Audacity keeps crashing!!!

[wolfkame]

i've been using audacity to record music for a few years now, and for maybe the past month it crashes every time i use it.

sometimes i open the program and click the record button and it immediately crashes.
sometimes i'm able to record but then when i click play, it crashes.
very rarely can i record a couple tracks before it crashes.

after it crashes, i can't re-open it. i have to restart my laptop to open it again.

i've reinstalled different versions of audacity countless times and i've had no luck.
i've tried deleting some stuff from my laptop hoping that it would work if i had more space on my laptop, but nothing has changed.

i've read of others having audacity crash but not a situation quite like this.

i'm really going crazy, as a music maker, i need to record songs for my own mental health!!! i'm very frustrated and in a bad mood all the time.

i know nothing about computer stuff and any tech knowledge is greatly appreciated!

thanks for any help and have a lovely day

[kozikowski]

There's nothing Audacity can do to cause the machine to crash. However Audacity does step on the sound drivers and control software and those can shoot a computer right in the head. Make sure your sound drivers are up to date from the manufacturer, not just from Windows.

Also, if you install Audacity, it will ask you somewhere in the installer if you want to start from scratch. Say yes. If you don't, Audacity will try to keep your old setups and preferences around. I don't know what it actually says, I'm not a Windows elf.

Koz

[wolfkame]

i checked my sound drivers and apparently they are all up to date :/
i'm pretty sure i reset all my preferences when i reinstalled audacity but i'll try again

thank you for your knowledge!

[kozikowski]

Also. be sure you're installing Audacity 2.1.0 from here.
http://web.audacityteam.org/download/

There are other versions such as 2.1 and 2.10 which are not supported.

Koz

[Gale Andrews]

Most computer crashes when recording are caused by incorrect or faulty audio drivers (or sometimes faulty video drivers).

i checked my sound drivers and apparently they are all up to date :/

If Windows says that, you don't have to believe it. It may mean that you only have generic audio drivers made by Microsoft, and all Windows is saying is that those are up-to-date. Generic drivers made by Microsoft are not matched with your motherboard, so may have missing features or may crash.

You want to go to the web site of your computer manufacturer, find your computer model, then install (or reinstall) the audio drivers meant for your version of Windows. If you have a 64-bit version of Windows, you must install the 64-bit drivers.

Read these links for help with these issues:
http://manual.audacityteam.org/o/man/fa ... tml#reboot
http://wiki.audacityteam.org/wiki/Updat ... ce_Drivers

i'm pretty sure i reset all my preferences when i reinstalled audacity but i'll try again

Here is the link for Koz:
http://manual.audacityteam.org/o/man/fa ... html#reset.


Gale