nickles

Hey Everybody: You've only got 3 more days left to bid! I hate to think my little bid is going to win it.

Hello Ignatius, Nice demo of PTE 5 capabilities. Thanks for sharing. Ken

Results: 1.) ATI Mobility Radeon PCI Express 128mb + 384 hyper-memory 1280x1024 LCD Laptop PTEShow.exe - Excellent..Music Fine PTEShow_H.exe - Excellent..Music Fine 2.) ATI Mobility Radeon x300 64mb 1680x1050 LCD Laptop PTEShow.exe - Lot's of jitters..Music Fine PTEShow_H.exe - Lot's of Jitters..Music fine 3.) ATI Radeon 9250 128mb 4x AGP 1280x960 CRT Desktop PTEShow.exe - Slight jitter at transition to 2 Photo objects otherwise excellent. Music stuttered for first 5 seconds of show. PTEShow_H.exe - Identical to above. 4.) ATI Radeon x1400 256mb hyper-memory PCI Express 1680x1050 LCD Laptop PTEShow.exe - Jittery at Transitions..Music Fine PTEShow_H.exe - Jittery at Transitions..Music Fine Igor, Should screen resolution effect performance? Ken

As a data point: Installed the Geforce 6600 OC card on my neighbors Sony Vaio Desktop PCV-RXA842 , integrated video w/ 32mb shared memory. Prior to installation it would not run a single PTE 5 without all kinds of jerkiness. Your original Spirit in the Sky only yielded a black screen. After installation, every PTE 5 show ran smooth as silk. The install was pretty simple. When the card was installed in the availble 4x AGP, the power supply connected and the system powered up the onboard integrated vga was automatically disabled. After installing the driver from the supplied CD and rebooting it worked like a charm. So far, of all the PTE test shows I've ran...I think your original 109mb Spirit in the Sky is the ultimate test of a graphics card...and it ran very, very nicely. ken

Hello Lumenlux, Hey, I'm interested in your card. I assume it is this one: http://www.compusa.com/products/product_in...6328&pfp=SEARCH I gather that it has 256mb of memory. I notice it also supports both DVI and VGA monitors. The system I'm considering it for is an older HP Pavilion 9880 1.5ghz with W2k. It has a Video Card slot that is specified as 4x AGP. Does the info that you got with the card say anything abot compatibility with 2x/4x/8x AGP bus speeds? I also have a neighbor that is interested. Evidently CompUSA's sale is over the 13th....so if you have anymore results the next couple of days...you might post. Your 1.2ghz system is probably XP? How much memory? KEN

Hello Igor, I'm curious, is there a way to use gray scale images and reduce the memory requirements of a video card? Probably a mute point. I don't think I would make very many B&W slideshows....but maybe from old B&W photos. Ken

Nathan, The problem I see with running a 1024x768 original image size is that if you are designing the show for that screen size...then you have nothing to zoom or pan too. Of course you could zoom in and pan but then the image would start looking pixelized. Does that make sense? sincerely, ken

Hello Anyone, Is anyone aware of a utility that might indicate how much video memory is being used? ken

I won't go as far as to say that they changed things as they should but they do change things. Try this, Select Cover Screen & Wide DVD then preview. Then do, Fit To Screen & Wide DVD and preview. It does something on my computer but probably not right. ken

Yep Ron, The .pte is still associated with PTE 4...to open a Beta 5 you must open PTE 5 first then open the file. Evidently PTE 4 files aren't compatible with Beta 5 and vice-versa. Igor will probably be refining that later. ken

It's evidently set up a little differently now. Notice you can "fit slide to screen" or "cover screen" as well as set screens aspect ratio and percentage of screen to use. A lot more flexibility. Just play around with the settings a little bit and see what happens. ken Hello Bill, Add Text is not currently enabled. Hope you got my e-mail. ken

LumenLux, Tested on 3 systems: 1. ATI Radeon 9250 128mb 4x AGP W2k.....my slowest CPU 1.5ghz Pent4...Intermediate capable video card 2. ATI Mobility Radeon x300 64mb XP Pro....my fastest CPU 2.11ghz...least capable video card 3. ATI Mobility Radeon PCI Express 128mb + 384 hyper-memory(shared?) XP Home...2nd fastest CPU 1.66ghz duo-core...best video card. Results: System 1. Original 109mb show wouldn't run. 9mb and 17mb ran the same and very satisfactory with some slight jerkiness. DISCOVERY! the apparent jerkiness occurs precisely at the end of the fade from the previous slide for an instant. This only ocurred if the next slide was being panned. It didn't occur if the next slide was not being panned(Igor? you might think about this one). The jerkiness was noticable because I was looking for it...not sure that it would be very noticable to a casual observer. System 2. Same results as System 1. Except System 2 would run the original show. Slight jerk at fade end as noted above. Occasional jerks(I hate that word...maybe slight discontinuities?) on original show elsewhere but generally pleasing to watch show. System 3. All three shows as smooth as glass even at ends of fades as noted above. One other thing. I think the video card works directly with a bitmap which is the same size(very large) regardless of the amount of jpeg compression. I think that using a very good quality jpeg shouldn't effect video performance. AM I RIGHT IGOR? I'll try to run on some other systems tomorrow. Oh by the way, I still love your show even though I've watched it about 20 times now. Sincerely, ken

Very good suggestion Boxig. I recently posted a PanTest show that is discussed in the "Video Cards" thread. As per your suggestion I've just posted the PTE files also. They are located here: http://briefcase.yahoo.com/bc/sknickles@sb...ic+Data&.view=l PanTest Beta5 is the ".exe" and PanTest PTE files will unzip to a folder called PanTest_PTE files. ken

Aha! Some discussion.... First Igor, The original post and hopefully all other posts are in NO WAY critical of your wonderful development. I plan very much to use PTE 5.0... it's absolutely the way of the future. I 100% believe your development is the way PTE should be headed....so continue to go for it! I'm personally willing to pay XTRA money for your eventual upgrade....please do not hesitate your efforts based on any of these disccusions. A couple of years from now these discussions will have no meaning as the technology changes and the older computers disappear. Now for others, I just made another simple panning/zooming slide show that I posted in my Yahoo Briefcase for test purposes. It can be downloaded hear: http://briefcase.yahoo.com/bc/sknickles@sb...ic+Data&.view=l You may have to refresh your browser button several times in order to get to it? It's named PanTest Beta5. It is composed of one photo from my Rebel 3072x2048, one short 128kbit-1.4mbyte mp3, and one two line .png title. It basically pans the entire photo with the screen set under project options to 4:3 PC/DVD. The Title also zooms and pans at the start and end. The show is set to run for 92.5 seconds. The mp3 was cropped to 92.5 seconds. If anyone wishes to down load and run in what they consider to be a slow computer give it a try and report if you get jerkiness. I've got four computers available including my son's and wifes...but all have a 128mb or greater video card. It runs smooth on all of them. I will run it on several much slower systems at the office tomorrow and report my results. Lumenlux, What caused me to post this was your show...it is the only one of the many beta 5 shows I tested that stalled out. It ran perfectly in 3 out of 4 of the computers I tested it in. I need to read the recent posts here...but wanted to quickly post while my thoughts were clear. sincerely. ken

Hello Igor, I know you've probably studied video cards extensively during your development. Here's a naive question for you. I shoot most of my photos with a Digital Rebel that produces a 3072x2048 image. If I convert such an image to a bit map (.bmp) it yields a file size of 18 mbytes. Would this number somehow be related to the memory requirements of the video card? If I panned this image on a 1024x768 screen from left to right, then down and right to left at full image size both horizontally and vertically would this take a fairly powerful video card? Like I panned in the KenBurns show I posted. I probablly need to digout my old NVIDIA TNT2 and try it. Think it had 64mb of memory. Would run it on a 1.5 mhz P4 machine. Hmm....maybe someone out there has a slower machine with a shared memory video chip...that could try the KenBurns show and report their result. I just hate to send people shows and they say to themselves,"Oh NO, another one of Ken's jerky slideshows"...you no what I mean? Thanks for your reply. sincerely, nickles

Nice show Ian. Ran very smooth on my system. Wow. I've been involved in the railroad business for about 30 years...but wasn't aware of the history on 4' 8 1/2" gauge width. Interesting how some things evolve...not as scientific as some might think. Thanks for sharing. KEN

Hello Ken, Thank you very much for the reply Ken. I thought this thread was going to die...but I thought as such is why I gave it the description. I understand what you have said. The next video card I buy will probably have lot's of considerations. What I was hoping to get some feedback on was "Is it possible to design a PTE 5 slideshow that will run in low power video cards?" I think it might be related to the image size. Can I design a slideshow that only uses 800x600 and zoom&pan without choking a lower speed video card...probably know one knows...except Igor. I was hoping that maybe this thread would generate a few guidelines. Anybody else out there have any thoughts on this subject? Thanks again Ken. nickles

You're very right Tom. Besides higher rez PC versions I normally add a version to my DVD collection. If done right they look very good. For my parents, I create a VHS version...which isn't to sharp...but they seem to enjoy them...they haven't mastered the DVD player I installed for them and probably never will. I've made a lot of them in a 16:9 format for my Plasma EDTV. Those really have good resolution. For those I normally create a anamorphic version which improves the image quality quite a bit. Some where floating around in the video threads I post my technique which has been very successful for me. thanks for your post, ken

Yep...the link works. A neat concept on the text and real fast in flight. Thanks for sharing... ken

Hello Everyone: I'm probably a bloomin' idiot for starting this thread...but I guess I'll show how dumb I really am. Hopefully if I drum up any responses...maybe I'll learn something. My main question concerns Video Cards...but first... I've been creating slideshows for several years. I'm not a professional photographer but enjoy the sport. My customers are my friends and relatives. I've been fortunate and can normally afford to keep up with the computer technology. Most of my customers aren't as fortunate. Walmart has a computer on sale...they rush out and buy it...and probably on credit. It has 512mb of memory, XP Home Edition and a onboard Video Processor with shared memory. In the past, just about any old computer they happened to have managed to play my slideshows. They're only problem was if they got busy clicking buttons they might have the same slideshow playing simultaeously but out of sync. PTE 5 has so much potenial...how do I make proper decisons on my slideshow designs to feel confident that it will play on my customers computers. I can't call them and ask them "what kind of video card do you have?". They wouldn't have a clue or know how to find out. I would like to be able to use some of PTE 5 capabilities but not sure how to constrain my design such as image size?, number of simultaneously objects?, speed of objects?, transition effects?, etc......Is it best to use only PTE 5 for people I know have powerful hardware? Hmm...Powerful Hardware...not sure I know what that means...I've got a laptop that runs fast to me...it has a duo-core Intel something or other...2GB of Ram...120GB HD...Radeon Express 128mb that will hyper-thread another 340mb something of ram...is that fast...I guess...or it was last month. What I think I may be after in this thread is an explaination of video cards...what's fast...what do the buzz words all mean? There's shared memory, hyper-threaded memory, 32mb, 64mb, 128mb, 256mb, Directx..maybe Directy...Direc3d...OpenGL...Do I need to no more about these to properly design a slideshow? If I do can anybody out there explain video cards to me? Enough said...I've put out my hook...gonna wit and see what bites it. ken

Hello Just a few comments. I use ZoneAlarm Firewall and AntiVirus software coupled with a hardware firewall at my router. Don't ever come to the conclusion that a hardware firewall will give you ultimate protection...another subject on another day. My comment concerns antivirus problems I had on the development of the PTE Jukebox software. The Jukebox is essentially a multi-slideshow within a slideshow. Each time a year button is depressed a slideshow is run for that year. At present there are 31 years and 31 ".exe" slideshows plus the main Jukebox.exe slideshow. I wanted the slideshow to be responsive to button clicks on the year. Unfortunately every time Windows executes a ".exe" file the virus software scans it before allowing Windows to execute it. That takes TIME. This caused a very slow response to button clicks on a year. If I disabled my virus software when running Jukebox it was much more responsive....with no delays. About six monts ago I got my first virus infection in a W2k system. I was using eTrust EZAntivirus that was supplied free by my SBC Yahoo! DSL provider. Fortunately I maintain a fairly comphensive set of backups of my operating system partition using Ghost...and was able to recover. Each time I recovered I would get re-infected shortly thereafter. I finally downloaded a free copy of ZoneAlarm firewall to assist me in locating the culprit..and guess what? My eTrust EZ Antivirus was going out and retrieving an automatic virus file update and after it installed I had the virus. I don't know exactly what was going on but I suspect a hacker was penetrating my sytem through my hardware firewall and identifying himself as ezTrust. I uninstalled ezTrust and bought ZoneAlarm Pro with firewall, antivirus, spyware,and pop-up blocker and my problems went away...at least for now....sorry wasn't going to cover this...must be another day. ken

Hello Lumenlux, Well, well this is the deal. Tried to run Spirit in the Sky in my older 1.5ghz 648mb Pentium 4 with W2k..Service Pack 4...DirectX 9.0c...ATI Radeon 9200 AGP with 128mb memory. and...this is what happened...the slide show ran beautifully and smooth up until the first mountain scene with cloud cover. The slide with half the clould cover immediaely appeared with no transition...then the screen went black. The screen went totally black but the music continued to play. Nice music but I got tired of waiting for an image to appear. So escaped and quit the show. Same thing when I repeated. So far I've ran 12 Beta 5 shows that have been posted in an about the forum. Your's is the first to "mess up" on this machine. I guess you are just going to have to quit creating slide shows...I have nothing else to offer you as a solution. Now...the show you made was pretty comprehensive...many slides with many new maneuvers. I've only made one show so far with Beta 5 and it consisted of one photo with a few zooms and pans. But I immediately noticed that one slide in Beta 5 is equivalent to many in PTE 4...as far as labor and thought processing to do it...exaggerated a wee bit...but you get my message? I'm going to really enjoy using PTE 5 and what I am saying is no reflection on Igor's brilliant work. I think his concepts in the visual editor are a work of software art. The point I guess I'm making is that with PTE 5 there are now so many possibilities that it boggles my rusty mind. A lot more decisons a slideshow creator must think through in creating his imagery..thus mucho more care and time. Just curious if you have any thoughts after making such a show. ken

Hello Mr. Lumenlux: Your 1st beta 5..hmmm A darned excellent job. I liked the distortion effect at the start. But in general the show imagery flowed very well to me. Don't know exacly what it was..but at times I almost felt a 3D sensation...and no I haven't been nipping the bottle. Of course what really made the show was your beautiful Peruvian images...where did you buy those....I'd like to get some too. Mechanically it was very smooth all the way through on my XP system. This evening I'll put it through it's paces on my slower W2k machine and let you know how it went...but I must return back to the office now...yep, I'm still having to work some. sincerely, ken

"I think you will like this one" I think you're right, Lin. Very nice. Was expecting to hear the airplanes engines. No sound? ken

Hello Barry, Pretty slick with the balloons. The balloon speed was fine with me. Ran flawlessly on my XP system. A little jerky in a place or two on my W2K system. I'm confident, with your creative genius, that you will be making some delightful shows with these expanded graphics tools. Surprised that I'm the first to comment. Cheers ken