Bad Performance in Premiere when Coloring 4K XAVC-I files from my Sony FX6

[J111]

Hi all,

In my 10 years of professional editing, I have never been so frustrated and ready to give up on Adobe altogether. My Mac M1 Max (64gb) began suffering a bit of lag in Premiere when coloring 4K XAVC-I files from my Sony FX6. I reached out to an online representative to see if he could help me optimize the software for a smoother workflow, as there is no reason my system should be lagging. 

Without proper communication, the representative started fiddling around with settings in Premiere. A few recognizable actions include initiating the Rosetta operating system, clearing Cache files, turning off GPU Acceleration, and temporarily deleting my third-party plugins. The representative also altered settings in the terminal, activity monitor, and Premiere folders on my computer. I am unclear exactly what he did here but suspect this is where the damage was done. After these actions, my project (along with all previous versions) slowed down significantly to the point that we could not view a single frame. Sitting in silence, my anger began to grow. I tried to type in our mutual chat box, but every time I began to write, he would pull the mouse away. As if he did not want a record of what was unfolding. 

After resetting all the alterations he made, the project file would no longer open. The Premiere beachball would load its endless loop without the file initiating. I finally got control of the chatbox and expressed my frustration with the representative, to which he had no reply. Not only was the initial problem not resolved, but a slew of debilitating issues have been thrown at me, causing me to miss an important due date for this project. 

After uninstalling and reinstalling four different Premiere versions, this project will finally open after a 3-5 minute load. Once opened, the video file's color structure was warped, requiring me to modify all the clips to Rec709. Now for the fun problems! The files will barely play back without a total freeze, the audio waveforms are mostly missing, and I keep getting "Frame substitution recursion abort" alerts,  along with my project files in finder turning to blank white pages. Oh, I am also getting these glitches and black spots in my footage now 🙂   (also present in export and rendering does not help). 

It is impossible to get anything done now, and I have the slightest clue how to begin remedying the damage that has been done. Can anyone here help me with this before I throw my computer out the window? I am willing to pay somebody for one on one assistance**

Moderator note: Title changed to reflect troubleshooting issue.

[Ann Bens]

@Kevin-Monahan 

[J111]

FYI, i just tried to reach out to Kevin-Monahan directly and was told I have reached my maximum number of private messages and to try again later. I have never sent a single private message on Adobe Forum in my life. 

[Ann Bens]

Its getting weirder by the day.

Log out then in and try again.

[J111]

Still receiving the same error for anybody I try to direct message. 

[Stan Jones]

J111,

My guess is that a new poster cannot send a direct message, but I do not know.

Kevin is very good about responding to @ mentions here. Give him a day....

Stan

[J111]

I am beyond frustrated with how inept Adobe's customer support system is. I had a call scheduled today with “management” but have not heard from them. I cannot work and have teams waiting on me to perform. Do you have any advice on how to get in touch with somebody knowledgeable who can undo the damage that has been done here?

[Orin25568882anfb]

I feel your pain J111...

Do you have access to another system with Premiere (yours or a team member) that can try to open the file to see if the file itself is corrupted or if the system is corrupted?   As another much harsher option, you could nuke your entire box (erase the hard drive) reinstall the OS and re-load Adobe, etc.  Yes, I know this is a several hour process. What this does is to ensure you are back to a baseline and it erases whatever shennanigans the Adobe CSR did to your system.  Personally, I NEVER let any support person open Terminal.  Misuse of Terminal by even a keystroke is the gateway to Hell.  No thank you.

[Kevin-Monahan]

Hi J111,

I am so sorry about this! I just heard that one of our senior support staff is reaching out to you to help fix the issue. If no one reaches out to you personally, do let me know.

I will send you a PM so you can reply to me. I am not sure why you cannot reply, but it likely has to do with you being new to the community. I know that new users cannot edit posts, but experienced users can. 

I hope that my PM to you won't have any issues but if it does, place a comment in a thread.

Thanks,
Kevin