billbruen

My thanks to all that have commented.......

I'd have to check with the Fruity One....can't keep up with his frequent hardware changes!

I received it fine Ron, but I think it's a good idea to add it here anyway....could sway other waverers..... Thanks again.

Thanks .....done.....

Thinking of buying my Mac using son PTE8 as a Xmas present, but a bit put off by the many posts of 'problems' when using a Mac. Would someone care to offer an opinion as to whether the 'best' setup is to use Bootcamp, Parallels, both, or something else altogether? Bill.

Thanks for that DG.......I'll give it a whirl.....

Thanks davegee.....sounds interesting....but I'm now getting into an area about which I know nothing, (.....build everything on a 16:9 frame/background. Use a PNG mask to provide a "window" for whatever AR you choose.) Can you point me towards any tutorials on this subject?

Thanks for that nobeefstu.......appreciated.

Thanks for the comment nobeefstu, but perhaps I didn't make myself totally clear? As I stated, I created two slideshow Projects with different aspect ratios: (980x654 and 1920x1080) I expected my DVD to reflect these two different sizes on my TV: it didn't, and I couldn't understand why.....hence my question. I couldn't quite get my head around your comment......why allow you to set different 'slide sizes' in the 'Show Project Options', if the 'DVD creation Project Options', was going to ignore that anyway? We are not helped here, by the fact that Igor has two sets of 'Project Options': the slide show creation 'Project Options' and the DVD Creation 'Project Options'. Perhaps he would consider renaming one of these. Anyway, some more thought and investigation, enabled me to find my error. In my 980x654 show, I should have ticked the 'Fixed size of slide (in pixels)' box. I normally leave this 'unticked' as all my shows are created for 1920x1080 TV screens. My DVD now runs as I wanted/expected. So, I think your comment that 'PTE-VideoBuilder does not offer authoring of DVD's for multiple aspect ration content', could be slightly misleading, to someone new to this game (as, indeed, I am). As you say, the 'DVD Creation Project Options', are for the Menu and Title only: but clearly, you can have the shows on the DVD, displayed in different ways on your TV. The important thing for the punters reading this, is to understand that, PTE will burn you a DVD displaying the slideshows as you want, on your TV, providing you have selected the correct options in your 'slideshow creation Project Options'!! Too obvious to state maybe? Thanks for making me think more deeply about my problem.

I created a DVD with two slide shows on it.... One was 980 x 654 (for portraits) and one was 1920 x 1080 for landscapes. The DVD works, but the aspect ratio doesn't change according to your menu selection (as I thought it would). It seems to just select one aspect ratio or the other during the creation phase. Is this a random selection? No doubt this is due to my misunderstanding of DVD nuts and bolts. I'm sure someone will be along to confirm, that what I'm trying to do is not possible?

Thanks for that Peter.......good to know info.

OK, a lot has been going on: I tried Beta 7, but was still getting 'problems'. My PC dual boots into XP, so I tried it there: no better. My Win 7 was already up to date with MS updates, but I did update my graphics driver, and I even ran MemTest86+ for four hours, to check my memory: no failures reported. The memory check was because I got a BSOD along the way......don't think I've ever had a BSOD since moving to Win 7. All this produced no visible improvements..... I continued just trying this and that, with my Projects, and I'm pleased to report that, I finally seem to have got a result. To be honest, I don't exactly know HOW I homed in on this, but the Projects were partially running, then stopping, and I just got a 'feeling' that 'something' was being 'overpowered', by something else. I had been using a large(extended version) audio track: something like 12Mb. I replaced it with a more modest 4/5Mb version and..... Bingo!! PTE has been running sweetly ever since. I haven't tried EVERY feature in PTE, but, I have created EXE files and burned some DVD's successfully....everything I've tried, (like modifying music tracks), seems to work fine. Just a comment for Igor, (which may be something or nothing): closing PTE by clicking the Windows 'Close' button, as opposed to 'Exiting' from the menu, somtimes seemed to produce odd results: or was it my imagination? When I checked what 'processes' were running (with Task Manager), I sometimes found 2/3 instances of PTE still in memory after I'd closed PTE down. My impression was that, 'Exiting' from the Menu was a more 'robust' procedure, so I use it all the time now. Remember that I was getting all kinds of funny things going on before 'the fix', so I may be talking through my hat with these comments. It wouldn't be the first time!! Finally, Igor, I know you're trying to be helpful, by loading up the last Project worked on, every time you open PTE, but, personally, I don't like it. I would much rather pick my own Project to open....we're talking seconds here. When I was having all my problems, I saw all this stuff going into memory, often the Project I DIDN'T want, and couldn't help but wonder if there was not some potential for some Project 'confusion'....you can get paranoid when your computer is playing up, as I'm sure everybody knows! Anyway, bottom line is I'm very happy with the way PTE is running now. Many thanks Igor and Team.

Re-installation was no better.....in fact it was worse....I created a new Project....not only did preview not work, it did not even display the slides when you clicked on them individually. I will move on to try the Beta 7.....

Thanks for that Igor......I'll try your suggestion and let you know how I get on.

Purchased and installed PTE last week. Have created and previewed a show successfully and built exe file, which works fine. But now, when I reopen the Project, the preview window 'run' button does nothing. If I press the 'preview' button itself (next to 'create'), again, nothing appears to happen: however, something seems to be happening in the background, as, if I click somewhere on the screen, I can see the blue Windows revolving circle, which usually indicates a hung application. I normally have to use Task Manager to get out..... Any clues people?