Rating: 
Summary: Product with good features IF you can get it too work.
Review: After finally rendering my project after multiple crashes and burning to a DVD the the audio was out of sync with the video and nothing I tried would remedy the problem. It can't be my computer as I have twice the specs the program requires. I am very disappointed with this program. Before buying this wait until a new version comes out and they have worked out all the bugs in this one.
Rating: 
Summary: I'm learning this software
Review: And it is not too difficult. There is plenty of documentation. I had an earlier problem with crashes on my Dell Inspiron 8600, but it was an OS problem. A new Intel chipset driver fixed it. In all of this customer support was good, but not spectacular. It has never crashed again except the time I ran out of disk space :) One complaint that I have is that instructions to install on E:\ partition were not followed completely. E is 30Gb, but some of it ended up on C:\. But I have found many programs that do the same. Next major laptop upgrade will have a 30Gb C:\ partition. So in conclusion, this product seems like a good value at $99
BTW, I did not like the Sony equivalent. It was too inflexible with regards to I/O formats.Rob
Rating:
Summary: Pinnacle Studio 9 Does Not Deliver
Review: As others have stated, this program has lots of bugs and the company provides little support. Adobe Premiere Elements knocks the socks off Studio 9, and you can buy it and Photoshop Elements bundled on Amazon for less than the retail price of Studio. Save yourself the frustration and headaches of Studio 9 and buy Adobe Premiere elements.
Rating: 
Summary: Do even think about it...
Review: Before you buy any Pinnacle Studio product, go to the user forums at pinnaclesys.com and read the boards in the support area. You will find nothing but users complaining about buggy software and program crashes. A lot of them. Happened to me. Just go find something else! If you persist and buy this product, you will be frustrated and want to hurt somebody.
Rating:
Summary: Infuriatingly Frustrating Software that Fails to Deliver
Review: Couldn't agree more with others who hate this program. I spent hours editing a video as an Xmas gift for my family and had a horrendous experience. First of all, Studio is a VERY finicky program. The editing module is prone to frequent unexplained freeze-ups and other strange unwanted behaviors. My editing time must have been increased by 50% trying to work around these infuriating quirks and sudden crashes. Still I hung in there because I had already invested so much time in the project and believed it would all be worth it in the end. But when it came time to "burn" my DVD, well that's when disaster struck. As others have described, the program tied up my computer for hours while it "rendered", a process that took far longer than other video editing software I've tried. But to make matters worse, after all those hours, the program just crashed. No warning. No useful error messages. Just suddenly frozen. This happened on 3 separate attempts!! I never was able to produce the DVD in time for Xmas and went home for the holidays empty-handed. All of my hours of hard work went down the drain like sewage. And even more infuriating, Pinnacle gives NO---absolutely ZERO---customer support. No 800 number to call, no operators standing by, no email address to write. Nothing. Once you buy the program, you're on your own and screwed. My Arcsoft Showbiz program which came with my computer may promise less but it delivers about 10 times more than Studio. I agree that this may be one of the worst softwares ever released for commercial distribution. It should be illegal. DO NOT BUY THIS SOFTWARE. Drive Pinnacle out of business. They and this silly program are pathetic. They'll never get any more of my money. Consider yourself forwarned...
Rating:
Summary: Is your time valuble
Review: Do not buy this software before checking their own forum.
Things you won't be able to do
1. Burn a trouble free dvd.
2. Keep even audio levels even
3. Output projects to tape without flaws
I used studio dv and 7 but this is by far the worst.
I switched to screenblast movie studio. It works first time.
Hope this helps.
Rating:
Summary: Proceed with caution
Review: Do not fall for the condescension seen in "Works for me." Studio 9 is built upon the code base for Studio 8, which was/is notoriously difficult to get running reliably in many cases. This was not limited to underpowered, overloaded, outdated systems running aging operating systems, as the reviewer would have you believe. During the course of my experimentation with Studio 8, I built a new system from handpicked, quality components, a fast, modern processor, 1gig of ram, 2 120-gig hard drives and Windows XP Professional. It has all the latest Windows, bios and component driver updates, absolutely no programs other than Studio running, and there are still problems when using the program the way that it's hyped in the advertising. To be successful, you're forced to restrict yourself to a rigid recipe which specifies the data format, sequence of operations and workarounds which are far from the quick and easy steps shown in product demos. Even where you've gotten past the crashes, lockups and freezes, and are able to actually write a DVD, audio and video frequently lose sync in longer projects. Studio 8/9 can be a wonderful program, if you're one of the lucky ones. Is it worth countless hours (no exaggeration) of aggravation to find out? Download a trial version when it's offered. If that doesn't work, don't assume that the retail version will. And don't assume that Studio 9 addresses the problems that existed in Studio 8 -- one of the Pinnacle techs freely stated in the support forum that version 9 is not a bug fix for 8. New features & old problems? Time will tell. Do you want to take that chance? If you buy this, put it on a credit card, try it out for a reasonable amount of time. Go to the pinnaclesys.com online support forums and see the number of horror stories that are just like the ones you could be writing. Then demand a refund. If they balk, involve the credit card company and contest the charge. Pinnacle thinks it's doing a swell job, because users who have run away from their products are still counted in their "installed base." If you wind up running away, at least take your refund money with you.
Rating:
Summary: Studio 9---Don't EVEN think about it!!!!!!!!
Review: Don't read any further--------go research some other video editing software because Studio 9.0 stinks. It crashes more than a deer in a china shop. If software had a lemon law like cars, then this product would qualify. I have had this software since February and have spent untold hours trying to get it to work. So far I have one 7 minute video and a 23 minute video that both required numerous attempts and workarounds. I have come to hate the word RENDER with this software---it takes hours(usually overnight) only to find out it crashed during the rendering process. If by some stroke of luck it does complete the rendering process, you have to cross your fingers and hope that your audio comes out OK on the DVD. In my case I found that Studio 9 has a serious problem with background music/audio---sometimes it is on your finished DVD and sometimes it is not. It WILL consistently crash during rendering plus other random times. In one project it would crash when I dragged a transition to the timeline! At first I thought it was me, but after reading these reviews, the Pinnacle forum and other DVD forums I discovered that everyone is having basically the same problems. It is too bad because this product has some great features and is pretty easy to figure out. Check out the review on Feb.28 and that about sums it up. Unfortunately, I love a challenge and I have spent way too long trying to make this product work. I am giving up on it and today I decided to put my losses behind me and I went out and purchased Sony Screenblast Movie Studio--so far so good. Don't wait for version 10, because if they haven't figured it by now, then they never will. Pinnacle should remove this buggy software from the market immediately---it is dangerous to a person's sanity!!!
Rating:
Summary: system lock ups
Review: I built a pc for video editing and DVD burning, and the studio 8 software kept locking up on me, too. I talked to a rep at CompUSA, and he told me that my problem was probably my crummy motherboard. I replaced it with an Intel Titan P4 motherboard, and it never locked up again. My only complaint is that it takes a looong time for the video to render, so start burning before you go to bed, and when you get home from work the next day it will be done.
Rating:
Summary: Run screaming from Pinnacle
Review: I cannot believe that they are still in business under the same name. I have owned several versions of Studio, starting with the one that ccame with my 1.6G Compaq. Not one of them has ever worked as claimed. Like another reviewer implied, if you buy a program from them, spend an equal or greater amount on Valium. You might get something, but it won't be without pain and suffering. I have been through the service maze - it is beyond useless - it is a trap. A typical reply takes three weeks and consists of a shrug and suggestion you upgrade to the newest version. Of course, that works the same or worse than the one you have. If this company built roads, I wouldn't drive on them.
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