Trouble Opening WAV file for Editing

[kozikowski]

Plays fine in Los Angeles. Perfectly well behaved WAV file just short of two seconds long.

No there aren't any girls here, they all went home.

Koz

[cetacean_dreams]

Plays fine for me, too, anywhere but from the inside of Audacity.

And the MP3 version, exported to MP3 mere seconds after its WAV cousin was exported to WAV, can be opened and edited in Audacity with no problem.

I have been monkeying with personal computers since an Apple II in 1984, and this is one of the most peculiar conundrums I have encountered. Pity, too, because I would dearly love to move to Audacity for all of my audio needs.

Why can't a high-quality ripper be incorporated that will let me rip my CDs to WAV and MP3? That is the other thing I do a lot of.

And I think I mentioned that Audacity will not open a WAV, for editing, that came from foreign programs either.

[billw58]

OK, here's a shot in dark. Reset Audacity preferences. You had 1.2.6 then moved up to 1.3.x and the problem followed you. Getting rid of the 1.2.6 config file can be tricky on Windows, but editing the 1.3.x audacity.cfg file so that Audacity thinks it's starting over is not hard. If you do this Audacity will ignore the 1.2.6 config file.

Go to Documents and Settings<user name>Application DataAudacityaudacity.cfg

You may need to turn on visibility of hidden files (Steve?). Open audacity.cfg in a plain text editor. Remove all content except the one line "NewPrefsInitialized=1" and save. You will lose all of your customization, including the location of the LAME library, so you may want to save a copy of the file somewhere before you edit it, or print it out.

Like I said, a shot in the dark. Best of luck.

-- Bill

[kozikowski]

<<<Best of luck.>>>

Indeed. And on the other computer? Remember this happened to the same person on two different computers. What's wrong with this picture?

I never got an answer to "what did you bring with you between the old computer and the new?" Video card, network card, sound card? Did you download a fresh Audacity?

<<<Why can't a high-quality ripper be incorporated that will let me rip my CDs to WAV and MP3?>>>

Because the developers have enough trouble keeping up with software that doesn't exist anywhere else. CDex is a snap in Windows. I even use it -- when I'm not on the Mac. Remember Audacity works on all three major computer types in a million languages. Any change involves vast effort on the part of the developer community and ripping CDs is very old news.

Unless, of course, you want to help.

Koz

[steve]

You may need to turn on visibility of hidden files (Steve?).

Open a file browser window
Tools > Folder Options > View"
Enable "Show hidden files and folders"
Also disable "Hide extensions for known file types"

As Koz says, having the same problem on 2 computers makes it a long shot - unless perhaps you moved your old hard drive into the new computer or something like that.

[cetacean_dreams]

Thank you so much for your replies. I have done fresh installs more than once. I will completely uninstall both Audacities (I kept 1.2.6 laying around when I upgraded) and run all my "cleaning" utilities before a totally fresh install including Lame. I have no problem doing that, and also I do format and clean every 2-3 years, anyway (my friend says the guys in his tech dept call that a "nuke & pave".

To answer the question about what followed me from old to new computers, I can't exactly remember but the Creative sound card may have. I have had 3 since about 2001, each much stronger than the previous one. Currently I have the X-Fi Elite Pro which has a huge card an an outboard box as well. As I migrate computers, I do bring along the latest and greatest sound card, but I think that getting this new card was part of what precipitated building the new computer a couple of years ago.

I will let you know if that works.

thanks again

[billw58]

I will completely uninstall both Audacities

Uninstalling and reinstalling the programs won't result in a "clean" install. You need to trash or edit audacity.cfg. In your case, since you've had (or still have) 1.2.6 on your machine, even if you trash audacity.cfg (the 1.3.x config file), Audacity 1.3.x will pick up "common" settings from the 1.2.6 config file. And that may be where the weirdness lies. So you best bet, I believe, is to edit the audacity.cfg file as noted previously.

-- Bill

[cetacean_dreams]

Bill -

WAH - HOO !

It worked. I can finally edit an existing WAV file in Audacity!

I did the uninstall/reinstall thing (no 1.2.6 any more) but I also cleaned out the config file. Boy, that is a huge file that builds up fast. That must have been where the problem was. I can hardly imagine how it has followed me through the years, I thought I always rebuilt things like config files whenever I did a reinstall.

Anyway, if the problem comes back, hopefully I will know how to fix it.

Thank you so very much for your help!

Harry

[billw58]

I did the uninstall/reinstall thing (no 1.2.6 any more) but I also cleaned out the config file. Boy, that is a huge file that builds up fast. That must have been where the problem was. I can hardly imagine how it has followed me through the years, I thought I always rebuilt things like config files whenever I did a reinstall.

Harry:
Probably no chance you still have a copy of the old audacity.cfg file? I'd be very curious to see it, and see if we can figure out what went wrong in it. I'm still mystified as to how a corrupted config file could mess up importing of WAV files.

Also note that although you say you have no 1.2.6 any more, its config file is still lurking in your system, waiting to pounce on you again if you ever delete the version 1.3.x audacity.cfg file! If you are comfortable editing the Windows registry (DANGER - can totally mess up your computer if you do it wrong!), have a look at this wiki page that details how to rid yourself of the 1.2.6 config file: http://wiki.audacityteam.org/index.php? ... references

-- Bill

[cetacean_dreams]

Bill -

I will try to find it. I opened the file in Notepad, and highlighted and deleted chunks of it, a chunk at a time, then did Save, so I doubt that there is a previous save.

I am scrupulous about running a clean and mean machine, and I run cleanup utilities all the time, as well as manually deleting TEMP files whenever I get the opportunity.

However, I may have some backup (I generally do "My Documents" only, not the whole "Documents and Settings") that may have it, but don't hold your breath. I wish I had thought that it might have been useful for you to see it.

Will I have to upload it to that site, or can I attach it?

Harry

cetaceandreams at gmail