Audacity Forum

(Pardon me if I'm posting this in the wrong place.)

One of the things I love about Audacity is that it is one of the few that support multi-channel (more than 2ch) wave files.

Unfortunately, there's a problem. If I try to load a REALLY large (over 1GB) multi-channel wave, Audacity only loads the first 25% or so.

I'm guessing that Audacity has a "buffer" of some sort that fills up quickly if the wave has more than 2 channels, so it only loads until the buffer gets full. Anyone else experience this problem? Anyone know of a fix or work-around?

The maximum size of a single uncompressed audio file that can be addressed in 32 bit is about 2GB. It may be that you are running up against this limit. There is no workaround on a 32 bit computer. Not sure if you have 64 bit hardware and a 64 bit OS.

Thanks for the reply.

I thought the problem was related to # of channels, and thought it occurred around 1GB, but I had no way of confirming it.

I'm using a 64bit Athlon64 X2, but with 32bit WinXP Pro, so I'm hitting that limit.

I'm trying to edit a huge 4+ GB surround sound file (AC3 to WAV conversion because I know of no AC3 cut/paste editor), but can not load the entire thing. It would be nice then if I could load/edit it in chunks if this is the case.

Any idea if I would I have the same problem with Audacity under a 64bit version of Linux?

Mugsy wrote:Any idea if I would I have the same problem with Audacity under a 64bit version of Linux?

I think I remember reading that someone tried that and it fixed the problem, but I may have dreamt it
If you have the chance, perhaps you could try it and let us know.

stevethefiddle wrote:If you have the chance, perhaps you could try it and let us know.

The new ver8 of Ubuntu comes out in just under a month. I use the 32bit v7.10 now but rather than waste time d/l'ing the 64bit v7.10, I'll just wait for v8.

Is there a separate 64bit version of Audacity for Linux I must use?

Mugsy wrote:The new ver8 of Ubuntu comes out in just under a month.

Cool - I wonder if they will include Audacity built against the latest Portaudio (with support for JACK).

Mugsy wrote:Is there a separate 64bit version of Audacity for Linux I must use?

I don't think so, but there may be some 64 bit specific patches, so probably best to just use the default installation (or use Synaptic if not installed by default).