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Audio and Video Questions and Answers

"How can I get an HP HDX Dragon for free?"

I haven't actually received that question from any readers (yet), but I'm offering a preemptive answer here because I'm sure you'd love to find out how you could get one of these sweet machines. If you've been following along on my blog, I've posted updates on each of the participants in the 31 Days of the Dragon giveaway to date. Today's the day I'm going to share the rules for my giveaway.

I'm keeping it simple, you simply need to share your opinion on the best Windows freeware in a series of categories, as well as provide a valid name and email address. A random winner shall be picked from everyone who submits valid answers to the survey. Your pick in each of the categories must be a verifiable spyware-free no-cost software application, so be sure you spell the software's name correctly. The winner will be posted to my blog at approximately 11 pm Pacific on 2008 May 22. You are welcome to enter from any country HP is legally allowed to ship to. All fields in the survey are required.

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"I have a Sony AVCHD camcorder. iMovie doesn't recognize the camcorder files. How can I edit the files on my AVCHD camcorder with my Mac?"

AVCHD support has been inconsistent for both Mac and Windows users. The format varies slightly depending on whether your camera is from Sony, Panasonic, or Canon. For Mac users, software support varies depending on which versions of iMovie, Final Cut Express, or Final Cut Pro you happen to be running. I personally prefer Final Cut Express to iMovie for editing on a Mac, but the correct version of either will work.

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"I want to connect my Blu-ray player (PS3) to my monitor. The monitor only has a VGA input. What would I need to convert the HDMI out on my PS3 to a VGA connection?"

One of the key challenges in converting HDMI to VGA is maintaining support for HDCP, which creates a protected signal path from Blu-ray players to a monitor as a means of preventing copying. There are a number of converters that will connect an HDMI cable to a VGA port, but anytime HDCP is present, instead of rendering the video signal, you get a black screen on the monitor. To avoid the black screen, you need a converter that includes support for HDCP.

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Michelle writes, "My aunt wants the Internet however she doesn't want a phone line and she doesn't want cable. Do you know of any internet installation with this kind of setup?"

Piggybacking Internet service as DSL over a phone line or high speed cable service are the two easiest ways to have Internet access, although they aren't the only solutions. Depending on where your aunt lives, there may be several ways for her to access the Internet without either of these more traditional Internet access solutions.

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"When you copy HD video from a camcorder to a DVD, do you have to playback on a HD-DVD player or will it play back on a standard DVD player?"

It really depends on the format you choose for your DVD whether the DVD you burn will play in a standard DVD player, or whether you need an HD-DVD player in order to watch your DVD creation. If you have an HD-DVD player, the method I describe for burning HD-DVDs on standard DVD media will result in DVDs that only play in HD-DVD drives. Your other option is to output your HD content as a standard definition video during the authoring process. Here's how this works:

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"How can I sync my AOL account with my BlackBerry device without using Outlook or any other email desktop client?"

AOL offers a wireless sync solution your AOL calendar and contacts without needing Outlook or any other desktop email client. Both Blackberry users and Palm users can benefit from this solution. All you need to do is install the AOL Sync software on your Blackberry and configure which features of your Blackberry calendar and contacts you want to sync with AOL.

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"I have audio files from my band's recording session that I want to put on YouTube. Every time I try to upload the files YouTube gives me an invalid file format error. I've tried both MP3 and WMA formats with the same error message. How can I upload my band's MP3 music tracks to YouTube?"

While YouTube may be among the best places on the Internet to find music by your favorite artist, it is not a music site. YouTube is a video site. The YouTube upload tool expects you to upload a video file format of some kind. YouTube specifically accepts MP4, MPG, AVI, MOV and WMV file formats. For your music files (or something like spoken audio from a speech) to upload successfully to YouTube, you need to convert it to a video format. Below are options that will make a video file with software from either a Mac or Windows PC.

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