Audacity 2.0.6 shuts down

[steve788]

Hi. New user of this version of Audacity (I did use an older version successfully some years ago). Here is my sequence of events, if you can help please let me know!

Windows 8.

1) Installed 2.0.5 a couple of months ago, used it successfully, including output of .wav files.
2) Went to use it again today. Imported and processed one .mp3 file and exported it as .wav. This worked.
3) Tried to export as .mp3 file. Got error message telling me a .dll library was required. Cancelled my request.
4) Closed file.
5) Tried to import another .mp3 file. Audacity fell over completely. Opened it again, tried again, same result. Rebooted. Tried again. Same result. Uninstalled Audacity 2.0.5. Downloaded 2.0.6 and used Installer. Rebooted. 2.0.6 opens OK. Tried to import .mp3 file, same result (i.e. Audacity 2.0.6 just falls over).

When I say "falls over" what I mean is that I get a quick pop-up window which I believe is where the file to be imported resides (last used location) but that disappears in a split second and Audacity disappears from the screen. I've checked in Task Manager and it's gone. If I try the procedure again, the same happens. Feels like something has become corrupted, but I assumed the re-installation would cure this.

Any thoughts?

Thanks in advance, Steve

[DVDdoug]

3) Tried to export as .mp3 file. Got error message telling me a .dll library was required.

Have you downloaded and installed the optional LAME MP3 Encoder?

5) Tried to import another .mp3 file.

Have you re-tried the one that worked before in "step 2"?

Are you sure this is an MP3 file? I assume this MP3 plays OK in Windows Media Player?

[kozikowski]

Are you sure this is an MP3 file? I assume this MP3 plays OK in Windows Media Player?

I'm betting it's not.

You can tell Windows to stop hiding file extensions..

Hidden File Extensions - Windows
-- Start > My Computer > Tools > Folder Options > View > [ ] Hide Extensions for Known File Types (deselect)
-- Apply (to this folder) or Apply to All Folders
-- OK

..and/or you can install MediaInfo.

http://mediaarea.net/en/MediaInfo/Download. Get the version without installer, because the installer may have malware or adware.


Koz

[Gale Andrews]

If you can post the MP3 file somewhere online for long enough for us to download it, we can try it out.

Where is the location you are importing the MP3 from? Is it an external drive? Is the drive working properly?

What happens if you use File > Open...? That should open at the same directory that File > Import... opens at.


Gale

[steve788]

Hi. Thanks for the replies. This is where I have got to.

I discovered that the directory containing the successfully-exported .wav file was corrupted, because it could no longer be accessed successfully by either Windows Media Player or iTunes. (iTunes behaves same as previously reported by Audacity, i.e. shuts down when import is attempted from that directory. WMP shuts down when file in that directory is double-clicked).

So having de-installed Audacity and all its components, which made no difference to iTunes or WMP, I deleted the suspect directory. iTunes is now functioning fine, i.e. able to import files from other directories, so is WMP.

As to the files themselves, yes they were .mp3 files and yes, prior to processing by Audacity they were played successfully in WMP.

What I propose to do is to repeat the procedure, in case I missed something. But as I said previously, the only error message I got was when I attempted to export as .mp3 and although I'm a new user to this version of Audacity I have used an earlier version extensively (albeit not recently). It certainly feels to me that Audacity caused the corruption in the directory, but I could be wrong.

If anything else comes to light I will post.

Thanks again, Steve

[Gale Andrews]

the only error message I got was when I attempted to export as .mp3

Do you remember what exactly that error message said?

Can you export as MP3 now?

I would recommend you right-click over the drive > Properties, click the "Tools" tab and run the error checker. This will run CHKDSK when you next boot the computer.

Gale

[steve788]

Sorry I don't recall the exact error message when exporting as .mp3 but it related to me not having a .dll library installed (as implied I believe by an earlier reply). I just cancelled, decided to deal with .mp3 at a future time and moved on. I will document this more fully if/when I go through the procedure again if I get the same error.

I don't see why that error would have had any impact on the rest of the problem, but it was the only anomaly I experienced, so that's why I've mentioned it.

Good idea to run chkdsk in case there is a disk problem, so I'll do that.

Thanks, Steve