Also, does anyone know why it plays nearly fine once I rewatch it but not when I watch it the first time? All advice/answers still appreciated.

You can keep the uncompressed file to edit with, but to actually be able to watch the product, you need to make an encoded (XviD or other) version. Your problem is very common. I have yet to see a single computer that could possibly be able to play an uncompressed video file of such a large size. The fact is: you're not supposed to be able to!1commander wrote:I've read on this forum... from a certain persons signature, at least, that Premiere cannot use xvid and divx files. This is home footage so I hope to be able to use it once again in premiere. Will cutting it into divx or xvid stop me from doing this?
Also, does anyone know why it plays nearly fine once I rewatch it but not when I watch it the first time? All advice/answers still appreciated.The video is very very important to me.
Codec packs are evil, stay away from them as they often lead to far more problems than they solve (including, in some cases, total system failure).1commander wrote: I got an enormous codec pack just incased I didnt have the codec installed anymore (Ace Codec pack ~50meg) to see if that helped, but to no avail.
The problem is that unless you have enough RAM to handle loading a file that big (after accounting for software that's running on your computer) it won't run properly. You are supposed to edit with large losless codecs and export in large lossless codecs, but to view your project you need to compress it (VirtualDub makes a copy -- it dosn't destroy the origional, so you don't have to worry about losing anything).1commander wrote: Sorry for the incorrect starting information, but if anyone has any additional input with this new info, please please let me know. The video is very important. Thanks so much to all who have given advice so far!