PPT98: Narrations Lost When Saving Presentation as 4.0 (194989)


The information in this article applies to:

  • Microsoft PowerPoint 98 Macintosh Edition
This article was previously published under Q194989

SYMPTOMS

If you save a PowerPoint 98 presentation with recorded narration as a PowerPoint 4.0 file, it will only save the picture of the icon and not the sound.

PowerPoint 4.0 does not have the direct ability to play sounds, except by using QuickTime Movie. PowerPoint 98 does not convert the native PowerPoint sound objects into QuickTime Movie Sounds for some performance reasons.

In earlier versions of PowerPoint (such as PowerPoint 4.0), nothing happens while a sound is played because QuickTime needs all of the processing time. This means that a PowerPoint 98 presentation that used sound with a transition would not work with PowerPoint 4.0. Because of this, PowerPoint was designed not to convert the sound files into QuickTime Movie files.

WORKAROUND

How to Insert PowerPoint 98 Narrations into a PowerPoint 4.0 presentation:

When you click Record Narration from the Slide Show menu in a PowerPoint 98 presentation and save the presentation as a PowerPoint 4.0 file, PowerPoint will drop the narration in the presentation. In order to play the narration in a PowerPoint 4.0 file, you will need to link the narration to create a file on disk, convert the sound files to QuickTime sound, and embed the QuickTime sounds into the PowerPoint 4.0 presentation.

Steps :

  1. Open your PowerPoint 98 presentation to create a narration.
  2. Navigate to slide one.
  3. On the Slide Show menu, click Record Narration. In the record narration dialog box, check the option for Link Narrations In. This option will create a sound file for the narration created in the specified directory. Record the narration.
  4. Save the presentation in PowerPoint 4.0 file format. To do this, click Save As from the File menu. In the Save File as Type dialog box, click PowerPoint 4.0 Presentation. Give the presentation a name then click Save.
  5. Close the existing presentation and open the newly saved PowerPoint 4.0 file. You should see the inserted narrations being converted into pictures of the sound icon. Delete all of the sound icon pictures in the presentation.
  6. Navigate to the first slide in your PowerPoint 4.0 presentation.
  7. On the Insert menu, point to Movies and Sounds, and click Movie From File. Go to the same directory you chose in step 3. In this directory you will see sound files that are the narrations used in the PowerPoint 98 version of the file. The sound files will be labeled as: Narration as, with an associated number. The lowest number will be the first slide's narration. Select the proper narration you want to insert into the current slide of your presentation, then click on convert. This will convert the sound file into a QuickTime Sound file that will be embedded into the slide for this presentation.
  8. Complete step 7 until all narrations are embedded into every slide of your presentation.
  9. From the File menu, click Save.

MORE INFORMATION

Modification Type:MajorLast Reviewed:10/3/2002
Keywords:kbinfo KB194989
©2002 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.