I  have been using Pinnacle Studio from V8.x, V9, V10, V11, V12, and now V14.  Earlier this summer, I bought a Canon Vixia HF200 and was shooting HD 1920x1080x29.97 H.264 quality, and would then encode to MPEG2.  I had a quad core, 2.4 GHz (3 GB) with a 128 mb NVIDIA video card.

 I wasn't able to use motion video titles in V14 and everytime I tried to put together a DVD with transitions.  Frequent lockups and all kinds of problems and I was just about to toss in the towel and go with something else.  Then, I saw a post indicating the NVIDIA 9500 GT card with 1 GB was solving problems for others.

 It has now solved my problems.  A simple 4 second clip that my previous configuration containing only a motion title with 4 layers would not render overnight.   Now, it renders in but a few seconds.

I hate having to spend another $70 to $90 on hardware to get a piece of software to work, but if you have tried everything else, try replacing the video card.  Preferably, buying from a retail outlet that will allow you to return it if it does not solve your issues.

My 2 cents.

More like your $200 than $0.02.  But that's just my 1/2 cent.

Please post again when you complete a >1 hour mini-blockbuster project with your 1920x1080i HF200 video.  Any preview screen blackouts or render delays if you insert lots of transitions, zoomed stills, overlays, or other effects?  Does the still preview function smoothly?  What if you insert a stabilize or speed effect?  Is the background rendering reasonably fast?  How fast (fps) were you able to render the AVCHD-DVD or BD image to your HDD?  Any hitches?  No "export error:real time" message?  Does the AVCHD-DVD or BD menu function, even if it includes background images or thumbnail still adornments?  Will the discs play, and menus work, on devices other than your PC?

If you try to burn to DVD+R DL, does it work?  Or do you get a burn fail message and add to the coaster collection?

That, too, will be worth a whole lot more than $0.02.

If advanced GPU specs are indeed requisite for some S14 functions, those should probably be verified and posted to the product specs and Knowledge Base.  However, I suspect that the GPU may cure some, but not all issues.  A >1 project with HF200 video might come close to a full stress test.

Thanks.

3 vendors have this card for < 60.00 on www.pricewatch.com

 just my $47.99

JKoch,

I can't comment on many of your specifics, but I have now taken my 1920x1080x29.97 fps, 24 MBit AVCHD video converted to MPEG 2 and done some extensive editing.

I've got a 1 hour DVD where I have menus, numerous transitions, color correction, titles, and other video effects that now render and produce DVD without issue.  Prior to purchasing the NVIDIA GEForce 9500 GT w/ 1GB card, my older 128 MB video card I had nuermous crashes.  That has completely disappeared now and V14 is stable for me.

I have now even edited some AVCHD video in smaller projects and there are no problems with those edits and rendering either.

Myself, I haven't tried to burn to a DVD yet directly from within Pinnacle as the DVD's I create are for more than 1-off's.

Beery