Nero or Pinnacle

Hi Austravel

I have never used pinnacle but I do own Nero. I think Nero would be the way to go. They have constant update that you can d/l for free..untill the next major version.
When a new major update is available the update costs are very good. Just my opinion.

Peter

Pinnacle is good for this, as its a video editing prog..
Then Nero to burn the presentation

Since I thought Nero was just a CD/DVD burning suite I had to have a look why you'd think that it would be a alternative to Pinnacles Studio. From the reviews I read, it sounds like a mixture of various things (none specified all it's features in a concise way). One review described it "jack of all trades, master of none".

I use Studio 8 (or maybe 9.. can't remember) for mini movies from the digicam including inserting 'stills' and for that it works well. It's got lot's of fades and transitions to make any home video look amaturer :) One thing I really like about it is the ability to blend a background sound file with the native video sound. On my PC it can't handle huge files but my PC is pretty minimal spec wise. I'm not overly familar with the whole program (and don't know what extra v10 gives you) but can't say I remember anything to catalogue and organise photo's.

There are a multitude of freebie programs for managing photo's, I use Faststone (www.FastStone.org).

So, not much of an answer.. just more questions for you to think about. the major 2 things I think you need to determine are :

1. How fancy/proficient output for the 'edit captured video' do you want and can Nero handle that (mixing video with stills and music). This is Studios forte.

2. Do either handle file (photos/video) organisation efficiently. Are you wanting to classify all photo's with searchable keywords, etc. Would it be better to have a purpose photo database application (eg ACDsee)

Cheers, Nige

for video editing I use Vegas Video from Sonic (bought out by Sony)
by far the best for me .. better than Adobe Premiere
Can do enhancements easy with chainable filters etc..
I burn video with DVD Architect or Adobe Encore (Nero will do also)..
I edit all my sound with goldweave when required ..
For Image sorting I use Pixort to first get the bad ones out ...
I do not use a catalogue program .. occasionally Adobe Album but
its not flexible enough. I create html albums with Photoshop for quick
browsing ..
Slideshows synced with music I use Proshow Gold .. the most convenient
in my book .. has a few quirks but produces exe shows as well as desktop DVD from the same file ...
Video editing requires a fast machine .. If you really edit .. which I am not sure because you mention Nero for editing ?? and it is only a DVD authoring tool and not a video editor .. I looked at Pinnacle and didnt like it, but can not remember anymore why I dismissed it at the time .. Premiere was too slow when previewing and rendering and I think Pinnacle wasnt very flexible as far as tracks and filters go but I dont remember and the newer versions might be better ..
good luck .. more complex than modern Diesel engines .. lol
gmd

use both pinnacle and nero 7. best answer really is "depends on what you want to do". nero is primarily a "burning" software with a bit of photo/video/music compilation. pinnacle is the reverse. if you are after the more basic features, then i'd recommend nero. I use nero when I want to dump my dv tapes to dvd with some basic authoring. if I have more time, I use pinnacle.

I hate it when others do this, but here goes; Roxio Media Creator isn't a bad thing either. Possibly the fastest renderer of them all (V7 used to be anyway) and can do most of the things you mention. Not sure about the latest version. Best thing you could do would be to download all the demos and just try them. Often, others will say that something is better than something else, but it's often subjective and dependant on the person using it; it depends on what you really need,

Andrew

Thanks everyone, looks like it's Pinnacle and Nero combined, since I now have them both.

Thanks again and have a Merry Chrisy.