Potentially Corrupt File? (Audio Quality Suddenly Changed)

Audacity Help Forum Windows
1

Hi there, I’ve been using Audacity for a while now. (I’m a vocalist who records for YouTube.) I currently have a project that I’ve been working on saved on my computer, but when I reopened the saved project to continue recording, the audio quality of the recordings was suddenly terrible upon both playback and export. I record with a Yeti Blue USB and I listen to every line after I record, so I know that there wasn’t any issue as I was recording. I reopened Audacity and recorded a test line in a blank project to see if the entire program was messed up, but everything was fine in the new blank project. To further explain, it suddenly sounds like the entire project was recorded over a long distance telephone line - even the backing track that had been imported into the project (which was not recorded using Audacity). I’m kind of panicking because I really loved how these vocals were turning out… Is there any way to fix this? If anyone needs further sound quality reference, I can add a Google Drive link of the audio file. I also copied the error log and it contains the following:

20:00:01: Audacity 3.1.3
20:00:01: sqlite3 message: (1) no such table: project in “SELECT 1 FROM project LIMIT 1;”
20:00:01: Error: Failed to load shared library ‘avformat-58.dll’ (error 126: The specified module could not be found.)
20:00:01: Error: Failed to load avformat-58.dll (error 126: The specified module could not be found.)
20:00:01: Error: Failed to load shared library ‘avformat-57.dll’ (error 126: The specified module could not be found.)
20:00:01: Error: Failed to load avformat-57.dll (error 126: The specified module could not be found.)
20:00:01: Error: Failed to load shared library ‘avformat-55.dll’ (error 126: The specified module could not be found.)
20:00:01: Error: Failed to load avformat-55.dll (error 126: The specified module could not be found.)

However, I was under the impression that missing .dll files would affect the function of the program in its entirety, but the program runs fine. It’s just the one project that I’m having issues with.

2

This is a spurious error message that everybody gets and is not indicative of anything wrong with your project. Perhaps the developers should be asked to remove this message from the log. :smiley:

3

I can add a Google Drive link of the audio file.

That might help…

And the avformat “errors” are really just a warning that you haven’t installed (or it can’t find) the OPTIONAL FFmpeg Import/Export library. FFmpeg is ONLY used to open or create file formats that are not natively supported by Audacity.

4

I am putting this out because I had an issue of clipping on playback after upgrading to version 3.1.3. I had upgraded over the previous version. I solved the problem by completely uninstalling Audacity, removing the folder in Programs, and then reinstalling fresh. Works fine now. (Windows 10)

5

Glad to hear it is all working now. Thanks for the report back. :smiley: