Software to aid encoding????

[drewson99]

I am wondering if there is anything that will put my computer into a stripped down operating mode, kind of like "safe mode" so that I might squeeze out a little more speed and stability while encoding, but also so my computer won't freeze in the middle of a project anymore.

I'll set it to go when I leave the house in the morning, and I'll come back 6 hours later to see it froze somewhere along the line, and I have to turn off my computer and reboot (CTRL-ALT-DEL won't even work when it does this)

Since you can't pick up where you left off with an encoded MPEG2 file (is that right? I always assumed) I always have to start over when this happens, and it SUCKS!

Help!

Andy

[Twizzle]

If you are using windows then most newer versions let you set up different users.

Try adding a new user and stripping out all of your 'background' proggies ie virus scanner, firewall, real player etc etc that normally start when you start windows.

Log in as the new user and you should have a bare bones system that isn't hogging any but the required resources.

If it keeps crashing (I am assuming that you mean the whole PC freezes)you could try downloading a benchmark util that has a facility to stress test the computer. That way you can chack that it isn't actually a problem with your RAM, HD etc.