Trouble Shooting Compatibility Problems

Articles

1.	Configuring your PC for Digital Video Editing
2.	Planning and Shooting your Videos
3.	Connecting a Digital Camera to Your Windows PC
4.	Video Dimension, Aspect Ratio and DVD
5.	Editing Techniques to remove unnecessary footage
6.	Useful Video Editing Techniques
7.	Adding Titles and Credits
8.	Speeding Up or Slowing Down Video Playback
9.	Applying Effects Correctly
10.	Applying Transitions Correctly
11.	Applying Picture-in-Picture Transition
12.	Using the Animated Transform Effect
13.	Using the Green Screen Technique
14.	Adding Life To Images: The Pan and Zoom Effect
15.	More Effects and Transitions
16.	Useful Audio Effects
17.	Create photos from your videos
18.	Watermark Your Videos
19.	Getting Edited Videos out of PC
20.	Inserting videos into PowerPoint
21.	Create Movies for Video Desk
22.	Troubleshooting Compatibility Problems

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Video Edit Magic v4.47

Troubleshooting Compatibility Problems

Video Edit Magic - Troubleshooting

A codec (enCoder/DECoder) is a device or program used for encoding and decoding digital data stream or signal. Most codecs have the ability to compress data. That is, they take audio or video data and convert it to a format that takes up less disk space and less network bandwidth. There is a wide variety of codecs used to compress video and audio.

Incompatible codecs interfere with the functioning of any software. In case of video editing software like Video Edit Magic it results in a range of problems. Choppy audio, no video/audio in preview, loss of synchronization between audio and video, video and/or audio missing from the movie, and incomplete conversion are some of them.

Video Edit Magic harnesses Microsoft’s DirectShow technology, a part of DirectX; to edit videos, display the preview, add effects, add transitions, and for most of its advanced features. DirectShow is a software component for handling and displaying digital video, including AVI, MPEG, QuickTime, Windows Media Video etc.

This technology is highly extensible. Software vendors develop codecs to extend the capabilities of DirectShow for their own products. For instance, Video Edit Magic has its own Color Balance Effect codec that manages the Contrast, Brightness and Gamma of a video.

In the same way, other software vendors may write other codecs like, say, an MPEG decoder to read MPEG files. While well developed codecs cause no problems, some codecs might overwrite DirectShow’s default codecs, causing problems for other applications using DirectShow.

How to fix incompatibility problems?

1. Compatibility tab in Video Edit Magic:

First open the Tools menu, and select Options.... Switch to the Compatibility tab. On this tab is a list of all the compressors present on your PC. Some of these compressors may be used by other programs running on your PC, but can cause conflicts while using Video Edit Magic. Video Edit Magic allows you to disable codecs by just unchecking them in this list. You can define which codec to use. These settings do not affect applications other than Video Edit Magic. The disabled state applies only to this program. The other applications that are using the codecs will continue to work.

2. Silencing Codecs

Video Edit Magic automatically recognizes an extensive list of incompatible codecs. By default the software silences these codecs by excluding them from the list of codecs on the Compatibility tab.

3. Installing the latest version of Direct X

Some compatibility problems can be resolved by installing the latest version of DirectX. To determine the version currently installed on your PC:

1.	On the Start menu, click 'Run'.

2.	Type in "dxdiag" to bring up the DirectX Diagnostic Tool.

3.	The DirectX version is listed on the System tab.

DirectX 8.1 comes pre-installed with Windows XP. DirectX 7.0 comes pre-installed with Windows 2000. You need DirectX 9.0c or higher installed to use the Compatibility feature of Video Edit Magic. Newer versions of DirectX also improve the graphics, security, and performance of your operating system. You can download and install it for your Windows 98, Windows ME, Windows 2000, Windows Server 2003, or Windows XP-based system. Even if DirectX is already installed on your PC, reinstalling it can solve some compatibility problems.

Codecs used by Video Edit Magic:

	XviD: XviD is a Mpeg4 video compressor; used to encode /decode digital video. Video Edit Magic uses XviD because its an open source and files processed using it can run on any platform. Xvid is not included with Video Edit Magic. If you would like to compress movies using Xvid, you can download the codec here.

	Sorenson Video 3: This popular compressor is the default codec for Video Edit Magic when creating QuickTime movies.

	MPEG: Video Edit Magic uses a GPL MPEG2 codec. This codec can be used to play MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 streams in any media player based on DirectShow. It can also be used as DVD decoder for unencrypted discs.

The above codecs are compatible with Video Edit Magic. The software does not compromise on quality, no matter what file format and codec you select. Many other codecs are available.

The advanced functionality of Video Edit Magic is based on DirectX technology, which assures higher performance in video and audio. The program also includes a simple to use Compatibility tool, making troubleshooting easy.