Is Windows Movie Maker just useless or is it just my system?

Hi all,

I could really do with some help here. This program (Windows Movie Maker) is driving me crazy. It's soooo sensitive with everything. As usual with anything by Microsoft, I got the idea of how to do things within seconds (for which there is absolutely tons of support) but why it keeps hanging and then not responding or mysteriously refusing to play the audio inside the timeline when everything is neatly lined up and has even played perfectly okay before, is completely beyond me.

I'm using only .avi video files and .mp3 audio files. It can handle that, right? Although why it's not easy to simply click and drag pieces of media without cutting them up or down remains a mystery that only Bill Gates, with his vast capital and intelligence, must be able to solve. Intuitive, my ****!

Any ideas? I have a pretty naff soundcard (ACRealTek97) so I thought this would be the problem but why does it play it one minute and then not the next? I can't get so much as a decent three-minute session of editing in before it screws up again.

I would really appreciate an alternative piece of software because my first impressions are that it is so unstable it's not worth bothering with. Please help!

 

I've used WMM across multiple machines and in both XP and VIsta without these issues. I've heard it called basic, yes, but unstable? This is the first time. As with any software save often is a good practice, but without knowing more information, I'd be suspect of your system or files.

Are they large files? What are your specs? What are you specifically trying?

I know its a common practice to bash Microsoft when things don't go the way you want, but as you can see, its left you no closer to an answer, and you aren't even sure if its the app that's the problem here.


At any rate, we need more information to continue.

 

I too have often used Movie Maker with no problem.
As to it "cutting up" you files, I assume you mean that when you import a video file it is cutting it into several clips.

Make sure you uncheck this box:
http://ioniafirst.com/mm1.jpg

This will prevent the program from automatically "detecting scene changes" and cutting them into seperate clips.

 

I was planning on posting up a reply saying that I'd solved the problem first of all because, for a long time, having worked with putting pictures and audio clips along the timeline, everything was working perfectly okay, albeit a little slow.

Then I started introducing video and yes, it started crashing again. So I thought, well it's a Microsoft package so I'll convert everything into wmv and wma files to make it easier and minimise the crashes. That didn't help. In fact, if anything, it made it worse as despite the audio files being the correct length when played anywhere else, once I imported them into 'Movie Maker' they cut short by a crucial 1-3 seconds.

I've now got to about the 3 minute mark of my current movie after having spent the entire afternoon on it by going back into the project as soon as it (increasingly frequently) crashed and now I can't access the project files at all without it throwing a wobbly.

Before I was making ultra-slow progress by making slight adjustment after slight adjustment before the program decided to randomly crash on me but now it's just become totally impossible to make any amendments at all.

@ joelsz - I have no problem with it cutting up files. In fact, I find it quite useful.

@ Adrynalyne - I'm finding it TOTALLY unstable!

A little bit of background FYI - I've had overall system crashes on my PC for years now where the whole thing just cuts out, usually on start-up fortunately, and then reboots. It seems totally unsolvable as I've already gone through the agonisingly slow and function-crippling process of making back-ups of everything, re-formatting Windows completely, starting from scratch and then reinstalling everything twice. I've been sending bug reports to Microsoft for 2-3 years about it but, despite having followed their instructions to the minutest detail, it hasn't had the slightest bit of difference. I believe the whole thing began with a driver error, anyway. This is why I feel constantly hostile towards Microsoft and have long since planned to buy a Mac as soon as this thing breathes its last.

However, this is beside the point. Sorry to go on but all programs function perfectly okay on my system. Occasionally, something goes screwy but I'm always able to troubleshoot it.

Here's the info you asked for: I'm running on a 2.8Ghz Intel Celeron processor with 1.5Ghz of standard DDR Ram, a hard drive of around 80Gb, an ATI Radeon 9550 256Mb graphics card and a RealTek AC97 Audio soundcard.

My task is to put together a movie featuring game footage for putting onto youtube. I can't get audio out of FRAPS (video capture software) because of my paltry soundcard so I'm using a combination of silent video and pictures interspersed with text here and there. A simple task really...and dead easy to put together by any normal method...but made excruciatingly slow and infuriating by this program that seems to say, "I'm working now, no, I'm not. Okay, I'll do that but not that. I can do that, but I don't feel like it right now. Well, yes. Logically, I should be able to do that but instead I'm changing the pattern of my behaviour as of now and doing this instead..."

That seems to sum up my experiences of Microsoft quite nicely, personally...

Sarcasm aside, please help...it's killing me!

 

I can imagine how frustrating it must be when something that should work actually doesn't. It sounds like you've got more patience than me. With other software applications, one solution is to uninstall and reinstall, but WMM is a bit different because it's effectively part of the OS.

There are loads of other programs that can do what you're trying to achieve. Some are free, some not.
If you want a relatively cheap and reliable one, I can recommend Adobe Premiere Elements. I think they're on version 4 now, and versions 1 & 2 still turn up on ebay for a nice cheap price.

 

@ plodr - I'm even going to begin here. I remember having learned enough about what I needed to do to solve the problem but I just don't remember anything technical. I remember the last time I did it I did stuff that concerned the hard drive and the memory. I have total faith in my ability to do things very thoroughly but using the suggestions by Microsoft taught me absolutely nothing. There had to be some other issue. It was like using an FAQ (does this stand for 'get F***ing Angry Quickly', btw?) where it's abundantly clear that your own fault never matches up to the advice on offer (I've never known one that did!). So I'm going to fudge this issue completely and say, "forget it! When it breaks, it breaks." I'm sick of trying to deal with it.

I've posted up for help in these forums a few times before about this and no one's been able to help me. Yet, from past experience, I still count these forums as being the resource for the absolute best technical advice that anyone can hope to receive.

@ Tarquin BA - Thanks. I will check that out.