"Audacity failed to read file on drive c:"

Zer01337 · Post by **Zer01337** » Tue Apr 17, 2018 8:30 pm

Windows 10
Audacity 2.2.2

Part 1:
Working on a project for over a month (Podcast series). I have exported to mp3 many 'rough cuts' to listen to and fix up. I'm finally at the 'ready' stage and blammo... this error pops up when trying to export to a) my desktop b) Documents/Audacity and even c) Entirely different drive and location.

Part 2:
A little frustrated, I decided to surf the web for solutions. While doing this I also load up a different episode to begin the process of editing. I get a noise profile, then try and start the noise reduction process... a few seconds go by and blammo again. Now I can't edit the files?

Part 3:
I read that it may have to do with Win10 'permissions' and so I've tried two different solutions to that and I've gotten no luck (1 involved editing the security tab under a folders properties menu and making sure the user was flagged as able to edit files, the other involved disabling the LUA via registry).

The problem persists and is extremely irritating.

Post by **steve** » Tue Apr 17, 2018 8:50 pm

I can see several error messages similar to that in the code, each warning of a different error condition, but I don't see that exact message.
Please check the exact wording of the message so that I can look up what error condition it is referring to.

Zer01337 · Post by **Zer01337** » Tue Apr 17, 2018 9:26 pm

"Audacity failed to read from a file on drive c:"

Post by **kozikowski** » Wed Apr 18, 2018 1:28 am

Are you using punctuation marks in your filenames? Dates, for example?

If you select your filenames wrong, you can force the machine to look for directories that don't exist.

Upper, Lower, Numbers, -dash- and _underscore_ are the only unconditionally safe characters. Your machine may allow others, but you may fall in the mud if you need to share files with somebody else.

Koz

roadsterUK · Post by **roadsterUK** » Wed Apr 18, 2018 7:22 pm

With an element of randomness creeping in to these problems I would be inclined to check that you are not running out of disk space. Audacity needs temporary file space as well as storage for saved projects and exported files. If there is apparently plenty of space left then try using check for errors which you will find if you open the properties for the C drive then choose the tools tab. Because its the system drive the computer will reboot in order to check the drive.

Post by **steve** » Wed Apr 18, 2018 7:42 pm

I've found the relevant bit of code that produces this error message, but unfortunately it does not tell us much that we don't already know.

The most likely trigger for the error message is that Audacity is unable to read the audio data that belongs with the project. There can be many reasons for that, such as an external drive not being on-line or at a different address, or the project being created in a different user account so that the current user (hence Audacity) does not have sufficient privileges to access the data.

Where are the project files (including the audio data) located?

Zer01337 · Post by **Zer01337** » Wed Apr 18, 2018 8:53 pm

File name is 'DATT Episode One'
File has been exported previously onto desktop as an mp3, in the last week Audacity decided it's got a problem
File is on drive C: (Desktop), Drive c: (Documents/Audacity) and Drive E:
Drive C has 33 gb of space, drive E has 128 gb of space
Computer is my personal pc, no other users

Neither drive generatees error messages when drive is checked for errors

Post by **kozikowski** » Wed Apr 18, 2018 9:27 pm

This is where you start being obsessive about what you write.

File is on drive C: (Desktop), Drive c: (Documents/Audacity) and Drive E:

That's impossible. An Audacity project manager (AUP) and the work files (_DATA) of the same name have to be in the same place or folder and on the same drive.

There is no c:\ and e:\

Where did d:\ go? Windows likes to number the drives in sequence and last time I did this, it will try to put the hard drives in order and push optical drives further up as you add stuff.

Koz

Zer01337 · Post by **Zer01337** » Wed Apr 18, 2018 10:17 pm

on desktop: Folder 'PODCAST' - inside, Audacity file(s) plus it's folder(s)
On c: it's under 'Documents/Audacity' with APF file(s) and folder(s)
On E: it's under DATT Backup folder, contains APF file(s) and folder(s)

NONE of these apf files in ANY of these locations will let me export to mp3 or run the recording(s) through effects like noise reduction. This is a NEW thing (within the last week or so) and previously I could export and edit with no problem.

Apparently I CAN start, record and edit new projects. So unless it's tied to length of project (30m - 1.5 hr), it doesn't appear to be a bug within Aud 2.2.2 itself. Next step I'm going to try is to copy/paste the effected project files onto a new project and see if that is a work around.

Post by **kozikowski** » Thu Apr 19, 2018 12:34 am

Next step I'm going to try is to copy/paste the effected project files onto a new project and see if that is a work around.

The project name is burned into the AUP file. So if you do that, you may need to create a fresh project in a folder so the two Projects don't interfere with each other—and use the same name.

A Project used to be limited to 13 hours, but I think that restriction has been lifted.

What happened to the d:\ drive again?

koz

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