Audacity Forum

Anyone ever try to run Audacity in a virtual session ?

This new Vista PC is great... but Audacity just won't run for me in Vista.
(I can import, record, modify, etc... just can NOT export an MP3)

So... I was gonna install Virtual PC and run Audacity in an XP session.

Anyone ever try that ?

<<<just can NOT export an MP3)>>>

What steps have you take to make it do that?

<<<So... I was gonna install Virtual PC and run Audacity in an XP session.>>>

Let us know how you make out.

My opinion is that your possibilities for success are almost zero. Audacity is a really simple audio program and it really likes running on really simple computers. The forum is littered with people trying to do overcomplicated jobs with exotic third party software and wacky hardware. Audacity has enough trouble managing sound devices and drive systems in a straight line path without having to filter its efforts through virtual machine software.

I predict [holding fingers to forehead] that Audacity is going to seem to work perfectly through capturing a long, complex, unique show, and then forget either how to save a Project, or how to Export a sound file.

Let's see how close I get.

Koz

Oh, right, the solution. I would export a perfect WAV file and use third party software to make an MP3. Much safer, and it gives you a good safety sound file of the final show. Never use MP3 as archive storage.

Koz

Audacity works pretty well in Wine but there is a bit of a performance hit, so you would be in with a chance. However, if the problem is just with exporting as MP3, then I would work around the problem by Exporting as WAV and using an external MP3 encoder (this also will provide you with a perfect WAV backup that you can burn to CD if you wish).

I presume that you have tried the latest version of LAME for Audacity?
http://audacityteam.org/help/faq?s=inst ... m=lame-mp3

Okay... let me clarify.

I cannot export as ANYTHING. No WAV, no MP3, no nothing.

The only thing I can do to get output is to save it as an Audacity project.
Which, of course, is perfectly useless outside of Audacity.


Next ?

<<<Okay... let me clarify.>>>

We are a complete slave to whomever asks the question.

This does ring a bell, yes. There are two uniquely Vista problems. Here's one.

http://audacityteam.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=796

The other is Audacity under Vista will freak if it doesn't find a Sound Device. Go back into the Windows Sound Panels and make sure you are set to record and play from a definite device that you actually have connected. Then make sure Audacity can actually see and record from that device. We assume it plays OK. You may need to restart Audacity for some of these changes to "stick."

Another possibility is to resinstall Audacity. You do that by trashing the audacity.cfg file and restart Audacity. You know you succeeded when Audacity asks you for English at First Birthday.

Koz

markh_tampa wrote:Okay... let me clarify.

I cannot export as ANYTHING. No WAV, no MP3, no nothing.

The only thing I can do to get output is to save it as an Audacity project.
Which, of course, is perfectly useless outside of Audacity.

Hi Mark,

What happens when you try to export? I could understand there might be an issue with MP3 if the Lame library wasn't installed and Audacity told where it is, but not being able to export WAV is very odd and interesting. That's because WAV exporting is about the easiest export type Audacity supports and it "should" be working.

Do you get any sort of error messages or can you describe what happens when you try the export.

Also, what version of Audacity are you trying? You may find that a more recent development build will work better.

I'm one of the developers and have Vista (SP1) here. I'm able to export just fine, but I do use these more recent versions. I know that 1.3.6 did have some issues with Vista, so that may be what you're running into.

And to answer your other question about Virtual PC.

My main machine is a Mac and I run VMware's Fusion for OSX to work with Vista, XP, 2k, 98SE, several Linux distros, and I recently added Windows 7 Beta to the mix. I can't say truthfully that I test every aspect on all of these all the time, but they all run Audacity just fine in a virtual machine. Though, as mentioned above, it will run slightly slower.

But, let's see if we can work out what your real issue is before you go down that road. It's so unique that there's bound to be an easy explanation.

Leland

<<<My main machine is a Mac and I run VMware's Fusion for OSX to work with Vista, XP, 2k>>>

This is me writing that down. The only reason several of the Windows machines are still around is I have legacy applications that won't run anywhere else (Microsoft Publisher, anyone? Corel Draw?). I didn't know I could mount a Win2K license like that.

Koz

Yeah, it seemed to be working... or at least it didn't just HANG the app.

Only problem is that I didn't want to wait TEN HOURS for it to finish saving the MP3.

Thanks, but no thanks.

I went back to Cool Edit Pro... at least that works in Vista.

markh_tampa wrote:Yeah, it seemed to be working... or at least it didn't just HANG the app.

Only problem is that I didn't want to wait TEN HOURS for it to finish saving the MP3.

Thanks, but no thanks.

I went back to Cool Edit Pro... at least that works in Vista.

That's a shame. I was really hoping we could figure out why you couldn't export at all. But, I understand...you need to get a task done and any roadblock can be frustrating.

Good luck,

Leland