So, I am on version 3.7.3. It, the help window, says I am on the latest version.
I’m using windows 11. Every since I’ve done the update, it’s been a while, this thing is constantly crashing in the middle of working. Gives me the report option but never sends a crash report.
Anyone know WTF is going on here? This is really getting on my last nerve.
I am by no means a professional. Like most, I’m basically a hobbyist. But the older versions NEVER did this. It’s almost so bad I’m ready to delete the program and try to find a 6 year old version. At least I didn’t constantly loose hours of work
NB: If you want more than one version of Audcaity on your computer you must keep them separate. Don’t install, unzip into it’s own folder, and create a portable settings folder therein.
If you install 2 versions of Audacity they will overwrite each others confg data and corruption will ensue.
Also note Audacity projects are not backwards compatible .
It very frequently crashes (and does not recover as with past versions on the rare times it did crash) then file losing all the editing work plus the file itself. I then have to go to my original from my “recording computer.” One thing that causes a crash if I plug or unplug a headphone. Having converted most on my files I use to the new format, otherwise I would return to the previous version. I often brag about how Audacity stands up to Audition, etc but this version is very unstable compared to past versions. I use it weekly to produce a NPR radio show plus I do radio promos and VO work. I have on several occasions lost a great deal of my editing work and the file is unreadable and unrecoverable with me going back to the original copy on my other computer and start over. FYI I am using a Win11 Pro 64bit Intel(R) Core™ Ultra 7 165H 1.40 GHz 64GB RAM with a 5GB internal SSD.
Are you running entirely on the internal drive? Audacity can be super unstable if you make it share files and process data on an external drive.
The farther away, the worse. Most hard-wired external drives (USB/FireWire) can work OK, but the instant you graduate to a home network, you can get into trouble.
Cloud drives can cause constant problems.
Audacity naturally assumes any drive it can see can be used for any job, no matter how delicate, sensitive, or accident prone.
If you split off your external drives and your internal drive can’t support the show, then you may have discovered the second problem. I think it’s still true that Audacity makes a copy of the whole current show each time you make an edit. If you make a mistake and have to Edit > UNDO, Audacity doesn’t unscramble the last edit, it just plays back the last show.
That can scarf up memory in a hurry for a long show.
I always edit on my internal C drive then Save all my completed files to external drive (every radio show is 58:30min and about 1.3GB). If I need to perform further edits, I copy it back to my internal C drive. Previously if I had a crash, Audacity did a great job of recovery and now it loses the whole file. I have gotten to the place where I SAVE after almost every edit.
The only serious problem I know of is going too far back does not support audio.com external drive.
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Have you ever done a Clean Windows Shutdown? Restart and regular Shutdown don’t close everything. They leave a lot of settings and configurations running to make startup Snappy and Quick.
This can be a problem if something in that retained bundle is broken. That “broken” can hang around forever.
The short version is hold the SHIFT key while shutting down.
One more. If you do decide to go with another Audacity, Delete the current Audacity and also delete the saved configurations and settings. I don’t know how to do that on windows.
This might add another piece to the puzzle… I have similar issues with 3.7.3 running on Ubuntu Linux 24.04.2 LTS. It freezes then shuts down during recording sessions. There doesn’t seem to be a specific trigger. Sometimes it will crash after 5 minutes, never makes it to 1 hour. Hardware is Intel Core i5, 4GB RAM, 500GB SSD. I always do everything on the internal SSD. Like other posters, reverting to an older version isn’t a good option since nothing I’ve done since upgrading will transfer. So far it hasn’t happened while editing but I have avoided putting a long recording on this machine. If there are Linux gurus on this forum, maybe they can shed some light.