Eyes

Yes, I did, but I feel they cover different aspects of the question in different places. I don't create a slideshow very frequently, and every time i make one I end up wrestling with the same sound issues since I forget about the lack of intuitivity when it comes to sound. I wanted one single document that covered all issues that I specifically encounter so I can browse through it next time before I start off. What I specifically want my future me to remember is to not use the music tab in the Syncronize Slide dialog. And to not make a soundtrack for the whole slideshow and then expect it to be syncronized in the same way on different computers. I just wondered if I got anything wrong in the document.

If you look at the line below the one you highlighted you can see that I edited the post saying I wouldn't upload, since I felt I had had the correct answer. Sorry, I guess I could have been a bit more clear about that. It is obvious that there is no way of making the kind of syncronization I did and then count on it to behave properly on computers with different performance (referring to this post).

So, by the trial and horror method and with the help of this friendly community I've come to grips with sound in PTE. I think. It's just that it feels a bit inconsistent from time to time. I have uploaded a document with my conclusions. I would very much appreciate if someone who knows better than I could have a look at it. If there are any mistakes it would be much easier if you could point them out instead of me continuing trying to find a solution. The document is three pages long. Here is the link: Sound_in_PTE_5.6.pdf

It's three pages. Could be considered a very thin book I'll give it a go tomorrow, it would be really good to know if I have mistaken anything.

Thanks for the answer, Colin, though it wasn't quite the one I hoped for. I'm sure you're right. Upgrading computers is not an option though, my client is a company where there will be a number of different computers where the show will be run. And downgrading doesn't sound that funny. I've learned to take another approach to the problem. I've had a hard time learning how to work with sound in PTE. I wrote down my experiences in order not to forget. Would people here in the community consider browsing through the doc for errors if I uploaded it somewhere convenient? I know it's a friendly community, but perhaps it's too much to ask?

I have tested it on one of my clients computers and the delay effect is even worse there. It certainly is no gamer puter, but still, the show is not that heavy. I will upload my test show later today. I very much appreciate your help. Edit: I guess from Colin's answer below that you were right, Xaver, so I won't upload the show. Thanks anyway.

I'm running the exe from the hard drive. I made a test show with the same results. It is 4 minutes long with 4 second slides. It's 800x600 and all slides are 600 wide, no size change. There is a rectangle popping up as an animation every 30 seconds with which I have synchronized the music (using Adobe Audition). The time between sound and animation gets a fraction longer each time. But it sounds to me one shouldn't need much of a graphics card to run it, but if that's the case I guess there is nothing to do.

Thank you, Xaver! 1. Really very smooth. No problems there. I have checked "Fixed size on slides" and the images are not resized. And I agree, it sounds like a performance issue. But I don't understand how performance could make the one thing go slower than the other when they are synced. Do they run in seperate threads or something? And furthermore, the laptop is a Dell Latitude with a dual core cpu on 2.4 GHz plus 4 GB RAM. Shouldn't that power be enough to sync background music with animations? 2. Thanks, I didn't know that.

I have two sound issues. 1. In a 5 minutes slideshow I am syncing parts of the background music with animations i certain slides. In the stationary Vista computer where I produce the show it works ok. In another stationary computer with XP it also works rather ok. But in my XP laptop the music and slides slowly get more and more out of sync. After 4 minutes the music is as much as half a second ahead of the animations. The music is one mp3 file (though the problem is the same with a wav file) that is added in the Project Options' Music tab. "Don't interrupt sound comment" is checked. I have tried with "Synchronize music and slides" both checked and unchecked with the same result. I tried it in 5.0 with the same result. What can I do? 2. When I pause a slideshow with the space bar the background music continues to play. That means that the whole slideshow gets out of sync with the music. Is this intentional? I would think that when I pause a show the music should stop too.

Yes, the sound part is a bit confusing to a newcomer. I discovered the Add music button during this thread, and it has another advantage that I was looking for: It doesn't stop the other music from playing. It's not actually commentary I'm after but sound effects, and the Add music button seems to me to be the only way of adding a sound to a slide without breaking the background music from playing. Correct?

Rats! No wonder this turned into such a confusing thread. Both functions are actually referred to as "preview" in the manual. I do apologize! And thanks for the tip to do a real preview from a selected slide.

Peter, on the XP machine I downloaded a fresh zip from WnSoft. And on that machine I have only opened your pte file and nothing else. It was a virgin installation with which absolutely nothing was done except opening your file. The problem can't lie in my pte file. I guess I have to give up for the time being. ...But hang on. Are we talking about the same thing? It just struck me that we could mean different things with preview. When using the Preview button at the bottom of the screen, next to the Create button, the music plays as it should, since this is the same as creating an exe file. What I'm doing is clicking the arrow button under the large preview window in the upper right corner of the main window, you know where there is a play button, a stop button, and a slider to preview the show. It's when I click that button that it doesn't work properly. By the way, thanks for you patience, it is much appreciated!

Oh, sorry about the gender confusion, Lin. Thanks for the answers, this seems to be a very friendly and helpful community. Peter, I have Vista environment, Intel Core2 Duo 3 GHz, nVidia 8800 GTX, 4 GB RAM. Peter, I have now installed PTE on an XP computer and the same thing happens there when I try your sample slide show. So the problem can't be my slide show settings, and it can't be this particular computer. I makes me wonder if it really is possible to hear the individual slides' sounds when previewing, but then again, you guys can hear them... Or is it a bug that occurs for anyone who installs the latest version of PTE without having older components of the version 5 development? I'm just rambling here, I'm at a loss. Here is another piece of info to ponder: When I add music on project level and leave the playlist for a slide empty, with "Play new music" checkbox checked, all music is supposed to stop when it reaches that slide. I does in the exe, but not in preview. Sum up so far: When playing Peter's very simple slide show with sound in one of the slides I can't hear any sound when previewing, only when playing the compiled exe. It doesn't matter what OS I play it in. I have a fresh copy of PTE 5.5 and I have not had any older version installed before. Music on project level plays fine, both in preview and in exe.

Thanks Peter. I tested your show and I experience exactly the same problem. I doesn't play when I run it inside the PTE program but it plays in the exe. Just to be sure I added the file in the project dialogue to play from the beginnnig of the show, and there it plays both inside PTE and in the exe. Are there any program settings that I am unaware of? Settings that influence all shows, I mean. I hope there is a solution, it's rather frustrating to have to "compile" the show and run it in its entire every time I want to test the sounds. By the way, Lin actually told me to click the "Synchronize" check box, not to uncheck it, so I guess she meant the same thing as you. However, I had already tried to uncheck it to no avail.

Thanks. I checked the "Synchronize music and slides" but it still only plays in the exe. I have tested and added the sound file in the Project Options Music tab, and there it plays in both "preview" and exe, but in individual slides I can't make music play. Don't know what to try next, any suggestions?