[ddouglass]

By DJ view I am assuming you are talking about the preview that is normally in the upper left corner of the Hoster main window. Anyway, I was having to same sync problem on my home computer that I use to beta test with and no matter what I did it would not sync. My show machine did not have this problem. The current beta for 4.02 that we have been testing fixed this, so they are on the right track.
I never thought about trying a different resolution for the screen.
It really doesn't matter how many programs you have installed on your computer, but how many background processes you let run while you are using Hoster. I turn off or prevent from starting on boot up many of the programs that try, such as Real Player, Quicktime, Office, Roxio, etc. Seems they all try to start small background controls just so they can open their programs a little faster if you call on them. These are not necessary and don't really speed up their operation any noticable difference.