File Size

  • Thread starter Thread starter AnnH
  • Start date Start date
A

AnnH

As a new user of PowerPoint I have enjoyed reading the expert advice in this
news group, particularly about adding sound to a presentation. I have now
put together a 24 page slide show of photographs, along with a wave file
that plays across the presentation and I find that my file is way too big to
email, at 47.5 mb. PowerPoint presentations that I have received are much
smaller. How do I get mine to a reasonable size? Help.
 
Ok, reread the post. The size problem is probably stemming from the WAV
file. To see if this is a solution that will work for you, make a copy of
the presentation (really, make the copy) and delete all the WAV sound files
from it. Save it as a new name. How big is the file size now? If it
dropped from a 45 MB file to about 1 MB file, then you may be in luck.

You can also try to save the presentation to an HTML folder and see what the
size of the WAV files are that way. Either way, if you can identify the WAV
sounds as the only cause of a bloated file, you will benefit from using the
following technique.

WAV files are uncompressed audio and H-U-G-E. They are fine for a few
second sound effect, but can become unwieldy when they run over a few
minutes. Instead, you may want to use the highly compressed MP3 format
(don't even mention the MP3 legal hearings going on, please). By converting
a WAV file to an MP3 you can reduce the filesize by incredible amounts. You
can then embed it as a WAV file with a RIFF header that fools PowerPoint
into thinking it is a WAV but playing it as an MP3. In essence, it is an
MP3 in WAVs clothing. There are a couple of tools that will add these
headers onto your much smaller MP3 file.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/cdexos/
http://www.studiodust.com/riffmp3.html

Note that Riff header MP3s will not play on all machines, so there is a
small element of risk.
 
Back
Top