Issues with rendering and timeline playback.

[myromance123]

Hi there,
I am currently using VideoStudio X6 Ultimate (although the application seems to say Pro). Hopefully I have posted this in the correct part of the forum.

I am running into some seriously debilitating issues with Corel VideoStudio X6. First off, I have just spent the past 12 hours rendering a 27 minute video. This is insane! There's something really off (unless this is the norm with VS x6?)

Settings:
Under performance I have everything ticked. Except Enable Hardware Encoder Acceleration (it's greyed out!). I have made sure to install an older Nvidia driver ( 320.18), tried W8's driver (320.56), and the latest Beta right now which is 326.80. I have installed CUDA 5.5, didn't work. Installed CUDA 5.0 (current) still greyed out. Will try version 4 now.

Smart Proxy is enabled (my videos are all 1080p), yet VideoStudio is unable to make a single proxy of any video even if I right click and choose Create Smart Proxy File. The folder is empty. Nothing ever appears in the Queue. I have tried restarting, moving the video sources, still nothing.

I have a screenshot of one of the video sources as an attachment. The videos originated from my screen recording in Ubuntu 13.04. They were originally .MKV files, but VideoStudio X6 is unable to handle MKV.

I am trying to render this project out as a MPEG-4 file, at 1920x1080 using H.264-MAIN. I had unticked Perform non-square pixel rendering, but that was a wrong move to make. However, even with it ticked, my second current render right now is taking just as long.

My target is to make a video for youtube, previously I used Kdenlive. However, I wished to add the cool effects that VideoStudio X6 boasted. It seems to be unable to handle an overdose of it's own effects...
I have added a screenshot, so you can see what I am working with. Maybe even spot where my beginner mistakes are.



In summary, my problems are:
1. EXTREMELY long rendering time (in contrast, a 20 minute video in Kdenlive only takes 1 hour to render H264 at 1920x1080).
2. Unable to make CUDA work with VS X6. Tried many driver versions. GTX680 is a CUDA card.
3. Timeline playback is really a NIGHTMARE. Constant hanging trying to move through it. Unable to get even a single video source through the Smart Proxy process.

I have only been using X6 for the past 5 days, yet I am slowly regretting this purchase. If anyone could kindly help me, at the very least reduce the timeline playback issues, I would be grateful. I feel like I'm going a little crazy right now.

My system specs:
OS- Windows 8 Professional 64Bit
CPU - AMD Phenom II 965 3.4GHz
GPU - Asus Nvidia GTX 680 2GB
RAM - 8GB DDR3 1333Mhz
Sound - Asus Xonar 7.1

If I have left anything out, please let me know. P.S: I also tried rendering to a separate harddrive to see if that would improve render times. Still the same long render experience.

source.png (7.85 KiB) Viewed 21277 times

[skier-hughes]

How did you make the file you have in the timeline?
Did you take your mkv and convert using kdenlive?

[myromance123]

I converted it to .AVI using Any Video Converter Ultimate, with Frame Size of 1920x1080 and video codec set to x264.
Would it be better to convert to a certain filetype? What is the most preferable type for VS X6?

I have managed to get the Hardware Encoder Acceleration tickable now, by installing Nvidia's 314.22 driver ( clean install, removed all older drivers and CUDA drivers ).
However, it seems like X6 isn't actually passing ANY of the load onto my GPU?



As can be seen in the image above, GPU-Z reports that the GPU load is just barely 2%? I am running the render now, and with the Hardware Encoder I am waiting to see if it will take 12 hours again. I really hope not...
Does anyone else experience a boost using CUDA or OpenCL? Or is it really just a fad at the moment? I am asking, so that I know whether to waste my time getting it to work or to not bother with it.

Is Corel VideoStudio X6 Ultimate meant to be used with Intel instead? I am looking into getting an Intel i7-4770 but that will be another month or so before I can afford the motherboard to go with it.
I am also unsure if it will even provide a worthy performance yield over my current experience.

[skier-hughes]

AVI is just a container and can hold well over 800 file types. Can you convert it to the same mp4 that you want to output first?
According to your screen grab, the file is a Microsoft dtv file.

[myromance123]

I will try converting them tomorrow, since I've already been rendering for the past 6 hours (just reached 50% and it's 1:30 AM here). It is looking like another total 12 hours of rendering again, despite enabling Hardware Encoder Acceleration.

By converting the source videos to what the intended output video format should be, will this guarantee a faster rendering experience and smoother timeline playback? Or is the timeline playback issue something else entirely?

GPU load is currently at 0%, so I can safely assume nothing is being passed to the GPU at this point. Very disappointed.

EDIT: So, after 13 hours of rendering with the .AVI files, I decided to try converting the source videos like you suggested. I converted all of them to MPEG-4 with H264 codec.


As soon as I started using these new .MP4 files in VideoStudio X6, I was able to perform the Smart Proxy process. This alleviated my timeline playback issue greatly! From now on I will only use this format with VS if I can help it.

The rendering process also reduced in time greatly, still not as fast as Kdenlive but it's much better than waiting 12-13 hours. Ran it today, and the 27 minute video rendered in 2 hours. Thank you for helping me get around this skier-hughes

My last issue, getting VideoStudio X6 to pass some of the workload onto my GTX 680 still remains unsolved though. Are only the older Nvidia GPUs supported in VideoStudio X6's Hardware Encoder Acceleration?

[myromance123]

Did another smaller project, 5 minute 50 second video, with multiple overlay videos + cropping + scaling and static images.



Rendering to H264-MAIN at 1920x1080 MP4 took a total of 30 minutes. This time I made sure that the source videos were as close as possible to the intended output. E.g of one of the source videos:



Since the Nvidia 314.22 drivers didn't seem to be making the CUDA work with Corel VideoStudio X6 Ultimate, I decided to try a newer driver. The recently released Nvidia 327.23

After doing the Clean install and restarting Windows 8, I started up VideoStudio X6 again.



It's greyed out again. During the rendering of the 5 minute project, the GPU load in GPU-Z showed 0% still. Yet when converting videos to H264 using Any Video Converter and enabling CUDA, this driver does offload the work on to the GPU (it makes use of about 20% of my GPU) and makes converting really fast. I just wish the Encoder in VideoStudio X6 would actually pass the workload to the GPU.

I tried checking the Windows 8 display settings but there's no Hardware Acceleration Slider available.



While I am very impressed with the effects and video manipulations that I can do with VideoStudio X6 Ultimate, I have to say it doesn't feel fully functional. I tried the Screen Capture and it's unable to record System Audio from my Asus Xonar DX 7.1 and will return the ever prominent "Prepare Record Failed!!!" error. Turning off recording of mic and system audio fixes that, but attempting to record any game causes the Screen Capture to crash.

Are there any other tips or tricks I can attempt to decrease the rendering times? Or get even a bit of the load onto the GPU?

[Cypherdude]

Hi there,
I am currently using VideoStudio X6 Ultimate (although the application seems to say Pro). Hopefully I have posted this in the correct part of the forum.

I am running into some seriously debilitating issues with Corel VideoStudio X6. First off, I have just spent the past 12 hours rendering a 27 minute video. This is insane! There's something really off (unless this is the norm with VS x6?)

Settings:
Under performance I have everything ticked. Except Enable Hardware Encoder Acceleration (it's greyed out!). I have made sure to install an older Nvidia driver ( 320.18), tried W8's driver (320.56), and the latest Beta right now which is 326.80. I have installed CUDA 5.5, didn't work. Installed CUDA 5.0 (current) still greyed out. Will try version 4 now.

Smart Proxy is enabled (my videos are all 1080p), yet VideoStudio is unable to make a single proxy of any video even if I right click and choose Create Smart Proxy File. The folder is empty. Nothing ever appears in the Queue. I have tried restarting, moving the video sources, still nothing.
...

In summary, my problems are:
1. EXTREMELY long rendering time (in contrast, a 20 minute video in Kdenlive only takes 1 hour to render H264 at 1920x1080).
2. Unable to make CUDA work with VS X6. Tried many driver versions. GTX680 is a CUDA card.
3. Timeline playback is really a NIGHTMARE. Constant hanging trying to move through it. Unable to get even a single video source through the Smart Proxy process.

I have only been using X6 for the past 5 days, yet I am slowly regretting this purchase. If anyone could kindly help me, at the very least reduce the timeline playback issues, I would be grateful. I feel like I'm going a little crazy right now.

My system specs:
OS- Windows 8 Professional 64Bit
CPU - AMD Phenom II 965 3.4GHz
GPU - Asus Nvidia GTX 680 2GB
RAM - 8GB DDR3 1333Mhz
Sound - Asus Xonar 7.1

If I have left anything out, please let me know. P.S: I also tried rendering to a separate harddrive to see if that would improve render times. Still the same long render experience.

I also have an nVidia CUDA-capable GPU. While it is an older GeForce GTX 460SE, it can still run CUDA and is rated 2.1 out of a maximum of 3.5. Using VSX6 SP1 Ultimate, I am currently converting a 1280x720 MOV file to WMV. I checked with Sysinternals Process Explorer and I also am not using CUDA at all. For VSX6 SP1 Ultimate, GPU usage was never above 0%. In fact, FireFox 24 uses more at 7%:


All hardware acceleration options are ticked:


I believe VSX6's "hardware acceleration" options relate to the CPU, not the GPU, but I am not 100% sure. In order to enable CUDA for VSX6 SP1, am I supposed to install the CUDA 5.5 PRODUCTION RELEASE? I always thought the CUDA Toolkit was meant only for programmers who want to program in CUDA, not for programs to use CUDA. I thought CUDA was already enabled in the nVidia video drivers and programs could tap into the GPU anytime they wanted to. I looked at Corel's VSPX6_Matrix_EN.pdf file and it says "NVIDIA® CUDA™ optimization" going back all the way to Corel VS X4. So why doesn't it work for X6?

With the above options, here are the final conversion stats: To convert a 19min:52sec 1280x720 MOV 3.585 GB to a same spec 1.238 GB WMV, 86 VBR, high quality, took 42 minutes. The GPU was never used. CPU usage was ≈80%. All 4 hardware and all 4 hyper-threading CPU cores were used. I believe the reason why you were unable to tick all your "hardware acceleration" options was because you are using an AMD CPU which might not be 100% implemented with VSX6. However, if other AMD users are able to use all these options, it is specific to your system or AMD CPU model.

Can someone tell me what I need to install for VSX6 SP1 Ultimate to use my CUDA-capable GeForce GTX 460SE? I have 2 different video cards. The main card is my GeForce GTX 460SE. The secondary card is an nVidia Quadro NVS 450. I am using 1 set of drivers and nothing more, nVidia v296.10. All video, YouTube, QuickTime player, Windows Media Player, PowerDVD 9, all work correctly with no problems. I do not play games on my system.

Thanks in Advance.

[myromance123]

am I supposed to install the CUDA 5.5 PRODUCTION RELEASE?

To save you time, I have already tried the CUDA 4, 5 and 5.5 and VideoStudio X6 does not pick it up. The normal driver installers already come with a CUDA driver, so it's unecessary for us to install the toolkits, but I tried it anyway to see if it would solve the issue.

I believe the reason why you were unable to tick all your "hardware acceleration" options was because you are using an AMD CPU which might not be 100% implemented with VS6.

This could be true. However, it doesn't explain why I am able to tick it when I use the older Nvidia 314.22 drivers.
I am fearful of VideoStudio's ability to support newer hardware from Intel though. If I do go with the i7-4770, will VideoStudio recognize it and allow me to tick the Hardware Encoder Acceleration? They don't list the specific hardware ranges this hardware acceleration software is meant to support, so it's a hit or miss situation.

Can someone tell me what I need to install for VS6 SP1 Ultimate to use my CUDA-capable GeForce GTX 460SE?

I'd like to know this too. I actually think there might not be anyone with VideoStudio who is capable of offloading the work onto their CUDA cards. No one else is posting here saying they can get it working, and I haven't found any past posts of people offloading the work. This makes me think that VideoStudio is actually completely unable to use graphics cards at all.

[BobbyC101st]

I realise this thread is about the VideoStudio X6 but my X5 solution may help.

My problem also was Greyed out box on hardware acceleration on videostudio pro X5 where it used to be ticked in the past.

My solution....install old Nvidia drivers which were used at the time when the tick was in the box...in my case...Geforce 314.22 driver.

Later drivers than this don't seem to work.

Looks like updating drivers is not always the right thing to do?

I would have thought though that Corel developers would have designed X6 around current Nvidia drivers.

My system....CPU Intel 980 ...GPU 680 GTX

I hope this solution helps others.

[BobbyC101st]

Update to my last post here...NVidia driver 320.18 is the most recent to allow the CUDA to be used in VideoStudio Pro X5.

Later drivers since then do not allow the box to be checked.

Driver 320.18 also allows faster processing times (as expected)

[myromance123]

Looks like updating drivers is not always the right thing to do?

That's just it though. I actually went and tried older drivers. While the 314.22 drivers did allow the box to be ticked, X6 wasn't actually offloading work onto the GPU. You can see it in the above GPU-Z images I posted. Thank you for trying to help though.

Driver 320.18 also allows faster processing times (as expected)

Be very careful with that driver! I used the 320.18 for one week, and it messed up my BIOS, gave me screen artifacts in BF3, ran my GPU at 100% all the time and made my system unbootable after that 1 week. I am not alone in experiencing this, check here:
http://modcrash.com/nvidia-display-driv ... ging-gpus/

It has actually broken other people's Nvidia cards. Don't risk it! Change to either the latest WHQL or stay with the 314.22 driver. I repeat, 320.18 is a dangerous risk! This is from my own first hand experience, on top of what others have showcased.

[BobbyC101st]

Many thanks for the advice of removing the 320.18 driver and installing the 314.22 again.

I read the article on the damage it can cause to GPU's and I think I am ok as I have not done any gaming since changing to 320.18.

I am at risk though with my 680GTX card.

At the time 320.18 came out I was using a 480 GTX card and had no problems until 320.18 was replaced but I gather that 500 and 600 series cards were failing.

Many thanks for your advice.

When a new driver comes out I will try it to see if it is successful with both gaming and videostudio pro x5.

I am not upgrading to videostudio pro x6 until I see this resolved in this forum.

[BobbyC101st]

Another little trick I found when your operating system is Windows 7 64 bit.

Copy the cuDAC32.dll located on my PC in the "C:\Program Files (x86)\Corel\Corel VideoStudio Pro X5" folder into the "C:\Windows\SysWOW64" folder

I have a Nvidia Geforce GTX 680 and it now processes the videos at 26% load instead of 1% load prior to moving the cuDAC32.dll

A significant reduction in processing time was achieved.

Hope it works for you too.

[Cypherdude]

Another little trick I found when your operating system is Windows 7 64 bit.

Copy the cuDAC32.dll located on my PC in the "C:\Program Files (x86)\Corel\Corel VideoStudio Pro X5" folder into the "C:\Windows\SysWOW64" folder

I have a Nvidia Geforce GTX 680 and it now processes the videos at 26% load instead of 1% load prior to moving the cuDAC32.dll

A significant reduction in processing time was achieved.

Hope it works for you too.

I have been converting MOV files into VBR WMV files. I don't know if VSX6 uses CUDA when it does this. It would be nice if it did. So far I have not been able to use my older GeForce GTX 460SE for this. It can still run CUDA and is rated 2.1 out of a maximum of 3.5. These are the 2 things I have tried:

• Copied the cuDAC32.dll file into the "C:\Windows\SysWOW64" folder
  In the v296.10 nVidia Control Panel, Manage 3D Settings, I added vstudio.exe, then changed "CUDA - GPU's" to only "GeForce GTX 460 SE".

None of the 2 above changed anything. Sysinternals Process Explorer still shows 0.00% GPU usage for vstudio.exe. I made the change for vstudio.exe in the nVidia Control Panel because I have 2 different video cards. The other card is a slower nVidia Quadro NVS 450 multi-display business graphics card. I haven't really done anything with VSX6 SP1 except do a little video cutting and then convert to a different video format, WMV.

Perhaps VSX6 does not use CUDA for the older nVidia GPU's. My EVGA GeForce GTX 460 SE 1 GB GDDR5 01G-P3-1366-TR arrived on the market on November 15, 2010. My GeForce GTX 460 SE is rated at 748.8 GFLOPS and I'm not using a single GFLOP, not even ONE. That's very... sloppy.

I am going to look into installing the CUDA 5.5 PRODUCTION RELEASE. Perhaps this is what I need to enable true CUDA encoding on VSX6. If there's anything else I can do to fully use my older GeForce GTX 460SE please LMK.

Thanks in Advance.

[myromance123]

Copy the cuDAC32.dll located on my PC in the "C:\Program Files (x86)\Corel\Corel VideoStudio Pro X5" folder into the "C:\Windows\SysWOW64" folder

Dude, how did you figure that out? I tried it in Windows 8 64Bit with Corel VideoStudio X6 Ultimate and my goodness, it actually does something!

Not a lot, but my GPU load jumps to 15% and 10% now when I'm rendering. While certainly miniscule, and I'd definitely prefer it to use 50% or more, it's totally better than nothing!

Thanks for sharing man
If you have any other tips to help offload even more work onto the card, that would be awesome.