Movie degradation: juddering

Hi fellow apple-users,
I'm getting increasingly frustrated at the amount of time I invest in getting in right with exporting my HD movies. After I import the data from my sony HDR-SR12 cam I watch them in imovie09 and the quality of movements depicted is just not the same as in the original: now movements of people or cars seem to judder.
I import the data from the camera with the Full-Original Size option. I export the movies in 1080p using the procedure prescribed in here:
http://www.maciverse.com/export-hd-video-from-imovie-09.html
Thanks for your support
Message was edited by: mynameis...Gladiator

the movements of people and cars don't seem to be smooth, they are jerky; It looks as if there weren't enough frames per second to fool the eye that this is movement and not a succession of pictures
I didn't notice any jerkiness or judder - your Crossroad video looked OK to me. When I first read your original post and you mentioned "judder" that term was familiar to me. I've always associated judder with the "_motion trailing_" effect that sometimes blights AVCHD footage. When zoomed in and quick movement occurs within the frame, or camera movement occurs, motion trailing can be quite evident - the movement appears jerky, stuttery, juddery or whatever best describes it.
This phenomena disturbed me at first, having moved from DV to AVCHD, but I've learnt to modify my filming technique and now no longer notice the issue. I pan very very slowly and don't move the camera at all when zoomed in close - if I can possibly avoid it. However, all this doesn't appear to be what you feel you are seeing on your footage. Your camera was basically stationary most of the time and you were shooting mainly in wide angle, not close-up. So, I couldn't see the motion trailing effect that I was expecting to see. In fact, as I mentioned, it all looked pretty smooth to me. Is the effect you are seeing possibly something to do with your set-up, graphics card or other issue?
Do you notice the judder when viewing in iMovie or QuickTime, or when viewing directly from your camera on a TV? Sorry if you've already mentioned any of this!
John

Similar Messages

  • Movie degradation over time

    I have sometimes had movies degrade over time. I have one specifically that I am looking at now that is a gray scale microscopy movie was made in 2006 with Cinepak and looked fine when first made. Now the first frame and several other frames (but not all) are dramatically posterized to a uniform gray. Sometimes I have seen a different degradation where you get blocks of pixels that turn uniform gray was if you reduced the resolution of the image. Is this a Cinepak issue or a Quicktime issue? Is there any way of recovering the data or preventing it from happening?

    Grandpa,
    Sadly, writable media DOES degrade over time - sometimes after a year or so. Cheap media (and sometime not-so cheap media), improper storage conditions (hot, sunlight, high humidity) and high burn errors during burning (result of high burn speeds over 4x) can all contribute to degradation.
    Roxio's new Toast Titanium 8 now includes the ability to recover data from some damaged discs - it's probably worth trying.
    Problems with the long term storage of digial images remain digital imaging's 'diry little secret' - see http://www.frontiernet.net/~fshippey/archiving.htm for an article I wrote on the subject.
    F Shippey

  • AVCHD long & transfer - juddering in viewer screen

    I have no problems to get my AVCHD files in my Log & Transfer window in FCP 6, also I can preview them in the L&T viewer. However as soon as they are transferred and transcoded to ProRes the footage is juddering in the viewer screen.
    Any idea what is going wrong? I have tried different 'easy setting' settings but without success.
    I have burned the material on DVD but the same juddering appears on the TV as well.
    Cheers,
    Mark

    Hallo DutchMaestro,
    Thank you for your reply, but could you be a little bit more specific (pardon my ignorance), you mean open the Quicktime file in finder?, I cannot find properties, the menu gives me preferences etc.
    My apologies, I am just trying to get to grips with FCP and just found out that my .mov are juddering as well. What am I doing wrong?
    Groeten,
    Mark (fellow dutchman)

  • What Compressor codec should I use for footage recorded on a Canon T3i, edited on FCP 6, and intended for Vimeo?

    I am looking for help!
    My planned workflow is as follows:
    Footage recorded on Canon Rebel T3i  --->  Edited on Final Cut Pro 6 (sequence compression is apparently H.264 according to the browser)  --->  Compressed with Compressor (ver 3.0.5) in original 1920 x 1080, 24p format  --->  Uploaded to Vimeo
    I am now at the point where I am trying to find a Compressor setting that will create a compressed movie that looks somewhat similar to what I see in the canvas in Final Cut Pro 6.  I have tried using the H.264, Apple ProRes 422(HQ), HD Uncompressed 8-bit, and XDCAM HD 1080p24 settings and in all cases, my movie plays back fine, however, the brightness/exposure seems to be hiked up a few stops and there is a substantial amount of noise in both the blacks and midtones that doesn't appear in FCP's canvas.
    My compressed movie I wish to export is only intended for Vimeo (similar to Youtube).  Is there a different setting I should be trying, or perhaps a way of downloading a more effective or current codec??  Any suggestions are greatly appreciated as it is very disappointing to see my movie degraded so much from its orginal quality.
    Shaun M

    H.264.  But the FCP Legacy (FCP 7 and earlier) Canvas and Viewer aren't color accurate.  Not designed to be. Their purpose is to show you what you are doing, show you the footage so you can make editing decisions. For color accuracy, the ideal way, since this was designed with television and feature editing in mind, is to have an IO device like those AJA.com and DECKLINK.com make, and send the signal to an HDTV or broadcast monitor. 
    Apple has realized that more and more people are editing for the web and computers only, so they made it so that FCX's viewer IS color accurate.  So...what that means is that currently, using what you have, you won't get things to match....they aren't designed to. So you can adjust for what happens when you export.
    But a big issue is that you are editing H.264 in FCP native. FCP doesn't work with H.264 native well, all sorts of potential issues can arise.  Sync issues, quality issues, the correct shot be exported, all sorts of things.  FCP works best with the FCP editing codecs. What are they? They are found in the EASY SETUP list.  But for HD, the most commonly used option is ProRes 422.  There is a BIG problem that FCP Legacy will SEEM like it'll work with H.264 natively just fine...it doens't throw up any warnings. That is bad. Also something Apple fixed with FCX. 
    The fact that you are editing H.264, and trying to export H.264, might also lead to the footage being more off that it would if you edited ProREs 422, and exported H.264.  Note...H.264 is a higher data rate codec, and easier for FCP to work with...but because it has a higher data rate, the file sizes are much higher than the original H.264.  5-6x larger.  FCP 7 did have a way to import Canon 5D, 7D and T2i (needed a hack with the T2i) via Log and Transfer.  But it doesn't work with the T3i...not even with that hack. Because FCP 7 was no longer updated after the T3i came out. It's 4 year old software, discontinued 2 years ago.
    If you want to edit native, you need to look at Adobe Premiere Pro CC. It's interface is more accurate too.

  • Premiere Degrading Quality (after rendering) of Animation Codec mov's and 4444 Codec mov's, which were made from SWF files, originally exported out of After Effects

    I am making a cartoon, which was created in FLASH,
    Then the SWF's were put into After Effects and exported out as MOV's. (I've tried both AppleProRes4444 and Animation codecs).
    Then I put those Mov's into Premiere. Everything looks crisp until I render. Once rendering is done, the video quality degrades. Here's a screen shot of Premiere:
    On the left is the source MOV (exported from AE), on the right is the timeline viewer (after rendering). The quality on the right is degraded. Help?
    If I use MP4 versions, exported out of Flash, through Media encoder, quality is not degraded.
    (Read on for additional info)
    It was easy and quick to create my MOV's out of AE, which is why I did it this way. I'm exporting to MOV's so I can edit quicker in Premiere. I find editing to sound in AE really difficult, and I don't edit in Flash (employees provide SWF files to me).
    Here is sequence settings in Premiere (these setting were created by dragging an MOV into the sequence and choosing "change settings" to match clip settings.
    Help? Please?

    I am making a cartoon, which was created in FLASH,
    Then the SWF's were put into After Effects and exported out as MOV's. (I've tried both AppleProRes4444 and Animation codecs).
    Then I put those Mov's into Premiere. Everything looks crisp until I render. Once rendering is done, the video quality degrades. Here's a screen shot of Premiere:
    On the left is the source MOV (exported from AE), on the right is the timeline viewer (after rendering). The quality on the right is degraded. Help?
    If I use MP4 versions, exported out of Flash, through Media encoder, quality is not degraded.
    (Read on for additional info)
    It was easy and quick to create my MOV's out of AE, which is why I did it this way. I'm exporting to MOV's so I can edit quicker in Premiere. I find editing to sound in AE really difficult, and I don't edit in Flash (employees provide SWF files to me).
    Here is sequence settings in Premiere (these setting were created by dragging an MOV into the sequence and choosing "change settings" to match clip settings.
    Help? Please?

  • Nice MOV from Screen Recording - Import to iMovie looks degraded

    Hi,
    I am wondering why I have a great MOV file from a Mac screen recording program, with audio, and this looks fantastic when viewed with Quicktime.
    Then I import into iMovie and it looks much degraded.
    I don't use iMovie a lot, but I figured MOV quality should look the same when imported into iMovie.
    Any help greatly appreciated!

    Welcome bdemil to the  iMovie boards ...
    some misunderstanding:
    iMovie is meant for PAL/NTSC content.. any other formats/resoltuions get converted = loss of quality..
    and: .mov is nor format, just a container; your Mac can display many codecs.. but only very few 'fit' into iMovie..
    I mostly doubt, any screenrecording fullfills the 'video' standards.. (interlaced, framerate, resolution...)
    for handling off-standard videos, QuicktimePro or MpegStreamclip offer some basic editing features...

  • IMovie 08 degrades movie quality

    When I open iMovie, my camera (JCV MG130) is detected and the movies are being imported into the iMovie library. So far things couldn't be better! However, when I export a movie clip to a file using "Share" -> "Export To Movie" and "Large 960x540" resolution, the picture quality of the exported movie is clearly degraded compared to the original file that was downloaded from the camera.
    *Does iMovie have a loss-less export function?*
    Additional comment:
    Overall, my experience with iMovie 08 (and iDVD 08) on my Leopard MacBook Pro is mixed. Great idea, but too many short comings. Example: when I want to create a DVD, I need to import/edit/export a movie in iMovie, then I need to import that movie file into iDVD (if I just open iDVD and load an iMovie project, iDVD crashes). This adds an additional step and it takes twice as long to render a movie (1/2hr clips takes 1 hr to render to file in iMovie, another hour to burn the movie to a DVD using iDVD). Clearly, this should be ONE step. If I want to index the movie, I have to import/export using Garageband, etc. In addition with the degradation of the movie quality as discussed above, I think iMovie and iDVD are more toys than serious applications. I would have expected more from Apple, to be honest.

    When I open iMovie, my camera (JCV MG130) is detected and the movies are being imported into the iMovie library. So far things couldn't be better! However, when I export a movie clip to a file using "Share" -> "Export To Movie" and "Large 960x540" resolution, the picture quality of the exported movie is clearly degraded compared to the original file that was downloaded from the camera.
    According to what I read concerning this model, it is a "Standard Definition" HDD camcorder. You should expect such degradation when sharing/exporting SD content at HD resolutions. This is the same as taking a 640x480 JPEG photo and enlarging it to 960x540, printing, and then comparing your output quality with that of your original picture. Enlarging the frame size in iMovie does not add resolution detail that did not exist in your original source file.
    Does iMovie have a loss-less export function?
    No. Unlike earlier versions of iMovie, the source files (in all of their various possible compression formats) are never stored as physical clip. Instead, all content remains in its original form and is manipulated "by reference" as you assemble and edit your project and is rendered in "real time" for previewing (which is why iMovie '08 has such high CPU speed requirements). No physical file is actually created until to share/export the file and at that time all of the various possible forms of content are rendered/converted to a single compression output format preprogrammed by the application or as selected by the user. It is very likely that the "reference movie" approach used by previous versions of iMovie had to be abandoned in order to make the process more universal for all source formats iMovie is now "theoretically" able to import. Think of the time base problems created when importing MPEG-2 camcorder content which has to have separate time bases and offsets for the video to synchronize it with AC3 audio which has been converted to AIFF. Now multiply this problem for each and every track simultaneously under the "playhead" at any given instant in the timeline. On the other hand, GarageBand does have a "Full Quality" option that allows you to export your video unchanged from when it was received by GarageBand and with either the original or AIFF (iDVD "ready") edited format to disk or to iDVD for the same automatic iDVD operations you formerly enjoyed with iMovie '06.
    Example: when I want to create a DVD, I need to import/edit/export a movie in iMovie, then I need to import that movie file into iDVD (if I just open iDVD and load an iMovie project, iDVD crashes).
    iDVD is not designed to handle iMovie "Projects." An iMovie "Project" is little more than a text file listing the particular ranges of audio and video source frames, text representing titles/instructions for displaying them, and a list of transitions also mapped to a combination of applied effects and a ranges of source audio and video frames to which they are applied, etc. while iDVD is only designed to handle physical audio/video compressed data.
    This adds an additional step and it takes twice as long to render a movie (1/2hr clips takes 1 hr to render to file in iMovie, another hour to burn the movie to a DVD using iDVD). Clearly, this should be ONE step. If I want to index the movie, I have to import/export using Garageband, etc.
    The "extra" step is required to transform the "text" description of the iMovie project into a physical audio/video file which iDVD can handle. In actuality, there is little time difference between iMovie '08 and previous versions. Previous versions of iMovie required you to wait while each non-editable file was converted as part of the import process. In addition, you had to wait while each title, transition, or special effect was rendered to a physical file during the editing process. What iMovie '08 actually does is consolidate all of this instances of waiting for the various conversions, rendering, and creation of various small files into the conversion and creation of a single long file where all of your waiting is consolidated into one long period rather than all of those old short ones. Stepwise, it was never done in "ONE step." As to the use of GarageBand as a separate application, I see little difference in using it separately for the chaptering and blending/mixing/synchronization of audio and video content and the use of iDVD as a separate application for the authoring and burning of DVDs. You don't hear many complaints about this being done in a separate application.
    In addition with the degradation of the movie quality as discussed above, I think iMovie and iDVD are more toys than serious applications.
    IMHO, if you elect to "play" with these applications and not use them as they were intended or to their full capacity, then "Yes," they are little more than toys.

  • High degradation of image quality dropping SnapzPro mov file into iMovie HD 6.03

    I'm using the older version of iMovie HD 6.03 because it is much easier to work with in syncing audio to images.
    I'm making a music video shot on my Nikon. The AVI files look alright, but when I drop a movie file captured with
    SnapzPro, the quality degrades terribly, really unusable. The Ambrosia folks tell me there is an automatic conversion
    from the mov file to DV taking place which doesn't happen in later versions of iMovie. I really prefer the interface on
    the older version and am seasoned with it. Is there a way to bring in the mov file without degrading it?

    Is your goal to create a DVD? PAL or NTSC? Then capture with Snapz Pro at the resolution Karsten told you (that's the first two he mentioned.)
    If your goal is larger definition than a DVD, then capture in one of the two last resolutions Karsten mentioned.
    If you only want computer screen viewing, then I recommend a 720p project in iMovie and a 1280x720 pixel capture.
    If you only want to burn a Bluray disc and watch on a HD-TV, then I recommend an 1080i project and a 1920x1080 capture.

  • Why does DVD Pro degrade the quality of my QT movies

    SUMMARY
    I have only been using Final Cut Studio for a couple of months, but have achieved good quality QT files for burning in DVD Studio Pro. Up to the stage of Compressor, the quality looks good. But import the files into DVD Pro and the image becomes blurred.
    If there is anyone out there who may be able to help I will willingly go into the depths of detail.

    Thanks for such a quick response to my posting. Being new to this kind of forum I wasn't anticipating such a quick reply. So ...
    Details:
    System info:
    MacPro 2,1
    2 x 3 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
    4 GB Memory
    ATI Radeon X1900 XT
    Cinema HD monitor 1920 x 1200
    2 x Pioneer DVD-RW DVR-112D
    Mac OS X (10.4.11)
    Final Cut Studio 2 - ( FCP 6.0.2, Compressor 3.0.2, Soundtrack Pro 2.0.2, DVD Studio Pro 4.2.1, Motion 3.0.2 etc., )
    Adobe CS3
    I am trying to create the best quality DVD I can achieve using the following mixed input media
    1 avi Output from Camtasia Studio screen capture software which is captured "full screen" at 1024x640 by my client
    (This could be output directly at 1024x576 by cropping before saving and can be QT mov format if necessary - however so far I have been converting to QTmov directly before editing the client files in FCP to add transitions not available in Camtasia Studio)
    2 Quicktime movies created in Flash output at 1024x576 - these include digital images, Photoshop and Illustrator files
    3 dv PAL footage captured 16:9 anamorphic
    My workflow approach has been to edit in FCP, including sending to Soundtrack Pro Audio Project, then to export Using Compressor with the intention of importing the edited file into DVD Pro.
    However the Preview in Compressor has shown disappointing resolution and I don't have the knowledge to choose the best settings. I have tried many combinations to the point that I have thoroughly confused myself.
    At this stage I need a "guru" who can suggest the best settings throughout to achieve the optimum result.
    In answer to your other question, the potential viewer is likely to be viewing on a PC using Windows Media Player or on a Mac using DVD player, BUT I also want the DVD to be playable on a set top DVD player.
    I am viewing my production on my Mac monitor which as you can see above is high res.
    Thank you for offering help. All advice (except jumping off cliffs etc.) welcomed

  • Best way to share HD .mov without degradation

    Exported my iPhoto slideshow to a HD (1920x1080) Quicktime movie and would now like to share with friends as a keepsake, without losing photo quality. I have read plenty on this forum about DVDs being SD, so iDVD won't cut it. Does the same hold true if I merely copy the .mov file to a DVD (like a backup)? This would be intended for viewing on a Mac or PC (assuming friends have Quicktime), not on a DVD player. It's a pretty large file (525mb), so I'd rather not post it to a website for them to download. Thanks!

    When you add a movie file to iDVD and then burn a disk from it, iDVD re-encodes the movie you add to make it viewable by a standard video DVD Player.
    If you drag a movie file directly onto a blank DVD (or CD for that matter) and then burn it, you are burning the file exactly as is with no change in quality. Those that you send your disk to may need to have Quicktime Player installed in order to play the movie on their computer. They can download and install it for free from www.quicktime.com.

  • How many times can you "Export - Quicktime movie" the same ProRes 422 file until it starts to lose quality?

    Lets say you are done with your project & you want an uncompressed copy of it as your master. If you keep importing it back into Final Cut Pro, & keep exporting (Quicktime movie), will it ever start to lose quality?

    I've never seen a number given, but would think it is very high.
    Apple describes ProRes here:
    About Apple ProRes
    And in that document says:
       "while remaining visually lossless through many generations of decoding and reencoding."
    I don't think I've ever seen degradation caused by recompression or multiple compassion, but as a workflow if you output a master file, then re-import it to add graphics and export that, you would only be 1 generation down from the master file. If you wanted to make multiple versions, you can always go back to, and re-import,  the master file and make the changes, then export, so all you exports stay only 1 generation down from the master file.
    MtD

  • Performance Degradation of new Servers

    Hi All,
    We are experiencing massive performance degradation on production when the system is under heavy use. It seems to be at its worst around month end. The worst effected transactions are the Cost / Profit centre 'line item' reports using RCOPCA02 (and other similar programs).
    We have the message server running on the database instance as well as 2x App servers. The Msg Srv and One of the App servers are very similar builds
    4x AMD Opteron 875
    16gb RAM  (10gb Pagefile)
    Both running Win Server 2003
    We're using MS SQL 2000
    The other message server is a bit weaker but has been around for some time (few years) and hasn't caused any issues.
    We have recently moved the Msg Server from an old (much weaker) server to the new build and since then seem to have performance issues. Initially after the move we had issues with the number of Page Table Entries (where down at about 6000-8000). Using the /3GB /USERVA=2900 switches we have this up to about 49,000.
    If anyone has had a similar experience or could offer some assistance it would be much appreciated!!!
    Cheers,
    Kye

    While investigating a different issue we've found that we have 3 servers that share the same set of disks on the SAN. Two of these where Message Servers (R/3 and BW) when both of these where running the 'Average disk queue Length' was at times reaching 400! (should be around 1-3).
    We've moved one of these instances back to DR which has relieved some of the pressure from the disks.
    We have also added another index to the GLPCA table (which was causing most of the problems).

  • Performance degradation after setting filesystemio_option=setall from none.

    Hi All,
    We have facing performance degradation after setting filesystemio_option=setall from none on my two servers as mentioned below.
    Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS release 4 (Nahant Update 7) 2.6.9 55.ELhugemem (32-bit)
    Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server release 5.2 (Tikanga) 2.6.18 92.1.10.el5 (64-bit)
    We are seeing lots of Disk I/O happening. We expected "*filesystemio_option=setall* " will improve performance but it is degrading. We getting slowness complains.
    Please let me know do we need to set somethign else along with this ...like any otimizer parameter( e.g. optimizer_index_cost_adj, optimizer_index_caching).
    Please help.

    Hi Suraj,
    <speculation>
    You switched filesystemio_options to setall from none, so, the most likely reason for performance degradation after switching to setall is the implementation of directio. Direct I/O will skip the filesystem buffer cache, and and allow Oracle to read directly from disk to the database buffer cache. However, on a system where direct I/O is not implemented, which is what you had until you recently messed with that parameter, it's likely that you had an undersized database buffer cache, but that was ok, because many (most) of the physical I/Os your database was doing, were actually being serviced by the O/S filesystem buffer cache. But, you introduced direct I/O, and wiped out the ability of the O/S to service any physical I/Os from filesystem buffer cache. This means that every cache miss on the database buffer cache, turns into a real, physical, spin-the-disk, move-the-drive-head, physical I/O. And, you are suffering the performance consequences.
    </speculation>
    Ok, end of speculation. Now, assuming that what I've outlined above is actually going on, what to do? Why is direct I/O lower performing than buffered, non-direct I/O? Shouldn't it's performance be superior?
    Well, when you have an established system that's using buffered I/O, and you switch to direct I/O, you almost always will have to increase the size of the database buffer cache. The problem is that you took a huge chunk of memory away from the the O/S, that it was using to buffer your I/Os and avoid physical I/O. So, now, you need to make up for it, by increasing the size of the database buffer cache. You can do this, without buying more memory for the box, because the O/S is no longer going to need to use so much memory for filesystem buffers.
    So, what to do? Is it worth switching? Well, on balance, it makes sense to use direct I/O, and give Oracle a larger database buffer cache, for the simple fact that (particularly on a server that's dedicated to being an Oracle database server), Oracle has far more sophisticated caching algorithms, and a better understanding of the various types of data being cached, and so should be able to make more efficient use of the memory, than the (relatively) brain dead caching algorithms of the kernel and filesystem mechanisms.
    But, once again, it all comes down to this:
    What problem are you trying to solve? Did you have any I/O related issues? Do you have any compelling reason to implement direct I/O? Rule #1 is "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." Did you just violate rule #1? :-)
    Finally, since you're on Linux, you can use the 'free' command to see how much memory is on the box, how much is free, and how much is dedicated to filesystem cache buffers. This response is already pretty long, so, I'm not going to get into details, however, if you're not familiar with the command, the results could be misleading. Read the man page, and try to be clear about understanding it before you make any assumptions about the output.
    Hope that helps,
    -Mark

  • HELP!!!! I NEED BACKUP FILES FOR A MOVIE THAT THIS KID DELETED!!!

    I'm in a high school class that is called E@ST. (Environmental and Spatial Technology) This kid got on the IMac and deleted this movie of a kid he hates. It was in IMovie. Is there any way I can find backup files or a ghost of it to restore? It was a class project.

    Hello and Welcome to Apple Discussions. 
    This is a little complicated any you'll need the IT staff to be onside to achieve it.
    Boot from an External Hard Drive - this reduces use of the internal drive. Any use of the Internal Hard Drive degrades the chance of recovering the iMovie project.
    Obtain and install Data Rescue II Demo - this free Demo version will at least tell you if recovery is possible.
    Use Data Rescue II (full version) to recover erased files to the external drive - again this minimizes use of the Internal Hard Drive.
    Copy the data back to the Internal only when you are confident you have recovered the missing files.
    Ideally your IT Staff have automatic back-up procedures in place and so should be able to restore the data to your accounts if you tell them the situation.
    Let us know how you get on.
    mrtotes

  • How do you move Lion from one physical drive to another?

    I've studied the forums & there's lots of discussion about having to install SL, then download Lion (again) then other thread says to copy the downloaded Lion (in the Apps folder) to an 8gb thumb drive, etc, etc.   I'm installing a new 512GB SSD in bay-4 so that's where I'd like to move Lion.
    Is RE-INSTALL really necessary to simply move it to another drive?   If not, please list the steps to move it.
    Many thanks for your thoughts and time.
    Dale

    Thank you there, Mr Linc Davis -- you're an officer and a gentleman!   I was sweating bullets there after my ORDEAL with the installation of Micro**** Windows-7.  I hate having my [blessed, holy] Mac polluted with anything Microsoft -- but unfortunately in life, sometimes you're forced to daily take a bite out of a s**t sandwich.
    For those of you planning to do this (as Linc said) -- here are the specifics:
    (1) Download current Lion (again -- it's free once you've paid for it).  As far as I know, there is no Lion disk (SnowLep yes).  The download will appear in your APPLICATION folder under INSTALL MAC OSX Lion.app (not your typical downloads folder).
    (2) After you've installed your SSD in a vacant slot, the existing Lion will take about 5 minutes to look at it thru it's crystal ball & casting out any demons found.
    (3) R-click the new target SSD and select GET INFO.   In the lower-right, click the LOCK icon to unlock the drive.  Enter admin password.  LEAVE the get-info window OPEN an active.
    (4) In your APPLICATIONS folder, launch the Install Mac OSX Lion.app & it should take about 3 minutes for PRE-install, reboot, & 10 minutes for FINAL install.
    (5) After installation, it will automatically reboot (again) and present you with a pane called Transfer Information to this Mac.  On the menu, select  FROM TIME MACHINE OR ANOTHER DISK.   It will present another pane showing you which checked items you want transferred (I chose all).   This took me about 40-45 minutes.  My highest regards to the Appple software enginners for their INTELLIGENT design of this simple-to-use transition tool.   Alternatively, the competition works on another planet (like I had to tell you Windows vetrans, eh?)
    (6) Post install (suggestions):  Delete your 4GB Lion install app in your APPLICATIONS folder (yep, it copied it over).  Rename your old folders (Applications, Library, System, Users)  and keep them around for a couple of weeks.  I plan to trash them later.
    This project was far more beneficial than I expected.  First, I read this Apple forum about SSD and installing operating systems.  Second,  I learned about something called TRIM.   I discovered that Lion would only activate TRIM if the SSD was a genuine APPLE SSD (not purchased out of your local bubble gum machine). So what the heck is TRIM anyway?   Here goes--
    When I got on the blower and talked with the Apple sales rep (his name actually pronouncable by humans -- even speaks English), I wound up breaking my piggy bank for $1500.   I asked him about TRIM.   He put me on hold to talk with one of the engineers.  5 minutes later he hit me with this:  "like old CRTs that used to burn a spot on the screen, the same concept applies to files stored on a SSD.  Since some files remain PERMANENT, performance degradation may occur if they remain in the same spot.  So TRIM technology seems to move things around a little", unquote.   Now some of you engineer nerds can probably elaborate better than I -- but that's not the scope of this note.
    I Bootcamped my 500GB SSD down the middle.   Windows-7 (64-bit) on one side, Lion on the other.  BOTTOM
    LINE: shock-your-finger response time.  I BLINK and iTunes or Safari are in my face.
    Best money I ever spent!
    Thanks guys for all your input, thoughts and TIME

Maybe you are looking for

  • HT1918 How do i remove a credit card from my apple ID account

    When i go to update my apps and programs on my phone it will not let me cause it says i have a credit card on file and there is a billing problem. My problem is i dont have a credit card and my daughter entered a bunch of random numbers. So now i can

  • MacBook odd DVI issue

    Hi All, I have a MacBook 2.2 ghz and have been using it successfully with the mini-dvi to dvi-hdmi cable for the past 3 weeks. I have a 50" Panasonic Plasma and it worked great. Yesterday (after not using it for about a week) I plugged it in and my M

  • Where do you set your UI Hints, EO or VO?

    Hi, While working with ADF-BC we always have 2 options, setting it inside VO or inside EO, where do you guys put them? I usually prefer to put it inside EO because of reuse, but I want to hear from someone that uses it inside VO his/her reasons to do

  • Outlook 2013 Search on Server 2008 R2 - non-functional

    The instant search on our Outlook 2013 is constantly turning up the "We couldn't find what you were looking for" message.  It is installed on Server 2008 R2 with Citrix providing desktops to our users. The PST files are being stored with the rest of

  • Performance and scratch disks

    hello! i am currently working with the follow: Mac Pro 3.5GHz 6-Core intel Xeon E5 64GB RAM 1867 MHz DDR3 500GB flash storage external G RAID 8TB thunderbolt my question is regarding my photoshop performance, recently i have been working on some mass