I use Audacity to edit my radio show and I was about to do the same when I noticed this week it wouldn’t import MP3 files like it usually does because it stated an FFmpeg issue. Something I’ve never encountered before. When importing it was giving me stupidly long waiting times going up and up until I pressed “stop” and the issue notice showed up. I downloaded LAME as I believed this was the only option but the programme wouldn’t open and made no difference when trying to import audio. I uninstalled it and tried to export the project as an MP3 just as a test and then Audacity tells me the only way I can do this now is by having LAME.
Fortunately I didn’t lose any work as I was just testing things out but I’m worried I may never be able to export another project without it. Is this a vital part of Audacity now?
Get the program not the installer. The installer has Nagware.
When you start having problems in Windows, it’s a good time to make it stop hiding filename extensions. It may turn out your “MP3” files are really MyMusic.AC3 or something else.
I uninstalled it and tried to export the project as an MP3 just as a test and then Audacity tells me the only way I can do this now is by having LAME.
That is true! You don’t need LAME to open an MP3, but you do need it if you want to re-export to MP3.
Can you play the file in Windows Media Player?
If it’s some other format, FFmpeg can open almost any audio format. Make sure you Install FFmpeg by running ffmpeg-win-2.2.2.exe.
…BTW - As you probably know, MP3 is lossy compression. If you open an MP3 in Audacity (or any other “normal” audio editor) it gets decompressed. If you then re-export as MP3 you are going through another generation of lossy compression and the “damage” does accumulate.
If you’re stuck with MP3 originals the best you can do is minimize the number of times the file is compressed but ideally you should compress ONCE as the last step.
Hello Doug, thanks for your reply.
I have used Audacity for nearly a year. In that time I have imported and exported MP3 files with no problem and for the last few weeks I have been using the LAME encoder to help. Now I’ve ran into this issue again and nothing is working. I edit my radio shows on Audacity so I take the first and 2nd hour and then stick them together and take out any bits I’m not happy with however now I can’t even import the files properly which is a real concern. I can play the file in the windows media player both before and after I put it into Audacity usually.
Hi Koz
Thanks for your help. The file I put into Audacity is an hour long MP3 recording of a radio show. I’ve never had an issue until recently and I did get Audacity from the correct place. I’m just confused at this point!
Audacity cannot export as MP3 unless LAME is installed. I don’t see how it is possible that you were exporting MP3s for years unless you already had LAME installed.
Audacity does not require LAME or FFmpeg to import MP3. Audacity can handle importing MP3 natively.
What is the exact error message?
Which version of Windows?
Which version of Audacity? (look in “Help > About Audacity”)
Apologies for the late reply. For a few weeks all has been well! Until this week that is.
My audio files didn’t show originally when I put them onto this website. However I think I may know what the problem is now. Does Audacity usually have trouble importing from a memory stick? I have just tried copying the hour of audio to my laptop’s storage and importing from there. It has now worked in Audacity.
I did manage to upload the file to MediaInfo. I couldn’t upload a screenshot here but I copied what it said: Does anything look bad from this?
General
Complete name : 2018-10-22 07-00-00.mp3
Format : MPEG Audio
File size : 54.9 MiB
Duration : 59 min 59 s
Overall bit rate mode : Constant
Overall bit rate : 128 kb/s
Writing library : LAME3.98r
Audio
Format : MPEG Audio
Format version : Version 1
Format profile : Layer 3
Duration : 59 min 59 s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 128 kb/s
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 44.1 kHz
Frame rate : 38.281 FPS (1152 SPF)
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 54.9 MiB (100%)
Writing library : LAME3.98r
Encoding settings : -m s -V 4 -q 3 -lowpass 17 -b 128
General
Complete name : 2018-10-22 07-00-00.mp3
Format : MPEG Audio
File size : 54.9 MiB
Duration : 59 min 59 s
Overall bit rate mode : Constant
Overall bit rate : 128 kb/s
Writing library : LAME3.98r
Audio
Format : MPEG Audio
Format version : Version 1
Format profile : Layer 3
Duration : 59 min 59 s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 128 kb/s
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 44.1 kHz
Frame rate : 38.281 FPS (1152 SPF)
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 54.9 MiB (100%)
Writing library : LAME3.98r
Encoding settings : -m s -V 4 -q 3 -lowpass 17 -b 128
My version of Windows is 1803 of Windows 10
My version of Audacity is 2.2.2
The error seems to once again have fixed itself temporarily. As soon as I see it again I’ll tell you exactly what it says. This is very strange as the issue comes and goes. I can go weeks without seeing an error message and then suddenly it appears when I try to import a file
The obsessives out here will immediately start writing down and graphing variables such as show size, frequency of failure and humidity, but I think I would start with a nice clean Windows shutdown (Shift-Shutdown) and then, when you start it, do that deep virus scan where you can’t use the machine for several hours. Have you done one of those?
If you have Spinning Metal hard drives you might want to check optimization or DeFragmenting. Solid State Drives don’t benefit as much from optimization.
Thanks Koz, I’ll try the deep virus scan. I don’t think I have any Spinning Metal hard drives. The thing is I am still able to edit my shows, sometimes it can be a case of closing and reopening Audacity. The problem is occuring much less frequently now
