Audio timing off on 1st run

[Guest]

This has happen several times over the last couple years. I insert an mp3
onto a slide and have words appear in varying - predetermined times based on
the tempo of the mp3.

During previews before actually giving the presentation, there are no timing
issues. Sometime the word sequence is off by 1/2 to 1 second. This is very
noticeable. I found that when I ready for my presentation to the audience, I
start the ppt without anyone seeing until a ways through the mp3. Then I
stop it and start it over for showing and the timing is back on track.

I find myself saying "I've got to warm it up first" in a joking way.

Has this happened to others?

When I run the ppt, I close down everything on the laptop including all the
unnecessary systray items. This is after a cold boot. I want all the
resources available for the presentation. This does not appear to be the
issue thou.

Today's presentation failed even after my "warm up". This was embarrassing.
HELP. I have two more presentations next week.

 

[Austin Myers]

Charlie,

Simply said, exact timing and PPT should never be used in the same sentence.
It DOES help to run through the presentation once as this pre-builds a cache
for the next time its ran. (Assuming you don't close PPT.) But exact
timing? Just not going to happen.

Austin Myers
MS PowerPoint MVP Team

Provider of PFCPro, PFCMedia and PFCExpress
www.playsforcertain.com

 

[Guest]

Thanks Austin... Well then, lesson learned and I'll say I've been fortunate.
I have create many complicated ppts under this same design. My current one
is 9mins. 18secs long. This time I created an 7min movie file from movie
maker. What launches the movie is an mp3 intro with words, as I stated, as
the last sequence. I tried a couple programs to capture the ppt slides as
jpegs and add them to movie maker but found it jerky and out of focus. Hence
I insert a movie file after the slides.

Without knowing what you said, my mistake this time was I "warmed up" the
ppt but closed down the program and restarted it. This caused the timing
issue.

Thanks again.

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

By the way, Charlie, your "warm it up first" theory actually makes perfect sense.
PPT has to prepare bitmaps of the slides it's going to display on screen prior to
displaying them. Once it does this, it caches them in case you go back to the
slide or run the presentation again.

By warming up the engine, you're forcing it to pre-cache slides, which puts it in
roughly the state it would have been in when you recorded the slide changes.

That makes it more likely to sych up the same way.

By shutting it down and restarting, you effectively chilled the engine down again.