Audacity Constantly Crashing

Starting last week, I have had Audacity crashing on me a ridiculous amount, and it’s becoming infuriating. I keep trying to send the crash report via the app, but it’s not working. Here is the report: Audacity Crash Message - Google Documenten

It keeps saying that I have an AMD CPU, but I have Intel.

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I’ve reported this but to no avail. It seems developers are more interested in adding frills than resolving long-standing issues - especially the inability to submit crash reports. Mine too says I have AMD but it is Intel. I wish someone in authority would acknowldege and own the issue until resolution.

Ridiculous being any number one or higher.

A couple of notes: When an application crashes in Windows, it loses control and can leave trash lying around—which can invite more crashes—more trash—more crashes. It’s best to do a clean shutdown when something like that happens. Ctl/Alt/Del > Hold Shift while you Shut Down > OK. This will take longer than either regular Shutdown or Restart because it scrubs and cleans out more things.

Was this right after you upgraded to Audacity 3.6.1? I’m not a fan of the 3.6 versions yet. I found some tool errors that can seriously affect the work. I dropped back to 3.4.2. You should try that, too.

Are you sure you have the right Audacity installer? I got this wrong yesterday (caffeine deprivation) and I’m not a New User.

Do you connect to cloud services or network drives around the house? Audacity doesn’t like that very much. Keep all Audacity activities on the local drive and close Audacity if you need to shuffle work or files around. You can use Google One Drive all you want, you just can’t let Audacity see you do it.

But wait! I hear you say. Audacity is advertising cloud storage! Yes, but if you pay attention, it’s not part of the regular file services. It’s a separate, carefully controlled connection scheme, it’s only to audio.com, and it’s only for Audacity Projects, not for any other type of file.

And way down the list is machine health. How much room do you have on your drive? Even when it seems to be enough (and you did a clean shutdown), when was the last time you did a defragmentation? Windows doesn’t save files, or it does, but only when new. After some use Windows starts saving fragments. Portions of files Windows puts wherever they will fit. That gets worse and worse as the machine ages. Windows spends more and more of its time remembering where everything is and less and less time recording your audiobook, for example.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/defragment-your-windows-10-pc-048aefac-7f1f-4632-d48a-9700c4ec702a

Note this isn’t a push a button, get a clean machine, and we’re done. Windows does it in stages and each stage can take a while. Last time I did it, Windows tells you how it’s doing. You don’t have to crank it all the way back to Factory Fresh. Any cleaning you do is welcome

Then, when the machine is roomy and clean, roll it back to Audacity 3.4.2 and see if that works OK.

Koz

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Note if you start a defragmentation and the drive has a lot of work on it, defragmentation may be done when the sun cools off. Make sure you have a lot of room before defrag.

Koz

Hi Koz, I get new versions from the pop-up within Audacity upon load and .exe them from Downloads, so I presume I have the right installer. Thanks for the tip about a clean shutdown, which I’ll do the next time it happens.

Brian

The full shutdown isn’t working. It started just before 3.6 came out, and Audacity was updated straight from the application itself.

On mine 3.6.0 pile of cack it allowed the screensaver and Norton to come on in the middle of recording the community radio DAB version of the Heritage Chart on Countywide which is on a lot earlier than every other version when they air the correct one that week that is and thrown me a crash log 2 tracks from the end so recovery was no good as the number one was already on by resuming time.

However in real working conditions in 3.6.1 so far it seems to have kept it locked onto the Audacity screen screensaver and Norton not going off and no crash error log in recording with real conditions so far so good on Windows 10 Computer Loaded OEM Home Version x64.

But I still fear although it didn’t crash in test conditions in a few hours before it starts it might crash when the chart gets here and I have to go distorted quality Countywide On Demand again as can’t listen to it on Heritage Chart Radio it’s the same time as Legacy Chart which become pay per listen on demand.

I am unfortunately experiencing a lot of crashing as well. Audacity 3.6.1.
Windows 11 Pro Version 10.0.22631 Build 22631

On the bright side, crash recovery actually works really well when I load it up again. I can usually start where I left off.

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I have the same problem. I record a lot on Sunday nights, 6+ hours, 2 files. Lately some, or like today, all the recordings vanish. No error codes. Can’t send a report back.
I’ve used Audacity for years with no problem. Since I updated I’ve lost more recordings than I’ve kept.
The recovery panel will come up. I click on finish and get nothing.
Is there a way to reinstall an earlier version?

I can predict your next posting. “Audacity Crash Recovery failed on a really important show. What am I going to do?”

Crashes are not normal. I would step back to the last Audacity that worked OK. Mine was 3.4.2.

You can get older Audacity installers here.

When you get the replacement installed, Tools > Reset Configuration.

Koz

Thank you for the tip! I will definitely give that a shot!

Luckily I’ve learned my lesson over the years and for important sessions, I’ll simultaneously record into a field recorder just in case.

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