Conflow

Daniel, Many thanks for your reply it's appreciated ~ that's the type of 'Info' people want to see. That 'Panasonic' is a very good Projector. And in their Class Panasonic is best and why wouldn't they be with Leica-Len's and Matsushita know a thing or two about advanced Opto-Electronics Systems ~ they are a world leader. Best regards, Brian.

Hi All, For some months past there have been various threads on the Forum concerning Projectors and the problems associated with them. This Post is not a 're-hash' of those threads nor is it intended to become a discussion piece about 'old wounds'. For those of you in the process of selecting or planning to purchase a New Projector ~ particularily those who want to use the PTE-PZR Effects, ~ this Post may be of some benefit to you. 1) Below you will find an Attachment titled:- Projector-1. This is a simple 'Block-Diagram' of the workings of a tyical Projector. It shows how the Image-System works. Explaination Notes on the system are under the Drawing. In every Projector there is a working part called the 'Frame-Buffer' and this is responsible for the Image-Construction you see on the Projector Screen. There are many types of 'pseudo' Frame-Buffers giving different qualities of Image-Reproduction. The best type is the 'Chip-Memory Frame-Buffer' and that should be specified at time of Purchase. 2) Also below you will find an Attachment titled:- Projector-2 This is the latest issue of 'Projector Reviews'.Com listing all New Projectors and a review of each. It also features 'Technical-articles' and may I draw you attention to an article,titled:- Frame-Interpolation with reference to my point (1) above. But be careful with this as many Manufacturers are trying to invent alternatives to the expensive 'Multi-Frame buffer System. Link to Projector-Reviews:- http://www.projectorreviews.com/ I hope this Post may be of help when selecting and purchasing your new projector. Brian.Conflow.

Ivor, You have my absolute sympathy in your efforts in trying to crack this problem. I should know what its like after 30 years of work in 'kicking' obstinate Computers into life. Amongst other things that's what we do at Conflow Services for a living. May I make a suggestion and ask you to try something:- Uninstall Virgin PC-Guard with its own 'Uninstaller' then go to Add/Remove Programs and see if remnants of it are still there ? Also as a way of help, you really need to Download/Install a Program called "Revo-Uninstaller' its suitabe for XP and Vista and many Forum Members use it to remove really 'stubborn' Applications and rogue Files. It also has a 'Hunter-Mode' where you can target an individual File for removal. This is a very powerful Program and its absolutely stable and has many common Windows options and its way better by far than Windows Add/Remove utility. (Ken Cox put me on to it years ago). It also has a fantastic Help & Support Forum (one of the best)...Your Firewall might block it, but just give your Permisssion and all should be O.K as it downloads from a Secure-Server. When you open it, it just Scans your System and does nothing until you make a job selection. But before that select the little 'Blue-Book' in the Toolbar, this brings you directly to a very expansive Help-Tutorial as how best to use the Program. LINK:- http://www.snapfiles.com/reviews/revo-unin...ninstaller.html At this stage you have nothing to loose ~ indeed you can re-install Virgin PC-Guard if you wish ~ but Revo-Uninstall will help. Best of luck, Brian.Conflow.

Colin and Ronnie, Colin, My errrooor,Ooops (damn these Specs) at least we have drawn Ronnies' attention to that problem. Ronnie, Thats an excellent idea, so much has been Posted about that problem I'm surprised nobody has thought about making a simple 'Tutorial' about it before now. Very good idea indeed. Best to all, Brian.

Tony, Just a 'quik' reply. The 3:2 Aspect-ratio is the American NTSC TV-Standard whereas the European Pal TV-Standard is 4:3 ratio - as are 4:3 PC Monitors. Hope that helps a bit... Brian.Conlow.

Colin and Amysangle, Colin, I think it slipped your memory in reply to 'Amysangle'. Very few PC's will 'automatically' open/run a CD-Disc when inserted into the PCs' Disc-Drive, particularily if the CD-Disc does not contain the 'Autorun-File' together with the PTE.Exe 'Show-File'.....So effectively one would think the CD-Disc to be empty as it won't run. It happens when you decide to play your Show on a Friends PC whether it's an old Win'98, Win2000, and older XP's. I fall into that trap all the time. !! Amysangle, you don't need a copy of the PTE.Program on any Host-PC for the Slideshow to operate on that PC. Brian.Conflow.

Peter, Once again you are absolutely on target, a lot of 'Research' has gone into your deduction. The 'Macro-Photographs' in our #4Post are of our own making and from our own research and they clearly show the structure of a JPeg scanned to a PC-Monitor with the embedded Data-streams. When a large Image is viewed on a small LCD Monitor (15/17") the system uses a method of 'best-averaging' to squeeze it into the small space. However when you try to expand a small Image to a large Screen the reverse is true... in fact its much worse. Because there is not enough data in the Image the 'best-averaging' system fill's in the voids with 'gradient Colours' deduced from those visible on that particular Line-Scan. This ends up as a 'clunky' Colour mass falling down towards 256 Colours if the Image is over-expanded and this shows as very heavy pixellisation. So we should select larger Images ~ but there is a limit to this also. Its imposed by the limits of a 32.Bit PC System and its available RAM and its processing speed Please don't take me to task on this,but in general viz:- * A good Single-Processor PC can comfortably manage Images of 1200x900 pix. * Duo-Core Processors with 1.Gb.Ram are comfortable with 2400x1800 pix. * Quad-Core (64.bit) with lots of Ram are just ticking over at 4800x3600 pix. But now things are becomming ridiculous unless you are in the 'Poster Advertising Business' or attempting to use Video-Projectors. But thats off topic because this thread was started by Robert(Lumenlux) on the subject of comparitive Picture quality ~V~ Image size. Brian.Conflow.

Ivor, O.K now we are getting some straight 'uncomplicated' answers and in reply as follows:- 1) Turning off a 'Firewall' (you have 2) ~ This does not mean they are 'stone-dead' they may still be running in the background and to check that---Open the 'Task-Manager'---'Process Tab'.. Look under the CPU Tab---check for Firewall activity. 2) Anti-Virus has the same behaviour. Turning them off does not mean they are 'inactive'. Usually they still run in the background and you need to check that also ?. 3) When you turn-off these Programs all you are doing is 'Unloading that Service' you are not killing it's background process. 4) You can not 'Unload' the Vista Firewall - it is still protecting the System.Kernel and Registry which it is designed to do. All you have done is drop its protection of the Comms-Ports. 5) I will say it for the 3 time...You can not have 2 Firewalls running simultaneously on a PC. Comment: I don't know who you are talking to,or what you are reading about Vista-Security but if you contact any Vista-Manufacturer they will verify that the BIG problem with Vista is its OTT-Security and excessive DRM-Security quite the opposite from what you have picked up. I "Attach" 2 Articles from Microsoft about your Security Programs. If you want the full facts simply open the 'Microsoft Knowledge Base' and type in a problem. (Examples shown below). (Look for the issue about Vista-Firewall rejecting Traffic from other Windows PC's) Vista has its problems and who better to ask but Microsoft who made it... Brian.Conflow.

Lumenlux. Robert, In theory you would be correct when you talk about 'nil clarity-degradation' (viz-a-viz) 1600x1200 versus 1024x768. There should be no-degradation when using modern LCD and Plasma Screens within size limits.....that's in theory! Problem being that we all use JPegs and these are Compressed-Images where each Image is made of a vast lattice comprising thousands of small XbyX.Bit Squares which are bordered with a 'Boundary' pulse. Because the Compressed 'Data-Structure' is set for all time with the 'Save-As' command there is only so much you can blow-up any Image before it starts to pixellate and becomes visible as an artifact. The bigger the origional Image the less the effect ~ but that beggers the problem of trying to fit a large Image into a reasonable sized Monitor Screen. Unfortunately we have reached the limits of JPeg-Technology (as we know it) and most Photo-Research Institutes have been in the process of developing 'Motion & Vectored Graphic Imagery' for the past few years. The 'big-problem' is how do we make a 'bridge' between JPeg-Technology and Vectored-Graphics....that's the hard one. It has to be 'cracked' otherwise the Photo-Industry would loose Billions of Investment-Funds tied up in current JPeg-Technology. Its also very nice to see that Igor and the WnSoft Team are actually working on Vectored-Graphics ~ but it will take time. The "Attachments" below titled:- Card-10, 11, 12, 13 will show what I'm talking about ~ Note Card-13. Hope this gives a little insight into JPegs 'degradation and what's happening with the expanded data bits. Brian.Conflow.

IVOR, There have been +740 Posts concerning your 'Vista-Medion PC' and you are no where near a solution... I need to ask you '2.Question' ~ but before that I want to make a 'Statement' viz:- Statement 'Vista-Home-Premium' (Any version) comes complete with an excellent 'Firewall' built into the Op.System and it also has 'Windows-Defender' built in ~ and 'Internet-Explorer' which is a component of the Op.System. You also have Virgin-PC Guard+Firewall. Question.1 Knowing these facts why the heck have you downloaded another 'Firewall' when you know this is 'Illegal' as you cannot run 2 Firewalls simultaneously on any PC without asking for trouble ?? Question.2 What is your problem and why are you so reticent to download a New Copy of PTE using the Vista-PC to do that job like everyone else does?. It's coming from a 'Secure-server' through your LAN Box on your wall (It has a Wired-Firewall) before it gets anywhere near your PC which has its own Vista-Software Firewall?..... It simply defies reason why you are not doing this?.....It cut's out all your XP-Stages which can create their own problems. It mystifies me ?? Brian.Conflow.

Ivor, Thanks for your reply and in response have to say 4 things:- 1) The PTE Program is running perfectly well on a vast number of Vista-PCs ~ ask any Forum Member. Why can you not get in running on yours ?? ~ you seem to want to ignore that fact. 2) You wrote..."I have had issues with Kapersky, Norton and another Virus checker which slips my mind at this time"... If you have tried these out ~this is your problem ~ they are not 100% Uninstalled. You need to be 100% sure about that. 3) Virgin PC Guard has a system of "Download-Filtering" (I wasn't going to go into this) but had you downloaded XXX and then had decided it wasnt for you, Virgin PC remembers your decision and prevents any further attempt's to do so. Its one of the reasons why Virgin-PC Guard is not rated by the Professional Anti-Virus Reviewers. (It's rubbish) 4) Look, instead of wasting your time pulling your Hair out why not downlaod a PTE-Show from any one of those available here on the Forum, try and run that and lets have the results. If the Show runs on your PC there is nothing wrong with PTE ~ if it fail's to run, its your Computer ot its Set-up. Best regards. Brian.Conflow.

Ivan, I checked into one of our PC-Database's about your Medion-Akoya PC Model:-PCMT7 (exclusive to Aldi) and things don't add up at all ~ also I don't know in which part of the World you are living in. 1) Your PC.MT7 was 1st. released in early 2007 with a single Celeron-Processor with XP-Sp2 Op.System and a miserly 258.Mb of RAM-Memory and little in the way of resident Programs. It also featured Kaspersky or Bullguard Anti-Virus (latter with a Firewall). At that time a New Vista-Home version was due for release ~ Tech details unknown and untracable. 2) It appears you let the Anti-Virus run out (3.Month Trial) and them when offered Virgin-Guard (Free) you downloaded that. Virgin-Guard has a Filtering-Firewall and its not their product' its 'packaged' for Virgin and uses 256.Mb of Memory, its an absolute "Hog" and its unstable. (Don't ignore the Reviews) 3) Removal of these products via the Add/Remove Programs routine will not work as special Uninstallers are needed which must be deployed in Safe-Mode. Nett Consequences of all:- 1) You have 2 Firewalls running simultanously Vista-Firewall and/or either Virgin or Bullguard....Not allowed. 2) You have 2 Anti-Virus running simultanously Win-defender and/or:- Virgin/Bullguard/or Kaspersky...Not Alllowed. 3) Switching-Off these Programs does not stop their Registry activities. My Advice:- If this is indeed a Single-Processor PC I would have it wiped clean and re-install with XP-Sp3 with Avast A/V (Not AVG 8.0). If its a Duo-Processor I would keep Vista-Home and Win-Defender (switchable) and also install Avast A/V or Bit-Defender (without firewall) having first removed those conflicting Programs. Sorry I can't be of any more help to you because this PC is in a right "mess" and serious surgery is needed. It's nothing to do with PTE ~and those 'warning-windows' you are getting should not be there at all~ your Registry is completely confused. I think you know that ? Brian.Conflow.

Ivan, Thanks for the details ~ I will get back to you soon. Your EMail Client (no matter what it is) has settings to allow 'Attachment Downloads' which is switchable and is tied up with your Anti-Virus settings whether in use it or not. This utility must be checked in similar fashion as checking OE. Vista comes with IE-7 ready installed ~ Its part of the Operating.System and cant be removed and Windows-Mail is part of that O.S and is somewhat similar to OE. I shall get back to you soon. Brian.Conflow.

Ivan, You are complicating things when you talk about PC-1 and PC-2 and what you are doing with them - that is not my concern. 1) Please tell me the Maker and Model No: of the PC which gets the 'Blue-Screen' while trying to download PTE Program ?. 2) Can you give me some idea of 'Purchase-Date' when it was bought ? 3) What Anti-Virus are you using on this particular PC ? 4) Are the OE and IE settings on that PC as I had recommended ? Ivan, I am trying to help you to get this PC operating with the PTE Program - everything else is irrelevant - but I must know the current status of this PC and that means I have to check its operational details. The above questions are very important and I must have accurate answers if I am to help you !! Just copy this 'Post' into your reply and make an 'Answer' under each 'Question' above...it's so much faster and more accurate. (Run your Left.Mouse Cursor over the Post to Hi-light it. Now Right.Clk on 'blue-print' and copy it. Open Your-Reply and paste it and Edit) Regards, Brian.Conflow.

Ivan, I am sending you a series of Outlook and IE Explorer Screenshots as attachments below. They are from an XP-Machine but you will find the similar things in your Vista-PC concerning Outlook-Express and Internet-Explorer. Check these and make sure you have the right settings. 1) You are 'Loged-in' as Administrator ~ Who set this up for you ? and do you have FULL Admin permissions ? 2) Unknown to you there is another Admin Account on your PC...its called OEMPC Account (Master-Account) and I wonder should this PC have been supplied by Virgin-Media have they 'fiddled' with this Account in their own interests ? (This actually happens a lot in the States and people like Comcast have been doing this for years). With reference to your Anti-Virus Set-ups:- 3) Virgin PC-Guard. This means you are a Virgin-Media Broadband Customer...Sorry I have bad news on this one !! This is not a 'main-stream' Program and it has very many issues (Google for:- Virgin PC-Guard and see for yourself) 4) Windows-Defender. Comes pre-installed on Vista and the PC.Industry reviews on this are not good ~ just passable. ________________________________________________________________________________ It's my opinion that you have a Settings-problem or alternatively a Program-conflict problem... Firstly, review your settings as shown below ~ let's get those out of the way, then we can look for other issues. Ivan this is really a situation of tracking down this problem and to do that, systematic methodology is needed. Brian.Conflow.

Jerry, Just a quick answer to yours above:- I see where you are coming from ~ In my experience if SWF is played directly with a nFLV Player or a Flash-SWF Player the results can be surprisingly good, but not as good as Flash-Video. You can compare these for yourself. About You-Tube...Its really a (low-level) 'Hybrid' Video-Film System where the reproduction size is approx 400x300 pixels and these Images seem to be 'raserised' into the system. Compared to Flash-Video which is a Vectored-Graphics system which is fully scalable which means you can blow up or down with no loss of quality somewhat like a good PDF Document. Because of the extreme compression-algorithms used in You-Tube its better to restrict your Image-sizes to 800x600.pixs which drastically reduces the compression down to 2:1 and makes the job of you Mpeg Encoders so much easier. This makes for a much better (received) Web Computer-Image which can reasonably be enlarged as the PC makes a much better job of enlargement than You-Tube can. You-Tube is not good with motion-artifacts such as PZR or movements within the Images themselves. Thats a classic mistake made by all aspiring (novice) Film Directors. You-Tube is useless with any 'lighting-artifacts' such as deep contrast (shadows) and suffers terribly from 'Flare-out' with any reasonable Hi-lights. There is a very simple Rule:- Once your production goes outside the Video-Format of 'Hand-Held Video Cameras' you are creating your own problems because HH-Video Cameras do all the preliminary work such as Auto-Contrast, Auto-Lux Level, and Auto-Gamma Correction plus Hi-Light suppression etc,etc,etc (all those things you can't do)......that really explains it all and consider that nearly 90% of all You-Tube presentations come from HH-Video Cameras ~ it's what its designed for !!. Concerning the making of SWF's ~ The 'Link' I sent you in Post #6 above has a plethora of 'SWF-Makers' but at the end of the day you really have to download and try a few of these until you find something which suits your needs. Hope this helps, Brian.Conflow.

Ivor, Being such a young PC it's probably still running on initial 'Factory-Default' settings and consequently Vista Home-Premium is running at 'Max-Security' settings ~ Vista can be such an awkward 'So-and-So' about everything when in this initial state. Quite obviously it see something...'which it considers as a threat'...so you have to teach it some good manners and to try and help you, can you answer the following:- 1) When you Log-On ~ are you Logged in as a 'User'? -or- are you Logged in as the 'Administrator'? 2) When downloading any Programs are you getting any 'Security-Message' in particular are you getting a small 'Yellow-Stripe' message across the top of the Browser-Screen just right under the Toolbar ? 3) As yet, have you 'tuned' the Internet-Security settings in your Browser Page ? particularily the Security and Privacy settings ? 4) What Anti-Virus Software are you using ? Thats enough for now ~ If/when you reply please stick to the questions. No long explainations as these confuse the issue(s). One thing is for sure, the answer to this PTE problem is simple ~ it isn't PTE ~ as its used on many Vista PC's here on the Forum. Regards, Brian.Conflow.

Jerry, I have just looked in on this thread and you wrote:-...."is there a way to save a project as a Flash file (.SWF)?".... Sorry for saying this, but your question above is a contradiction. Flash and SWF are two different File Formats although most PTE users seem to think that they are one and the same thing ~ as do most A/V Enthusiasts. 1) SWF (Shockwave-Flash) is a Movie Format ~ its highly compressed and very 'lossy'. A variation of that is used by You-Tube as a type of Hybrid-Video Format. 2) Flash (FLV) is a Hi-quality Video Format ~ its the true world of Vector-Graphics. Very little loss, used by Commercial Business. Both can be used on the Web and its easy to see the difference. Look at 'Motion-Adverts' for Vehicles and Airlines and things like 360.degree product views ~ its nearly 100% certain ther're using Flash ! Correct me if I'm wrong ~ but you seem to need Hi-Quality on the Web ~ the best is Macromedia-Flash now called Adobe-Flash. It's expensive, Adobe-Suite is approx $2500) - but there are many small Utilities out there (some-free) which will fit your needs. The 'Link' below will give you some ideas:- http://www.snapfiles.com/downloadfind.php?...ind+it&lc=1 The "Trick" is to get your Slideshow into an 'acceptable-format' 1024x768 or 800x600 pixel Images and then get them into a really good Video-Converter (PAL/NTSC Format) and then into a good Video~Flash Converter. There are Programs available which will directly convert AVI's into a (simple) Adobe-Flash Format. You need to experiment to find what suits you best ~ reason being that 'Adobe-Flash Creator' is the top of the heap, its good ! but I reckon something less ambitious would suit your requirements. Hope this is of some help to you ~ remember don't confuse Flash with SWF. Best of luck with the project. Brian.Conflow.

Lumenlux and Steve, No:2 An Apology, I had written..."Active-X and Direct-X are one and the same thing depending on the terminology used in your part of the World"... In essence this anomoly of terminology is true ~ however I have been corrected by a Microsoft collegue that this is incorrect !... The confusion has come about with the fact that version numbers of "DirectX 6,8,9,10" just happen to coincided with the exact versions of "ActiveX 6,8,9,10" over the past few years. No only that but minor upgrades of each have virtually followed the same No: sequence. To put things straight, the Win '98.Se will work correctly with DirectX-6 or 8 and depending on 'driver-updates' will work on DirectX-9. Similarily anything that uses Multi-Media Players such as 'Flash' or 'Macromedia' will require the appropriate ActiveX-Control 6,8,9. ActiveX-Control 10 will not work on Win-'98Se ~ and I am led to believe that DirectX-10 will not work either. My apology, it just goes to show that these things must be put under the 'Microscope' and not taken for granted... Brian.Conflow.

Hi Guys, This is just a thought:- When Burning or Replaying WAV Files ~ by design they require a 2.second 'Lead-In Time' and if stitching these together (track after track) that time delay accumulates. However if you "merge-them" track after track only the 2.sec Lead-Delay is evident. By the way Cedex strips out the 'WAV Lead-Delay'~ Only when you go to Burn the track will you see the Burner Software re-insert the Lead-Delay. Why not try that WAV-Track reconverted to an MP3 and see if your timing- error still exists ??... Just a thought, Brian.Conflow.

Lumenlux and Steve, To avaoid confusion, let me clarify a point:-...I had already mentioned Active/DirectX in my #6 Post above. Active-X and Direct-X are one and the same thing depending on the terminology used in your part of the World. Copied from my #6 Post above:- 2)..."You need to make sure that you have a copy of ActiveX 6, 7,or 8 installed on the '98se thats vital. ActiveX 9+ won't work properly with Win'98se".... Hope this clears up any confusion, Brian.Conflow.

Dave, I am writing these Posts on a Hewlett-Packard Laptop XP-Home ~ not only am I replying to you but others also have similar problems regardless of type of Operating-System. Those user's have to be considered (because they are reading these Posts) and on seeing the number of 'screen-shot' downloads there certainly is a case for making things clearer concerning the 'Clipboard' utility...and as far as I am concerned that's the Topic of this Thread. Irrespective of PC Op-System or Photoshop, that's where the books stops, at the 'Clipboard' utility. Quoted.."the boys done good on the weekend"..lets hope it continues? All the best... Brian.

Dave, We are talking about the 'Clipboard' utility its a core-component of every Windows Operating System and it resides down in C:\WINDOWS\system32. We are running many Pc's here in our Workshops including XP-Home...... But that irrelevant...because 'Clipboard' is intergral in every Win-System, hidden or otherwise. As I have said, many XP's and Vista Systems (all types) have it suppressed.."denied to User"...as Windows uses it. I know its stupidity, but thats the 'Big-Daddy' syndrome of Microsoft. Clipboard is in the Accessories List and of course it can be turned-on for 'User Usage'. If its not there the PC won't work correctly ~ or in your case it may be a 'hidden-file' ~ if so do a Start-->Search for Clipbrd, thats correct Clipbrd and it should find it. (Firstly make sure the Folder-Attributes are 'set'...Show Hidden Files etc:- See below) Brian.Conflow.

DaveG Simple answer to that:- Something else in the background has grabbed your 'Clipboard - unknown to you ? It's why I went to the trouble showing people how to get access to it and why it should be in your Start-Menu. If you dont know whats on the 'Clipboard' (at that point in time) how are you to know what's happening with it particularily if you have used the "Save" command somewhere in the intervening period ? Put it on the 'Start-Menu List' so you can diagnose what's going on... Brian.Conflow. "Attachments" below show why....

Gerald, Thats a very nice Program ~ thank you for sharing it. We also use 'PNG-Images' for editing with 'Type-3' Scalable Fonts. They are so much better for editing than JPegs ~ and as you know there is very little "corrosion" with PNG's compared to JPeg's particularily when they are carrying Scripts. On the matter of Screen-Captures and Photoshop and Clipboards here are a few 'facts' which PC.Owners may not know ! 1) With many XP and Vista Pc's there are some vital Accessories turned-off by 'default' so as to deny 'User-deployment' and can only be accessed by Keyboard-inputs. Unfortunately this 'default gives priority to some Auto-Start Programs (eg:-Photoshop) to the exclusion of other Programs trying to gain access to vital Accessories. (Win Media-Player is another example). 2) PC.Users make mistake's when installing Programs of selecting from the Program "Option/Prefrences" '~ AutoStart' on Bootup or selecting 'Always on Top' ~ the latter gives more problems than anything else ~ if its active, deselect it. 3) To see if your 'Accessories' are configured correctly refer to the 2 "Attachments" below. In particular make sure 'Clipboard' is turned-on and the same applies to 'Paint' and 'Character-Map'. All of these should appear in your Program Start-Lists. See "Attachment 3". Hope this helps, Brian.Conflow.