Laptop Specs and Vegas Pro 13

[Craig Yuill]

I have been trying out a trial version of Vegas Pro 13 on a Windows 7 laptop I have access to. The laptop has an i5 processor, 4 GB of RAM, and integrated video graphics (Intel HD 3000, I think). I am thinking of purchasing a Windows laptop with much better specs (i7 quad core processor, 16 GB RAM, decent dedicated video card). I was thinking of using Vegas Pro 13 as my video editing program, but...

Most of the video clips I produce are from a Nikon camera that outputs full HD clips as AVC .MOV files. I have encountered problems when using Vegas Pro 13 - the well-documented black preview screen and rendering problems after adding more than two or three clips to the timeline. I have also tried various well-documented remedies that are supposed to fix the problem, like the following:
- Uninstalling the current version of Quicktime and installing version 7.5. (Turned the clips green in the preview panel.)
- Turning the quality of the preview to "Preview (Auto)" or "Draft (Auto)".
- Setting "GPU acceleration of video rendering" to OFF in the Preferences - Video tab.
- Setting "Close media files when not the active application" in the Preferences - General tab.
- Setting "Disable resample" in the Switches menu for all clips in the timeline.
- Rendering individual files as intermediate .MXF files, then reimporting into a new project. (Saved intermediate files seem to be made up of only a few frames each second that have been repeated several times each.)

I have also been trying out trial versions of PowerDirector 13 and Video Studio X7, and have been able to preview edited footage and also produce rendered output files from both, without hassles. (I have, however, not been entirely satisfied with the quality of the output files from those programs.) I figured Vegas Pro 13 would better suit my needs - but it won't if it fails to work properly.

I want to like Vegas Pro 13. I have a feeling that machine specs might be at the heart of the issue. I am wondering if Vegas Pro users could tell me if improved specs like those listed above should allow Vegas Pro 13 to work properly, or if there are other settings I still need to change to make it work.

[Jeff Harper]

Vegas' performance and speed will be affected by an older machine, but it should still work.

The reason Vegas is not working for you is NOT due too specs, so to speak, but probably a hardware situation that could take forever for you to figure out. Vegas is much more finnicky than it used to be.

If you buy a new machine there is a good chance Vegas might work properly but you won't know till you try it.

Your specs are certainly "low" for video editing in Vegas. Integrated video and 4GB of ram make for a machine that is, in my opinion, seriously underpowered for Vegas. You really need a dedicated graphics card for Vegas, IMO, especially for editing HD.

[Edward Troxel]

Please find a machine with a better video card. An AMD/ATI or nVidia card will be better than the Intel HD card. For example, if you wish to run Titler Pro, it will not work with the Intel HD 3000.

[Craig Yuill]

I was finally able to edit the footage in Vegas Pro 13, without having to find a more-powerful computer. I did so after doing the following two things.
1) Set virtual memory for the project to 64 MB, and the maximum number of threads for rendering to 2. This was suggested at one website I found.
2) I finally found a way to transcode the .MOV file into .MXF ones. I closed whatever project was open, then imported a single video file into a new Untitled project in Vegas. I then rendered it as a 4:2:2 1080i60 file. I then closed the Untitled project without saving it. I repeated this until all files I needed were transcoded.

I was able to import these transcoded files into Vegas and edit them without difficulty. I could then output a good-quality 720p30 file. Interestingly, I was able to edit a short movie containing several 720p60 .MOV files without difficulty (and without the need to transcode to .MXF).

It seems that it is possible to edit with Vegas Pro 13 on a less-than-ideal computer. This makes me feel better about getting a well-speced Windows laptop and using Vegas Pro 13 as my video editing program.

[Jeff Harper]

Well done, Craig, glad you found a way to make it work!