[This article was first published in the May, 2007, issue of
Larry's Final Cut Pro Newsletter. Click here to subscribe.]

Here's a technique to try when Final Cut Pro won't open.

Many Final Cut Pro plug-ins were written exclusively for the PowerPC processor. As FCP is opening, it checks all it's plug-ins to make sure everything is OK. If you have moved PowerPC plug-ins to an Intel/Mac, FCP will often freeze as it tries to figure out how to deal with these older plug-ins.

The long-term solution, of course, is to upgrade your plug-ins so they support both PowerPC and Intel processors. But that won't help you while Final Cut is freezing during start-up.

What you need to do is remove the offending plug-ins. While deleting them is a permanent, though somewhat drastic, solution, all you really need to do is move them where FCP can't find them. Then, later, you can figure out which of these is causing the problem.

You will find Final Cut plug-ins stored in:

[Macintosh HD] > Library > Application Support > Final Cut Pro System Support > Plugins.

Open the Plugins folder and drag the contents outside of the Library folder. Final Cut should then start up with no problems.

If you want to find out which plug-in is causing the problem, quit Final Cut, then add only a few plugins at a time back into the Plugins folder and restart FCP. When it freezes again, the offending plugin will be one of the most recently added files to the plugin folder. Keep repeating this process until you find the offending plugin(s).

Larry Jordan is a post-production consultant and an Apple-Certified Trainer in Digital Media with over 25 years experience as producer, director and editor with network, local and corporate credits. Based in Los Angeles, he's a member of both the Directors Guild of America and the Producers Guild of America.

The information in this article is believed to be accurate at the time of publication. However, the author assumes no liability in case things go wrong. Please use your best judgment in applying these suggestions.

The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author. This newsletter has not been reviewed or sanctioned by Apple or any other third party. All trademarks are the property of their respective owners and are mentioned here for editorial purposes only.

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