Igor

Al, Hans, Please try newest beta 8s: http://www.wnsoft.com/test/apr-deluxe_29-12-2006.zip It should fix problem with 16:9 slide shows.

Thank you, Lin! A very interesting technique of snow and good slide show! p.s. I found only one problem with a sound: a music contains "clicks". I played extracted MP3 file in WinAmp and also reproduced this problem there. Because of this I suppose the problem in this MP3 file.

Robert, We can add this feature later, but personally I think that it better to show images on fullscreen, as all commercial movies. Overscan area varies on different TV displays (but not larger that shown in PTE with "Show safe TV zone" option).

Robert, If it possible, please send to Sergey and copy to my email address all these .pte project files and .ptv file saved in VideoBuilder. We'll try to reproduce this problem. What size of all 6 project files (including images and music)?

Thank you, Al! It we've found reason of this problem. For 16:9 video we set "Pan & Scan" flag on DVD that in case of 4:3 display says to DVD player enlarge picture to fill all screen without black strips. We'll fix it in the next beta and will use "Letterbox" flag for 16:9 slide shows.

Please try newest beta 8R I published yesterday

Robert, This option "... % of a slide to show main images" exists in beta 8. It will work for all new slides and click "Set for existing slides" button to assign this option for current slides. But it's not a good way, because some TV screens can show whole picture, and all PCs. I have a LCD projector and I disabled overscan to see all picture, because all commercial DVD movies uses all size of DVD picture.

Dave, Please create in Video Builder DVD folders (on output options choose only "Create DVD folders" option). Start Nero, choose create DVD-Video, then add files from VIDEO_TS folder which Video Builder created to Nero. And add your 54 folders and 3000 files as you tried in Video Builder earlier. Will Nero able to burn DVD-Video disc?

1) Pure DVD-Video disc should not contains other files, but as I said many years all DVD players can play such discs. So you can forget about that old limitation. 1a) Sorry, I was wrong, Nero allows to add additional folders/files to DVD-Video disc. 2) You're right Video Builder shouldn't crash in this case. We'll try to reproduce this situation. Probably it's our bug. Please try to burn created VIDEO_TS folder with additional files/folders in Nero. How it will work?

Al, Sergey will write you tomorrow and we'll try to solve this problem! I remember about your question. Thanks.

In Video Builder, second page, main menu -> Edit -> Safe TV zone

PicturesToExe Deluxe v5.00 beta #8t http://www.wnsoft.com/apr/apr-deluxe_beta.zip (4 MB) It's a minor update of beta 8: + Video Builder: added "Show safe TV zone" option. * Video Builder: Added compatibility with more range of DVD writers. * Video Builder: Fixed bug with black picture in DVD menu (it mistakenly shown a first frame of slide show) * Fixed several bug with duration of slide show in AVI file and DVD (for not synchronized show, and more than 1 music file). * Improved compatibility (graphical interface) of main program of PicturesToExe with Windows Vista. p.s. we're simultaneously working on beta 9 right now: full music synchronization (in progress), support of old video cards (completed), drop shadows for objects (completed).

Dave, Pure DVD-Video disc should not contains any folders/files except of content of VIDEO_TS and AUDIO_TS. However all DVD players during last 5-7 years can play DVD-Video disc with additional files/folders. And many commercial DVD movies contains various files (e.g. "Harry Potter" movie). I think it's a limitation of DVD-Video standard that allows only some number of files and folders for DVD-Video. Nero will not allow to add any additional files/folders if you choose create DVD-Video project option. But please don't create your project as DVD-Data with adding of VIDEO_TS folder, because such disc will not play on many stand-alone DVD players (even modern).

Thank you, friends! I wish you Merry Christmas and good coming New Year! We'll work all next week and continue our work on January 4th.

Thanks, I very glad! Rarely I hear about similar problem that occur in 3D games. In all cases it was definitely bug in drivers and updating always helped. However I never heard about this problem in slide shows before. p.s. a similar bug was found in NVIDIA drivers that included to Windows Vista (final release). Fortunately the problem happens only with Microsoft Media Center in Vista - screen flickers. And no problem in other 3D programs/multimedia software. I think NVIDIA already issued updated drivers.

I think it's a bug in this particular version of drivers. Please download and install latest drivers from ATI web site: www.ati.com

In the next beta 9 you'll see option to show soft shadows for objects - images and rectangles. With many options (like in Photoshop, PixBuilder Studio or Video Builder). (And real-time soft shadows for text objects in beta 9 or 10) Also shadow will keep direction (angle of projection) if you rotate object. It adds impression of a deep of space.

Peter, I'm afraid it would be difficult to trace this problem. If even we write new music player and spend 2 months for rewritting of that code, no chance to quickly check up - will it help or not, if this problem occurs so rarely. As I know even WinAmp sometimes stutters when some programs work in background, especially on integrated sound cards.

More new video card will render video in several times faster. For example even ATI Radeon 9600 Pro renders AVI/DVD in 5 times faster than ATI Radeon 9000. We use high quality rendering with Bicubic like quality of resizing to DVD format.

Chess, Aero Glass user interface, Media Center - all they in Windows Vista use fullscreen Direct3D mode. And this main reason why ATI realized unified gamma settings for Vista. I think they understood now why it so important. I agree with you and I hope that ATI will release new XP drivers with unified gamma, too.

Nor PicturesToExe, nor slide show don't set Internet or local network connections. Probably this warning occur because in beta 8A I always copy temporal EXE file of Preview to Application Data folder? I reworked this moment and now installer puts Preview.exe file to Program Files where located other PicturesToExe's files. Please try future beta 8i which I will release today.

Urmas, If you don't play 3D games ATI drivers for WinXP up to spring of 2004 should solve this problem , at least you can try. I tested today Windows Vista RC2 with latest ATI drivers and gamma and brightness/contrast settings unified for desktop and fullscreen slide shows created in v5.00 p.s. according unofficial letter of a person from ATI, they plan to fix this problem with gamma also in Windows XP, but as I understood it will be available when they finished works on drivers for Windows Vista (as their primary goal now).

Hans, Please try latest beta 8g, it may solve problem with 99% of burning: http://www.wnsoft.com/test/apr-deluxe_beta8g.zip 1x1 images will be correctly supported (in other words, - ignored) in the next betas.

Urmas, ATI said me that their drivers for Windows Vista will use unified gamma settings for desktop and for DirectX. So there will be no problem with slide shows.

Did you rebuild EXE file of this slide show in v4.48 and same problem? What file size of the EXE file? What kind of music file you added to this project: MP3 or WMA? Will the problem gone if replace music to another MP3 file?