Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Ottawa, ON Posts: 471	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound I again point to the file format -- m2ts -- and the fact that the ever capable VLC player can't play them. You can wrap the source AVCHD file as an mov and expect QT to play it -- if it does, there is no point chasing imaginary hardware issues. I have no issue at all playing 1920x1080 30p AVCHD files on my Core2Duo 5400rpm laptop -- talk of more powerful hardware requirements is, IMHO, premature. Cheers, GB

January 11th, 2012, 03:48 PM	#28
Paul Kinney New Boot Join Date: Jan 2012 Location: livingston texas Posts: 6	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound I am thankful for all the suggestions contributed by the very knowledgeable contributors in this forum. I have saved them to disk so I can refer to them again in the future. I have been a full-time Rver for 16 years so I don't have room for a desktop setup. A super speed PC is too expensive so I must do the best with what I have. I have discovered a new free media player called Splash which must have the right codec set for High Definition AVC/H.264 camcorder movies because, in conjunction with removal of the Aero graphics user interface in Windows 7, I have been able to smooth the raw display of HD clips somewhat. The Panasonic software that came with my HDC TM700 camcorder automatically converts the camera's internal 1080/60p clips to 1080/60i when it off loads them into my laptop as m2ts files. The Corel VideoStudio X4 Pro editor then makes smaller temporary proxy files which display with normal motion when I have them in the editing window. Using the Create Video File option in VideoStudeo I rendered the resultant project with its full size files to a DVD quality disk file (MPEG 169) and was able to play that file on my computer with good results. I then rerendered the same project to the follow series of Blue Ray disk file formats using the same Create Video File option in VideoStudio and was able to play those files (Transport Stream (.m2t)) as well. The Blue Ray formats are: Blue Ray 1920 x 1080p Blue Ray 1440 x 1080p Blue Ray H264 1920 x 1080p Blue Ray H264 1440 x 1080p Blue Ray H264 1920 x 1080 Blue Ray H264 1440 x 1080 I then again rerendered the same project into AVDCH m2t files in the following formats (I'm not sure what player these file were designed for): The files played just fine using Splash. AVCHD 1920 x 1080p AVCHD 1440 x 1080p AVCHD 1920 x 1080 AVCHD 1440 x 1080 So for now, my plan is to burn DVDs of my movies and share them with friends who have DVD players. I will keep the project file and burn Blue Ray disks of the same movies to share with friends if and when Blue Ray players become common. I also have decided to retain original clips on my camera, even after they have been imported into my PC and DVD is created, as long as there is adequate space on the 32 GB hard drive for new footage. By doing this I am always ready to display stunning 1080/60p video from the camera directly to my friend's TVs. Since I can now create non-jerky movies I think the post administrator should close this post. It is terribly long and has served its purpose. If I have further problems I will open a new post.

January 11th, 2012, 04:48 PM	#29
Dave Blackhurst Inner Circle Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Apple Valley CA Posts: 4,874	Re: Jerky Video and Garbled Sound Hey Paul, Glad to hear you've got it running - sounds to me like the Splash player had the "magic" CODEC to get smooth playback. I don't think your notebook is a slouch, and totally appreciate your reasons for using one - I've just shifted much of my "work" to a small, light laptop, the only tricky thing is video editing, and I'm right on the edge of being underpowered for that, so I'm fiddling with tweaks to make it happen! Would be nice to use my "room heater" i7 for as little as possible... I don't want to be held personally responsible for "global warming"! Just like a good 24 hour Greasy Spoon Cafe, DVi typicallly doesn't "close"... threads are left open, leaving them for edification and eventual archiving, since it's not uncommon that someone else out there will hit the same speed bump. Threads do "pass" from natural causes, like when a solution is found, but unless somethings deemed offensive, it's left up for the greater good! FWIW, Blu Ray is right on the cusp of becoming mainstream (about stinkin' time!), players have definitively broken under $100, and you might be able to pick up a BR burner and an external enclosure for around $100 if you shop around. And, it is possible to burn a BR compatible (most players anyway) file to a regular DVD - bitrate has to be under 18MBps, but it's how I archived most of my older HD stuff (you'll find threads here that discuss how to do it), now I'm prepping to add BR delivery since the camera bitrates are 24/28Mbps and I'll be trying to preserve as much quality as possible, and the cost is getting pretty cheap! Glad to hear you're running smooth, grab a cup o' your favorite beverage and hang around, DVi is a great place!