VEGAS Pro

What works

1. Installing (with workaround) and running the program.
2. Importing H.264 encoded MP4 files of various resolutions and frame rates.
3. Transforming video events using pan/crop and video FX filters.
4. Using media generators for patterns, backgrounds, and text (using legacy text plug-in as main text plug-in can have issues on Windows).
5. Changing project render settings and preferences.
6. Rendering using DV and uncompressed encoders.
7. Resizing the main window and moving/displaying/hiding window layout within the main window.

What does not

1. Video preview window when rendering and pan/crop workspace when editing show what appear to be a black outline filter when the image should reflect the current state of the video event in the timeline.
2. Windows can be detached from the main interface and moved/resized, but not re-attached. Re-attaching requires resetting window layout to default, as the window manager does not detect the window hovering over the main interface and refuses to "snap" it back in.
3. Rendering using Mainconcept MP4 and Sony AVC encoders on my test PC, which uses a low end Intel Atom CPU from 2010 and 3GB of memory. The resulting error message states that there is insufficient memory. My crappy hardware is most likely the reason for this.
4. Media Manager (error appears when opening this tab saying the Media Manager is not installed).
5. Occasionally buttons above the video preview window will not appear. Move your mouse over this area to make them show up.

Workarounds

See extra comments for full install guide and needed workarounds.

What was not tested

More advanced features of the program not mentioned above.

Hardware tested

Graphics:

• GPU: Nvidia
• Driver: proprietary

Additional Comments

Using Wine Development version 3.6 (Ubuntu 3.6-1). The insllation guide (below) is based on a modified version of the test results submitted in September 2011 on Ubuntu 11.10.

To give due credit to the original author:

https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=18288&iTestingId=66535

1. Install winetricks, see: WineHQ Wiki: WInetricks.
Make sure your winetricks build version is up-to-date...

winetricks --version

2. It is strongly recommended to create a new WINEPREFIX, set to Windows XP compatibility. Type:

WINEPREFIX=~/.vegas WINEARCH=win32 winetricks winxp

2. Install needed prerequisite libraries and follow the install prompts as in Windows. Some may not be needed, but I installed all of the below prerequisites to get Vegas installed and working. I also set the WINEPREFIX variable to the appropriate prefix folder to be safe the correct prefix was being used across multiple terminal sessions. Type:

WINEPREFIX=~/.vegas winetricks corefonts fontfix msxml3 msxml6 dotnet2 directmusic directplay quartz vcrun2005 vcrun2008 quicktime72

3. Place the Vegas installer EXE file in your .vegas/drive_c folder and start the installer. Type:

WINEPREFIX=~/.vegas wine your_vegas_pro_8.0_installer.exe

4. Follow the prompts up until the point where is wants to install .NET Framework 3.0 and/or Visual C++ 2005 Redistributable. We will need to use a workaround to install the program, as the install wizard does not detect these libraries are already installed.

5. Change to the main installation directory:

cd ~/".vegas/drive_c/Program Files/Sony Setup/Vegas Pro 8.0"

6. Type:

WINEPREFIX=~/.vegas wine start vegas80_enu.msi

7. Follow the install prompts and choose to create a desktop shortcut. Type:

WINEPREFIX=~/.vegas wine start vcredist_x86.exe

8. Follow the install prompts (if any) and close your second terminal window. I am also not sure if this step is needed as Visual C++ has already been installed with Winetricks, but this is a step I followed to get working results.

9. Now click cancel on the original installer that prompts to install the previously mentioned libraries. This will close the installer. What this workaround has achieved is installing the main program while bypassing the initial prerequisite checks. Attempting to install the prerequisites normally as in Windows would fail or corrupt the Wine prefix.

10. The original cited test results mention the need to obtain msvfw32.dll from Windows XP and install it in the system32 folder as a native DLL. This is no longer needed and actually prevents Vegas from starting with the below error:

Sony Vegas Pro
Version 8.0c (Build 260)
Exception 0xC06D007E (Unknown Type) IP:0x7B43CFBC
In Module 'KERNEL32.dll' at Address 0x7B420000 + 0x1CFBC
Thread: Sffc SplashThread ID=0x2F Stack=0x1AFF000-0x1B00000

I have overwritten this file and left it in my prefix system32 folder, but removed the override setting in the winecfg Libraries tab. I am unsure if copying the DLL file is still needed, but I doubt it since we are not using a native Windows DLL, only the native built-in library provided with Wine.

11. Finally, launch Vegas using the desktop shortcut .desktop file. You may discard the second .lnk shortcut file as this is only used in Windows.

12. Register Vegas using the "register from another computer" option. This works with legitimate and illegitimate methods of activation. How you activate is up to you, I am simply reporting either method works in Wine for testing purposes only.

I have tested this on a pretty weak PC (spare that was collecting dust), which most likely triggers the "low memory" errors when trying to render using the above mentioned encoders. However, I am still not confident there is not a Wine bug or missing Windows software/libraries causing this either. Please test on your own modern hardware and report the results!

Also, if you encounter any issues from following this guide you may need to delete your Wine prefix folder and start over. It took me multiple attempts to get this working using a 7 year old WineHQ guide and Vegas is known to be difficult to install and use in Wine.