Bad Sound

  • Thread starter Thread starter Rob S.
  • Start date Start date
R

Rob S.

PROBLEM REPORT



Powerpoint version:10.1.4


Computer: Macintosh G4


Windows version: Mac OSX, actually. Panther version


Description of problem: I laid down a sound track behing my
PowerPoint show and it sounds great on my computer. The problem is
when someone else tries to listen to it on another computer, it's
distorted. On my boss's IBook (non Panther) and on the Art Director's
G-4 (also non Panther), the sound hesitates, or cuts off and on.
Depending on the computer, it may cut off infrequently, or constantly.
Also, when viewed on a PC the sound is scratchy an distorted.
Is this a sound card issue or an operating system issue?
Or something else entirely?
 
Thanks for the suggestion, but after reading through some of the other
"Sound" threads in the forum, I got the idea that the sound file might
be too large. it was an AIFF file and topped out at 70 Mbs. Not
tiny. I popped it into "Audacity" and output it as an MP3 file,
knocking it down to about 4 MBs. I put it into the show and tried it
out on a laptop that had run it choppily before and it sounded fine.
One further question though.
Is there any reason why the timing would be different from machine to
machine? I timed it on my machine to have the sound fade out just as
the last slide fades to black and it worked fine. On the laptop, the
sound faded a few seconds before the last slide faded out. It's not a
big deal and I'm probably the only one who will notice it, but I was
just curious if it could be caused by different processor speeds and
the fact that the audio file isn't embedded in the show.

Thanks in advance,

Rob Spore
 
Timing is not one of PowerPoint's strong points as far as consistency across
platforms, versions and systems is concerned. It is normal to have a
difference of a few seconds in playback of sound even on the same system.

You might want to play around with MP3 bitrates - if you don't need CD
quality sound, you can encode the original AIFF sound file to a lower MP3
bitrate. I'm not sure if WMAs work on PowerPoint:mac - that would be another
option. The quality of sound fidelity is directly related to the system
resources required.


--
Geetesh Bajaj, Microsoft PowerPoint MVP
PowerPoint Notes: http://www.indezine.com/notes
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Technical Specialist, PowerPoint Live
http://www.powerpointlive.com
 
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