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I have used both 32x32 and 64x64 successfully. Peter

Guys, I sense it is time for some basic facts about digital sound files... I'd like you to visualize a simple sine wave showing on an oscillascope: comprising just one sweep from the baseline, up to maximum positive amplitude, down through the baseline to minimum negative amplitude and back to the baseline. Also, assume that this wave form lasts for just one second of duration. I have deliberately chosen the oscillascope for this example because it illustrates one very important point that is easily overlooked: sound isn't digital, it's analogue! There is no such thing as digital sound: there is only digitized sound. To store the sound as a file in our computer, it has to go through a process to convert it from an analogue to a digital representation of that analogue sound. This is done by an analogue-to-digital converter (ADC) routine. Using our one second of sine wave as our source, the ADC process cuts this up into slices (think slices of meat at the deli counter). The more slices it cuts, the higher the quality of sound reproduction will be. This is called the Sample Rate. CD quality reproduction is achieved at 44,100 slices per second (44.1KHz). So Gary's pieces at 11.025KHz will not be of the same sound quality as the piece at 44.1KHz. Having sliced the sound file up, the ADC now has to encode each slice. It has a choice of how many bits (binary digits - 0s and 1s) to use to encode each slice. This is called the Sample Format. CD quality sound files are usually encoded at 16-bit. Note that the files on a commercially-produced CD are encoded as WAV files. A WAV file is the sound equivalent of a TIFF image file. Note also that Audacity supports Sample Formats of 16-bit, 24-bit and "32-bit float". Arguably the 24-bit and "32-bit float" options should give even better sound quality. But now we come up against the human factor. The human ear can distinguish sounds in the range 20Hz-20KHz (approximately) provided that there is no impairment to the hearing (e.g. from an excess of loud disco music in your youth or a natural loss of performance with age). The combination of a Sample Rate of 44.1KHz and a Sample Format of 16-bit is more than adequate to capture accurately the range of frequencies that are audible to the human ear. Whatever software you use to do your soundtrack assembly, I encourage you to set the sample rate and sample format to the values I've indicated: 44.1KHZ and 16-bit. So what about the 128kbps vs 192kbps debate? These are "compression" values for MP3 files (for an analogy, think JPEG compression in your image editor). The only time you set this value is as you save the output file. Because MP3 compression is a "lossy" compression just like JPEG compression, there will be some noticeable degradation of the final output compared to the original. regards, Peter

Hi Eric, In Audacity, as part of File...Export processing. After giving the file its desired name and specifying the file type to be MP3 rather than WAV, click on the Options button (bottom of the three) and then use the drop-down selection for the Quality. N.B. These instructions are based on Audacity v1.3.11 beta. Note also that this is where you can set the Bit Rate (Constant - which I use, Variable, etc.). A couple of years ago, I saved the same music clip under each bit rate from 128 through to 320. I could hear a difference up to 192 but could not hear the difference between that and 224. I therefore decided that 192 would be sufficient for my needs. regards, Peter

Gary, You asked about 128kbps. I use 192kbps for all my MP3s. I can hear a difference in quality between 128kbps and 192kbps when played back on a good quality pair of speakers. regards, Peter

Ken, Within the PTE File List you can use Ctrl+Click to assemble a collection of images to drag and drop into the Slide List; and also Shift+Click to select a contiguous range of images. Were you aware of these capabilities? They are not a solution or workaround but may go some way to mitigating your problem. regards, Peter

I do not see what Cor sees. I'm using Firefox 8.0 on a Windows 7 64-bit Home Premium SP1 PC. Peter

Lin, Why not put the PTE Rectangle and PTE Text both as children of a PTE Frame and place that frame in the PTE Mask Container? The size of the rectangle could then be adjusted independently of the size of the text. The Mask Container would still control both. Peter

Dave, Actually, bosque4_002 is 342x256. It seems as though Photoscape realised it couldn't divide 1024 exactly by 3 and so cut the two outer images at 341 and the middle one at 342 on each row. Peter

Hi LRRH, Bosque4_001 and bosque4_002 are still the original sized versions. You have not replaced these with 1200x900 versions. Peter

Little Red Riding Hood, Your problem is caused because all the nine images are slightly different sizes. To achieve perfect alignment it is essential that all the images are EXACTLY the same size. As DaveGee said, you must begin with an image that is EXACTLY divisible by 3 on both axes. A size of 1024 x 768 is not exactly divisible by 3 on its long axis. Having said that, it is possible that you might be able to work around the problem by turning off "Edge anti-aliasing" for each of the nine segments in the O&A Properties tab. regards, Peter

Laszlo, If you use Audacity to prepare your soundtrack mixes, do a File...Save Project As. It creates a xxx.aup file and a folder xxx_data. The xxx.aup file is a bit like the PTE xxx.pte file. It contains the basic instructions. The xxx_data folder contains all your sound file data, held in its most detailed form. To do more work on the soundtrack, simply double-click the aup file to launch it into Audacity. You are working at high quality all the time. The "lower quality" kicks in only when you do the final File...Export... and select MP3 and its associated options. You can open the aup project file as many times as you need, do a File...Save... at the end of each edit session, and you are not degrading the sound quality each time. regards, Peter

What is the status of View...Advanced Options... Show real slides in Slide List? If not ticked, try ticking it. Peter

Peter, The only problem with the voice-over is the mix level. You need to lower the volume of the music more, so that your voice stands out above it. If you mixed the soundtrack in an external sound editor such as Audacity, I recommend setting about 18-20dB of difference between the level of the voice and the level of the music. In the passage near the beginning where you were talking about the flowers slowly opening, you had a mix of all yellow "daffodil" types and yellow and white "narcissus" types. I think, for a competition entry, this would be better done with all the same type. If a judge can see a way in which the sequence could have been improved, technically or artistically, it will not get top marks. regards, Peter

Brian (Conflow), I have moved your tip about MS-Esentials into the topic for that software (see here under Off-topic forum) regards, Peter

Anthony, If you do, ensure that you have downloaded the correct version of MSE for your operating system (32-bit or 64-bit) before you remove AVG. Make sure you close down all Internet access while you effect the changeover - to minimise the possibility of a rogue getting in while you have no defences. I downloaded and ran the AVG Uninstaller provided by the AVG website, rather than do a Windows uninstall. I put both the AVG uninstaller and the MSE installer on the Windows desktop rather than in any folder. The AVG uninstall seemed to pause at one point and I wondered whether it had hung; but I remained patient and it ran through to conclusion in about 5 minutes elapsed. It wanted a re-boot to tidy up the last loose ends. This re-boot required me to OK the resumption of the AVG uninstaller - so don't walk away when the re-boot happens! I then took all the MSE Install default options during its install. It automatically "phoned home" to download the latest versions of everything it needed and then I let it scan the C: drive (c96K items in just under 10 minutes). All totally painless - and no infections found in the system files. I intend to run a custom scan on my two "backup" drives this evening after adding todays's backups to them. At the weekend I'll do the same to the weekly backup drive after adding this week's increments. At that point I'll have the best reassurance I'm going to have that the disks are all free of infection (I'm not expecting any surprises but you never know). regards, Peter

One final post from me. I've jumped ship, bitten the bullet, taken the plunge, etc., uninstalled AVG and installed MSE. It took just under 15 minutes from start to finish. I shall watch this topic with detached interest from here on. regards, Peter

Brian, My experience is that Windows (Vista and 7) will not allow me to save a file if its name contains any of the "Invalid and/or Reserved Characters". So this seems to me to be a "red herring". regards, Peter

Mick, I don't recall seeing anything other than PTE created exe files being reported here on the forum. This point hadn't passed my notice. It is, therefore, somewhat inevitable that part of me wonders whether it might be evidence of something sinister towards PTE: some kind of attempt at commercial sabotage, perhaps?; not necessarily by AVG themselves but possibly using them as an unwitting agent. regards, Peter

Gary, In that case I don't understand why you cannot simply right-click...Dropbox...Copy public link. That's all that I do. Sorry I cannot help further on this. Peter

Gary, You didn't answer one of the questions, I repeat: Did you put the file in the Public folder in your Dropbox? regards, Peter

Gary, No, I usually do what you do. Did you put the file in the Dropbox Public folder? Is the file icon showing a little green tick? regards, Peter

Gary, Uploading to Dropbox is not "instantaneous". The Dropbox icon changes to something that looks like a circular arrow on it to denote that uploading is happening, and then to an icon with a green tick to confirm that the upload has completed. regards, Peter

I have published a fresh version of the Iona.exe using PTE v7.03. The file was then scanned with AVG - no threat detected. I have now emptied the virus vault. From here on, if AVG detects another false positive in any of my sequences, I shall do as I have just done: re-publish using latest PTE, re-scan that file with latest AVG, empty the virus vault. I do not, at this point, intend to ditch AVG. I will, instead, "go with the flow", as it were. I don't have a large collection of files created with lots of old versions of PTE (nothing older than v4.43). I don't download many sequences posted by others - and always wait until someone else has done so. In that way, I try to limit my chances of getting an infection if ever a real one did tag itself onto a PTE sequence. A high level of false positives is bad news for the company behind AVG - their reputation is at risk. A high level of false positives is bad news for Wnsoft - the reputation of PTE is being compromised. Any level of false positives is bad news for those who use PTE as part of their professional business. In my opinion, this subject has taken over from registration key problems as the major cause for concern for the PTE user base. I have e-mailed Igor about this issue, recommending that he needs to take further action, working in conjunction with the anti-virus companies, to eliminate this false positive problem once and for all. regards, Peter

Some time ago during the life of this topic, AVG 2012 Free "found" a Trojan in my sequence, Iona.exe, and sent the file to the Virus Vault. A subsequent update to AVG then passed that file as clean and removed it from the vault and restored it to its original folder - with its file name having "_AVG_RESTORED" appended to it. I re-created the file Iona.exe using the same version of PTE that I had used originally. I then scanned this file with the then current level of AVG. It was passed as clean. Yesterday AVG once again "found" a Trojan in my sequence, Iona.exe, and sent it to the Virus Vault. It did not find a Trojan in the version it had previously passed as clean and restored from the vault. As far as I can tell the two files were identical - created using the exact same version of PTE (v6.0). Now, according to AVG, one has a virus and the other doesn't. Work that one out! I don't think the AVG coding team know what they're doing. regards, Peter

Gary, Do you have any of the "high order" parts of the path? For example do you have a folder called Worlds on your C: drive? Does that have a folder called PTE? etc. If not, when was the last time you did a full anti-virus scan and a full anti-malware scan? regards, Peter