*NO* version of Audacity works for me in Windows 10

Audacity 3 Help Forum Windows
21

Well, that was my hole card…

So, if I were to speculate, its likely something you did in January:

Could it be you started using a network or cloud drive - they can cause havoc with Audacity.

Are you having storage capacity issues - possibly using a compressed drive?

Did you install Wondershare, Filmora, or Uniconverter in January ?

So that puts you at going back to review Steve’s posts, starting with this one:

22

Thanks, well to respond to your questions:

“Could it be you started using a network or cloud drive - they can cause havoc with Audacity.”

I have been using a network almost constantly with Audacity, well before these problems started popping up.

“Are you having storage capacity issues - possibly using a compressed drive?”

I am not using a compressed drive and do not have storage issues.

“Did you install Wondershare, Filmora, or Uniconverter in January ?”

I did not install any of those. I have no idea how Wondershare got on there.

So that puts you at going back to review Steve’s posts, starting with this one:
steve wrote: ↑Sun Apr 18, 2021 10:47 am

“Are you able to generate a tone? (Generate menu > Tone)
If so, can you play it?”

Yes, I can generate a tone and play it. However, I cannot export the tone or save it.

Any further suggestions?
Thanks

23

That’s worrying.
Probably worth giving your computer a thorough test for malware.

24

If no virus, then uninstall Wondershare : Start > Settings > Apps > Wondershare, etc. > Uninstall

and remove it from your startup suite: Start > Settings > Apps > Startup

25

Hi, I want to thank you all for your patience in dealing with this. I uninstalled Wondershare, checked for viruses, rebooted, ran Audacity, and once again whenever I try to open a project*, import anything, save anything, or export anything, I get the same error message - although now the report is sent to C:\Users\Brian\AppData\Local\Temp, which is where it should have been sent to all along I guess.

Any other ideas, please? Am I really the only one who’s ever had this problem?

In gratitude,
Brian

*I should reiterate that I CAN open a project if I select it in Explorer, and click “Open.” Which tells me the problem has something to do with how Audacity interacts with Windows, specifically for file options.

26

Good. At least we have a little progress. It would seem that Wondershare was overriding the Windows default temp location in some way.

I’ve never seen that problem / symptom with the debug report going to the wrong place, so for that particular issue, yes you appear to be unique.


So what exactly is it that you do that triggers the crash?

27

What triggers the crash is from inside Audacity, opening a project or importing a file, or saving a project or exporting a file, So I can’t open anything I’ve done, or save any work I’ve done.

Thanks

28

Please try this and let us know what happens:

  1. Move the “chirp.wav” file that I posted here to your Desktop.
  2. Reboot your computer
  3. Do NOT open the Windows “File Explorer”.
  4. Launch Audacity.
  5. “File menu > Import > Audio”
  6. Navigate to the Desktop and select the “chirp.wav” file
  7. Click the “open” button to import the file.

What exactly happens and when?

29

Hi Steve,
OK, I did steps 1-4, but when I try step 5, what happens is what always happens, I get the same old error screen and Audacity shuts down. I don’t even get a Navigator tab to select the file for importing. As a side note, if from within Audacity, I use the keypress option for importing a file, Ctl-Shift-I, Audacity shuts down without going to the error screen or generating an error report.

I don’t know if this sheds any light whatsoever on the problem.

Thanks again,
Brian

30

Not much, but everything seems to be pointing towards something on your computer shutting down Audacity as soon as it attempts file access.

When you installed Audacity, were you logged in as “Brian”?
What security apps run on your computer?

31

I have uninstalled and installed Audacity several times, most commonly logged in as “Brian” - I may have been logged in as the administrator a time or two, I’m not sure.

As for security, I just use the standard packages that come with Windows 10. If there is a good third-party package that you think might spot things Windows doesn’t, I’ll certainly give it a try.

I should also add that Audacity worked fine until sometime in January (when I first posted to this forum). I can’t really think of any event that happened then which might have precipitated this - and no other program has these issues.

Thanks

32



Also, consider the possibility that you have two versions of Audacity loaded on your computer. Can you get the version number “Help > About” from Audacity when
(1) when you start Audacity manually and you have crashing problems, and
(2) when you select the project with Explorer and click Open and it seems to work?

33

Hi, nice idea. But in both cases it’s Audacity 3.0.0 (presumably the same version).

34

The standard Windows tools should be sufficient.
I was only asking because we have previously seen cases where 3rd party security products have blocked Audacity. I was checking that is not the case here.


Ah yes, I thought this was sounding familiar. This post: https://forum.audacityteam.org/t/debug-report/57251/14

This line looks significant:

15:39:32: Error: File 'C:\Users\Brian\AppData\Local\Audacity\SessionData\project28123\e00\d04' couldn't be removed (error 5: access is denied.)

“Error 5: access is denied” means that the application does not have the necessary privileges to access the location. That looks like the same issue as in this topic. However, Audacity, running with “Brian” privileges, should have read / write access everywhere that the user “Brian” has read/write access.

There’s an article here about setting the privileges for an app. https://www.howtogeek.com/368598/how-to-manage-app-permissions-on-windows-10/
Audacity must have (at least) permission to access the microphone, and permission to access Documents.

35

Hey there,
Well, I tried to do what the link you sent suggested, but OF COURSE, I cannot alter permissions in my stupid version of Windows - right-clicking the app in the Start menu does not bring up an “App settings” options, and going to the Start menu and right-clicking does not bring up an “Advanced Options” (Christ, Windows is a POS). I did go in Explorer and right click on Audition, which brought up Properties, and I went to that, and in theSecurity Tab gave full access to all users. Now of course, this didn’t solve the problem (even after rebooting) and I just get an annoying message on starting up Audacity asking if I want to allow this app to make changes.

FYI, I was doing all this as an administrator

I am really at my wits end. I don’t want to have to buy a new computer (how does Audacity run on Mac?).

Thanks

36

You don’t have a virus on your machine, do you?

You could try booting up in Windows safe mode - I don’t even know if Audacity would run in safe mode, and I don’t know what that would tell us one way or the other: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/start-your-pc-in-safe-mode-in-windows-10-92c27cff-db89-8644-1ce4-b3e5e56fe234

So 3.0.2 came out today. As far as I know it contains no magic for you.

Do you want to try uninstalling Audacity? Make sure it is really gone. Try to start it up both ways. Then delete all the Audacity directories.
Then delete all the Audacity directories under C:\Program Files (x86)\

Then try downloading 3.0.2 from here: https://www.audacityteam.org/download/windows/

37

Not sure, but I think that the permissions thing is the correct approach.
Which folder’s permissions did you edit through the security tab?
Also you may deactivate the message described above in control panel.

38

Thanks,
The permissions I modified in the Security tab were (I made them all yes):
Full Control
Modify
Read & Execute
Read
Write

Then there was tab to go to “Special Permissions” but I clicked on that it brought up about three more screens I had no idea about. So I didn’t do anything. It shouldn’t need any special permission, should it?

BTW, as to whether Audacity has permission to use the microphone, the answer is yes (at least I can record tracks from the mike - I just can’t save them).

39

Sorry, I didn’t want to mean “which folder’s permissions” but “which folders permissions” (I mean, the permissions of which folders).

40

I set those by going to the C:\Program Files (x86)\Audacity folder and right-clicking on the Audacity app. I guess I thought those permissions would extend to whatever directories the program was trying to access. Is that not the case, and if so, does it matter?
Thanks