In addition to your Pinnacle Studio software, an efficient editing system requires certain levels of system performance as noted below.

Remember too that while specifications are important, they do not tell the whole story. For instance, the proper functioning of hardware devices can also depend on manufacturer-supplied driver software. Checking the maker’s web-site for driver updates and support information can often be helpful in solving problems with graphics cards, sound cards and other devices.

A 64-bit operating system is recommended if you are planning to edit HD material.

The more RAM you have, the easier it is to work with Pinnacle Studio. You will need at least 1 GB of RAM to achieve satisfactory operation, and we highly recommend 2 GB (or more). If you work with HD or AVCHD video, the recommendation rises to 4 GB.

Intel Pentium or AMD Athlon 2.4 GHz or higher – the higher the better. AVCHD editing demands a more powerful CPU. The minimum recommendation ranges up to 2.66 GHz for editing 1920- pixel AVCHD video. A multi-core system like Core i7, Core i5 or Core i3 is recommended.

To run Studio, your DirectX-compatible graphics card needs:

Your hard drive must be capable of sustained reading and writing at 4 MB/sec. Most drives are capable of this. The first time you capture, Studio will test your drive to make sure it is fast enough. Video files are often quite large, so you also need a good amount of available hard drive space. For instance, video in the DV format fills 3.6 MB of hard drive space per second of footage: a gigabyte every four and a half minutes.

For capture from video tape, we recommend using a separate hard drive to avoid competition between Pinnacle Studio and other software, including Windows, for use of the drive.

Studio can capture video from a variety of digital and analog sources: