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T
thesteng
Participant
December 30, 2011
Question

Conforming and Indexing Errors, Media Pending, Audio won't play in timeline

  • December 30, 2011
  • 1 reply
  • 34523 views

I'm working on a desktop PC which is running Windows 7 Professional 64-bit and Adobe Premiere Pro (version CS5.5). It's currently utilizing a second gen. 3.4Ghz i7 2600 processor, 16GB of 1600Mhz RAM, 64GB solid-state drive and a ASUS P8Z68-V Intel Z68 Motherboard with onboard audio (Realtek ALC892 chipset) and onboard video. My problem is this:

The conforming and indexing of all of my imported media never seems to finish regardless of how many times I reopen the project file and wait for it. On the lower right-hand portion of the screen, next to the conforming/indexing progress bar, is a little red "X". When clicked, it pops up with a list of errors that read: "An unexpected error occurred while performing a conform action on the following file...". As a result, my audio channels have no waveform and during playback there are no audible tones or levels. On some video clips there's just text that reads "Media Pending". This only appears to happen with project files that I saved on external hard drives, and I suspect it has something to do with the Media Cache Files folder and how Premiere Pro locates these conform/index files. I've also encountered this problem in CS3 and CS4.

I have a few questions:

1) How do I avoid error messages in regards to indexing and conforming

2) How do you know when indexing/conforming has completed itself? (there doesn't seem to be a progress log or a list of commands/executions)

3) Indexing and conforming appears to be an automatic process, but is there a way to do it manually?

4) What's the best way to setup your media cache files when you click EDIT > PREFERENCES > MEDIA?

5) If I have approximately 1 hour of footage, what's an average wait time for conforming/indexing? What about 5 hours of footage? 10?

6) Adobe recommends not editing until the conforming and indexing has completed itself-- how important is this?

7) Sometimes it appears as though the conforming and indexing has finished, but then I still have problems with playback. Do I have to reopen the project for it to continue with the conforming/indexing progress? I've already determined that the video file I'm working with is intact and free of any corruption.

I'm fine with having to wait for a project to conform and index, but it never seems to complete itself! Any help regarding this matter would be greatly appreciated.

This topic has been closed for replies.

1 reply

Harm_Millaard
Harm_Millaard
Inspiring
December 31, 2011

The first problem when using externals is that you have to explicitly define a fixed drive letter to that external in Disk Manager. That way projects can always find the media. Media pending is often caused by slow disks but is usually of short duration, a couple of seconds, unless you use USB externals, then the time may be much longer.

Indexing, conforming and peak file creation is an automatic process and must be finished before you start editing. You will see the progress in the lower right hand corner of the screen.

Indexing is required to speed up GOP editing, conforming is required to edit the audio and peak files are required to display waveforms. If that process is stopped before it is finished, you can run into video and audio problems. As to where to setup your media cache and media cache database, have a look at the Generic Guideline for Disk Setup in the FAQ section under the Overview tab in the Hardware forum.

To solve your problems, I suggest you completely clean your media database, change the location to a different internal disk than your C drive, load your project and let the indexing, conforming and peak file creation finish. The time required for that process depends on how fast the system is, the codec of the source material and the length of the material. Therefore it is nearly impossible to say how long it takes, but for comparison, a 6.5 hour AVCHD with 5.1 audio loads and indexes in a matter of minutes on my system.

    T
    Travis Crank
    Participant
    January 15, 2012

    Non-effective. The first thing any of these gentleman are told to do with conforming issues is to clear the Media Cache, etc.

    And that often creates more problems than it solves when you have a pending project(s) that you re-open & allow to re-conform. This whole process is so buggy & unpredictable & I'm a hair's breath from completely giving up on Premiere, the development of the conforming process is so poor it had no business even being released in this state. And now they're concentrating almost exclusively on CS6 development, using all the complaints, screen clips & feedback we the users have provided, only not to introduce a solution for CS5.5. Instead, we have to wait for the possibility it may be resolved in a subsequent version.

    And exactly what might compel a person to buying the new release when you can't solve something so problematic in the version we're already using??!

    Adobe?????

    I've written here only to assert that this man is NOT full of it, he's not doing anything wrong & the problem is entirely PREMIERE. Not his own ways & means or how he's using the program.

    Those who are not encountering these problems must be doing drudge-work with the same kinds of material & in short productions to not be running into audio conforming issues. Because I encounter them with EVERY SINGLE PROJECT.

    Sick, sick SICK of it.

      shooternz
      shooternz
      Legend
      January 16, 2012

      FWIW. I  (and I assume most others) dont see the issue ... and I dont do "drudge work".

      I also edit files more designed for editing than mpeg-2 and mp4 and I rarely use subclips.

      Have you tried different source files?

      Conforming when I first load source files takes seconds and does not re conform next time the project is opened.

      The O.P in this thread has had some areas identified by Harm that seem logical.

      Be interesting to see how he fares.

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