Smart Proxy doesn't work

jcafaro10 · Post by **jcafaro10** » Mon Dec 29, 2008 7:38 pm

I'm trying to get the Smart proxy feature to work. It's wayyy to slow to try and real time see what's going on by dragging the slider in this program so i want to use the smart proxy on my videos but when I click to make a smart proxy clip nothing happens. A window pops up asking me if I want to do it, I click yes...nothing happens. Nothing appears in the SP file manager, nothing appears in the SP queue manager

Post by **Ken Berry** » Mon Dec 29, 2008 9:38 pm

Welcome to the forums!

However I am afraid you provide too little information to be able to give any sensible answer. We have no idea what your computer specifications are, for example, nor the type of video you are trying to edit. If it is AVCHD, and your computer is anything less than a Pentium 4 3.0 GHz with hyperthreading, SmartProxy won't work. And you would not be able to play the edited video smoothly.

So come back to us with that information and someone should be able to provide a more complete answer.

jcafaro10 · Post by **jcafaro10** » Mon Dec 29, 2008 11:43 pm

I'm not really sure what you mean. I understood that Smart Proxy did some fancy rendering on a clip to make it easier to edit smoothly. Isn't that so lower end machines are able to have a better time? Either way, I've tried on two machines. Both are core 2 duos. One has integrated video, and the other has 8800 GT. I'm trying to edit a DIVX video. The clip is on the timeline but I can't drag the slider smoothly. Trying to use Smart Proxy doesn't create a smart proxy clip. Nothing happens. There is no indication that anything is occurring.

jcafaro10 · Post by **jcafaro10** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 6:30 am

The program also seems to be running painfully slow. I never had these problems with Adobe Premiere or anything. It's impossible to work with anything. Even with one clip in the library, a small 20mb divx clip, its sluggish to click around, move the clip slider, navigate the timeline. Everything is just running ridiculously slow as if this program is working so hard. It's not my machine either (Core 2 Duo, 2 gb of ram)

2Dogs · Post by **2Dogs** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 5:20 pm

What are the properties of your DivX clips?

Smart Proxy is used to create lower resolution avi files used in your project to enable you to do all your edit settings.

When Smart Proxy is enabled, the default threshold is 720 x 480 (NTSC) or 720 x 576 (PAL). If your clips have a greater resolution, Smart Proxy files are automatically created. You may also change this threshold resolution - go to "File>Preferences" or hit "F6" and click on the "Smart Proxy" tab.

You can also change the default directory used for the Smart Proxy files, or just use the window to check where they are being stored.

In my limited experience of using Smart Proxy files, with some 1920 x 1080 AVCHD clips, I find that they do work, but they also do take a long time for VS to create.

Check for the proxy files in the default directory. After they've been created, the thumbnail in your library should have a white two-frame filmstrip icon on it.

Next time you find VS acting sluggishly when you have a DivX clip on your timeline, run Windows Task Manager set in the "Performance" tab so that you can see what is going on with your cpu, RAM and pagefile usage.

DivX is a delivery format, of course, never intended for editing. I believe the usual workflow in Premiere or iMovie and the like would be to convert it to an editable format using something like Cineform. That's all well and good, but when you compare other programs to VS, bear in mind VS is a consumer video editing program not costing several hundred dollars.

jcafaro10 · Post by **jcafaro10** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 6:54 pm

I got smart proxy to work for some videos but not for others. First I had to set the editing mode to avi instead of mpeg. Also, I fixed the sluggishness. For anyone else noticing sluggishness try installing XP Codec Pack. Then when you load a divx video into VS it will ask you if you want to use ffdshow. Say yes, and it will go much quicker

2Dogs · Post by **2Dogs** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 11:33 pm

Smart Proxy works for me when my project properties are set to avi or mpeg - it makes no difference.

One thing that can make a difference, and perhaps generate a "sluggish" response is setting the preview method to "High Quality Playback".

Some people perhaps imagine that using that setting results in better quality output, whereas in fact it makes not a jot of difference, affecting only the preview quality.

Much of the time, however, the sluggishness may be caused by VS creating proxy files. That's where watching cpu usage with Task Manager is so useful. If you bother to try it, you can clearly see that VS is using over 50% of your dual core cpu to do something that it's not giving you any warning pop-ups or other messages about - not even the old egg-timer. I suspect many users unaware of this hidden activity try to scrub the timeline or otherwise do something while VS is busy, and end up thinking that the program has crashed.

I've only worked with short AVCHD clips thus far, and I dread to think how long it would take to generate proxy files for a one hour project.

You never did say what resolution your DivX clips were. Since you appear to be able to work with them now using FFdshow, I assume they are in fact standard resolution.

As codec packs go, the XP one looks OK, and does have an uninstaller. Note however that FFdshow is available separately and is probably all you need. I've used FFdshow with no apparent ill effects for the last couple of years, but I can't say I noticed a night and day difference in the way VS handles DivX files with and without it.

jcafaro10 · Post by **jcafaro10** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 12:02 am

Where is the HIgh Quality Playback setting of which you speak?

2Dogs · Post by **2Dogs** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 12:20 am

Go to "File>Preferences" or hit the "F6" key, and in the "General" tab, you will find it to the right of "Playback method:"

The choices are for "Instant Playback" or "High Quality Playback".

Lots of other settings worth checking out in preferences too - sometimes the VS defaults are odd. I usually uncheck "Enable audio while scrubbing" as that just gets on my nerves.

jcafaro10 · Post by **jcafaro10** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 12:57 am

What does scrubbing mean?

2Dogs · Post by **2Dogs** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 1:21 am

moving the " jog slider" - it's the white downward-facing triangle containing a smaller red triangle - in the preview window in either "project" or "clip" mode, or the similar jog slider in timeline view on the timeline.

Doctor Keo · Post by **Doctor Keo** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 2:43 pm

Hi I'm editing about 1 hour of AVCHD video (My first with X2 Pro!) I hit a problem with scene 58 and beyond breaking up on preview. After reading the above posts I realised that all scenes 58 and above didn't have a proxy file created - I've now selected them and I'm now creating them. What I can't understand is why the first 58 was created but not the others. Have I missed a setting? Thanks for the above info. Doctor Keo

2Dogs · Post by **2Dogs** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 3:23 pm

It's hard to tell what may have caused VS not to generate proxy files for clip 58 and on.

How did you import the clips? Did you highlight all of them and import them into the library or onto the timeline in one go?

Since you don't get any information messages from VS when it's creating proxy files, it may simply be that your pc was still working away to generate them in the background. On my pc, one hours worth of AVCHD clips would result in several hours of proxy file creation!

You don't give any pc information, but next time you import clips, try running Task Manager to monitor cpu usage. If you have a quad core system,I'd be interested to know what kind of cpu utilisation VS gets when creating the proxy files. On my C2D laptop, it seems to be around 50%.

Doctor Keo · Post by **Doctor Keo** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 4:18 pm

Hi- Thanks for your reply. I used the HD Writer (Panasonic) to import the video from the camera SD9 and then used the Load Video button. On the creating Proxy files, once I had noticed the icons missing from the video clips I left the computer the run for a couple of hours while out and found that the program hadn't created any new proxy files. I then had a look at the smart proxy file manager which was empty. To create the proxy files for the remaining 42 minutes of video took just under one hour.

My computer is an AMD 64X2 processor 3800+ with 4 gig Ram running Vista 32 bit and a Nvidia 8500 GT video 1 meg.

Doctor Keo · Post by **Doctor Keo** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 4:58 pm

I seem to be encountering another problem with the proxy file previews any clips longer than about 20 seconds starts to break up (video and sound) and all of the clips have the sound and video out of sync. Thanks Doctor Keo.