Bad picture using Windows Movie Maker

[Guest]

Hi,
I have been trying for months to put my videos made on Sony DV camera
DCR-TRV33E onto my computer. Using the software that came with the camera
(Pixela Imagemixer 1.5) I get a good picture but no sound. I was told to try
Windows Movie Maker. Using this I do get sound, but a very poor picture (very
blurry). I am using a USB cable and I was told to use Firewire, but even the
Movie Maker Sample file comes up blurry on my computer.
Any suggestions???

 

[Graham Hughes]

What are the specs of the pc? How old is the monitor? Do you watch dvd's on
the pc? What are they like in quality? Firewire is definately the way to
capture video, usb just cannot handle the bandwidth required for full frame
avi capture.

 

[Guest]

Thanks for your quick reply! The pc is a Dell Dimension 4600, the monitor is
also Dell, bought last year. DVD quality is good, only time picture quality
is not good is when I use Moviemaker. Don't have firewire installed. Not sure
if it will solve my problem as quality of the MM sample file is poor as well.

 

[Graham Hughes]

Turn off all other apps when using MM. Include internet/firewall/anti-virus
etc. Defrag the hdd before use. Do you have a seperate drive to save video
to?
It could be that the graphics card drivers need updating, directx is now up
to 9.0c, update wmp to version 10 and try installing windows media encoder.
If non of this works, look at the acceleration settings of the graphics
card.
Have a read of www.papajohn.org problem solving accelration and codecs and
also video.

 

[Guest]

I will try to do this. Thanks again for your help!