Catalina 10.15.7 Audacity 3.0.4-Intel neither playback nor recording working

Audacity Help Forum macOS
1

Running a late 2013 MacBook Pro with Catalina 10.15.7 and audacity-macos-3.0.4-Intel. Get error -9997 both in trying to record with the built-in microphone (only input source I’ve tried) or playback of AIFF, WAV and mp3 files I’ve opened in Audacity. Checked in System Preference Security & Privacy and Audacity has permission to use the built-in microphone. I also checked the settings in Audio MIDI Setup and tried all the bit-rate selections for 44.1 kHz sample rate for both the mic and built-in speakers with no success. In Audacity preferences I have the Devices set to built-in microphone and built-in speakers and in Quality Sampling I have 24 bit 44.1 kHz. When I try to record I get the message “Error opening recording device. Error code: -9997 Invalid sample rate” and below that in the diagnostic box headed with Problem details:

{
“timestamp”: 1630377022,
“event_id”: “df0a79fe7aed435b84e7c56c245250cb”,
“platform”: “native”,
“release”: “audacity@3.0.4”,
“contexts”: {
“os”: {
“type”: “os”,
“name”: “Macintosh”,
“version”: “10.15.7”
}
},
“exception”: {
“values”: [
{
“type”: “Error”,
“value”: “Error opening recording device.\nError code: -9997 Invalid sample rate.”,
“mechanism”: {
“type”: “runtime_error”,
“handled”: false
}
}
]
}
}

When I open any AIFF, WAV or mp3 file and try to play it I get the message: Error opening sound device. Try changing the audio host, playback device and the project sample rate. The problem details box has the following:

{
“timestamp”: 1630377602,
“event_id”: “8ef7b4fd19bc4310abcc3f65caf1b5cd”,
“platform”: “native”,
“release”: “audacity@3.0.4”,
“contexts”: {
“os”: {
“type”: “os”,
“name”: “Macintosh”,
“version”: “10.15.7”
}
},
“exception”: {
“values”: [
{
“type”: “Error”,
“value”: “Error opening sound device.\nTry changing the audio host, playback device and the project sample rate.”,
“mechanism”: {
“type”: “runtime_error”,
“handled”: false
}
}
]
}
}

Any help getting recording and playback working will be greatly appreciated.

2

Have you tried changing to 16-bit?

– Bill

3

Have you tried changing to 16-bit?

What he said. Start with plain, ordinary configurations and work up. 44100 sampling rate and 16-bit stereo is the configuration for Audio CD. Everything supports it, even if it says on the box much higher values.

Because Audacity comes out of the shrink wrap set for overdubbing, you also have to get the playback settings right—even if you don’t use them.

Audacity used to ignore a sound device if you got the Stereo/Mono setting wrong.

Koz

4

Got the sampling rate at 44.1 kHz and tried 16 bit, 24 bit and 32 bit floating in the Quality setting in the Audacity preferences all with the same result when trying to record. Audio recording works fine in Quicktime and I have no problems with Skype and Garageband, so Core Audio seems to work fine.

It’s frustrating since I’ve been using Audacity for a long time on many Macs and versions of MacOS and never had any problems, particularly showstoppers like this.

5

There is something I just noticed and wonder if it provides any clues. In Audacity Help menu Diagnostics Audio Device Info has nothing after Supported Rates for both the built-in microphone and built-in output.

6

Downloaded Ocenaudio and both recording using the built-in microphone and playback using the built-in speakers of recording in it and imported files works great.