Malfunction Devices (DVD, hard drive, operating system, sounds)

[HappyRain]

I would guess this goes here. It's lengthy because I wanted to include everything I could think of when asking for help, that way everyone would have the info up front.

I use Windows 7. And I have owned the computer a short while. around 7 years. And a few things are malfunctioning on it in the past year, and all in the same way. They are

Windows DVD Maker -came installed with the computer
Windows Movie Maker -Same as above
Video Converter Ultimate - Personally installed by myself around 2013 or 2014.

All of these used to work perfectly. Now all of them have the issue of not wanting to complete projects. They will all get half-way done, then just stop and abort the entire process. And I am assuming it may be the computer for all of these different things to have the same problem. The DVD maker had been doing it off and on since 2014. But this year, it has gotten worse and intolerable. The Movie maker started to malfunction 2015. And the VC lost it this year.

With the Former 2, I am on my own, and at a loss. They come with the computer. So I find it hard to think updating the computer would hurt them.

Here's the basic layout of the DVD maker.

Spoiler

And here's what's happening as of late. I have seen this so much, I have dreams about it. lol

Spoiler

And sometimes I get the standard message "Burner Not Found"

The Movie Maker

Spoiler

I don't know anything about drivers, but when I go to devices / drivers, I always read that everything is working correctly. But something is apparently off. I figured it may just be the DVD make, personallyr. So I decided to pay and order a new one for download on my computer. The free trial version worked fine. But when I finally purchased the product, BAM, same exact issue as my original maker. Won't complete a burn. So it's apparently not the DVD maker. And I don't think it's the discs, because I have tried different types with the same issue. I used different brands of DVD+RW because they can be reused. I also used DVD-R and DVD+R. All have the same problem.

So is Windows 7 just becoming obsolete with everything and I need a new computer, and operating system? Do I just need to take my comp. and have it looked at professionally? I am at a loss. because quite a few things are malfunctioning. And they're all things I frequently like to use and need.

[harry chickpea]

First guess, bad DVD drive. Buy a new USB one ($25+-) and use it instead of the internal one.

[Skunk Workz]

Originally Posted by harry chickpea

First guess, bad DVD drive. Buy a new USB one ($25+-) and use it instead of the internal one.

This would be my guess as well.

The other thought (less likely though) would be do you have enough free space on the hard drive. I've had some video programs (transcoding and burning) fail when there wasn't enough space on the disk to write the temp files.

[mawipafl]

Originally Posted by Skunk Workz

The other thought (less likely though) would be do you have enough free space on the hard drive. I've had some video programs (transcoding and burning) fail when there wasn't enough space on the disk to write the temp files.

This is what happened to me, only I didn't know it was the problem. I could create the project and save it, but during the final rendering process it would hang. Sometime I'd get all sorts of strange messages, but most times I got no message at all.

I have both Windows DVD Maker and Movie Maker, and the "hang" problem occurred with both. OS Win 7 64bit.

My computer guru fixed the problem. I wish I knew how, but he said that even though there appeared to be tons of space on my drive for creating projects, the space was too fragmented. Perhaps he did something like a Defrag to consolidate the empty spaces?

Today I use Windows Movie Maker without issue.

[HappyRain]

Originally Posted by mawipafl

This is what happened to me, only I didn't know it was the problem. I could create the project and save it, but during the final rendering process it would hang. Sometime I'd get all sorts of strange messages, but most times I got no message at all.

I have both Windows DVD Maker and Movie Maker, and the "hang" problem occurred with both. OS Win 7 64bit.

My computer guru fixed the problem. I wish I knew how, but he said that even though there appeared to be tons of space on my drive for creating projects, the space was too fragmented. Perhaps he did something like a Defrag to consolidate the empty spaces?

Today I use Windows Movie Maker without issue.

Well with my Movie Maker, it basically drops the files. You have the film, or different vid files, and the source has not be lost. But somehow the Maker will lose the files, even though the source file has not been touched. And because the file was dropped mid-save, it never finishes. I have to close the Maker, then reopen it, and bam, the files are all back. But if the vid is loading and it takes longer than 20 min. The files will get dropped during the save, and so I have a longer project that I spent time putting together, but can not save.

Did your's do this?

Also, I want to thank the answers. I wish I had come here 1st to get some suggestions before listening to the advice on the other site.

[Tek_Freek]

Run Ccleaner first
Run Defraggler

Click the green icon at top right of each page and be patient. Don't click any other "download this" buttons. I've been fooled on occasion by that. Grrrr. Filehippo is very safe I use it for pretty much everything I download and have for years.

If you've not done either type of clean up before it might a while - a long while.

Edit: How long has it been since you checked the start up and installed files? Ccleaner Tools menu will show them to you and allow you to disable/uninstall any that you don't need. It will also let you copy the list to a text file if you want to post it here for advice.

[thecoalman]

Movie Maker as with any video editor does not touch the source files unless you explicitly save it as same file. As you are working on your project save as project file or whatever they refer to it as. This is just small file that saves what work you have done, it does not include the source files. You can open this and continue your edits later or if it crashes trying to render the project you can always open it up back up.

As others have suggested try cleaning up the drive. CCleaner works better but windows has it's own disk cleanup. Right click C: and select properties, on the general tab select disk cleanup. Once that has completed right click C: and select properties again. On the tools tab select optimize drive.

Right click C: and properties again, note how much drive space you have. You'll need many gigabytes for rendering video projects, 20 or 30 is safe number but it could be a lot less.

[bigbear99]

you could have any of several problems:

- defective memory
- too little memory
- too many programs running in background
- fragmented hdd

Don't agree with the recommendation for CCleaner - it's mostly a "registry cleaner" and few people need to do it.

You are better off using the built in windows tools, disk cleanup to gain more space, and the optimizer/defragmenter.

[Tek_Freek]

Originally Posted by bigbear99

you could have any of several problems:

- defective memory
- too little memory
- too many programs running in background
- fragmented hdd

Don't agree with the recommendation for CCleaner - it's mostly a "registry cleaner" and few people need to do it.

You are better off using the built in windows tools, disk cleanup to gain more space, and the optimizer/defragmenter.

Completely incorrect information. You obviously don't know how to run Ccleaner.

[mawipafl]

Originally Posted by VanillaChocolate

Well with my Movie Maker, it basically drops the files. You have the film, or different vid files, and the source has not be lost. But somehow the Maker will lose the files, even though the source file has not been touched. And because the file was dropped mid-save, it never finishes. I have to close the Maker, then reopen it, and bam, the files are all back. But if the vid is loading and it takes longer than 20 min. The files will get dropped during the save, and so I have a longer project that I spent time putting together, but can not save.

Did your's do this?

Also, I want to thank the answers. I wish I had come here 1st to get some suggestions before listening to the advice on the other site.

I didn't have this problem - sorry to hear you are! Losing files sounds like either a software glitch (can you reinstall Movie Maker?) or some kind of conflict, as if Movie Maker is trying to do its job, but something is running silently in the background and interferes.

If it's a conflict, and I'm not sure this would work, but maybe you could open Task Manager and watch what processes are running while you're working with Movie Maker. See if something unrelated to Movie Maker jumps and starts using more of your CPU.