PG Music Home Forums PG Music Product Forums Band-in-a-Box for Windows BIAB won't run this morning

I'm running 2021 Audiophile with the latest updates on the same ThinkPad I've been using for several years. Plenty of memory, plenty of CPU. Everything was working when I shut it down last night. Other music apps work just fine this morning. I've checked the usual things, it's using WAS driver, mixer volume in BIAB, Windows Sound Panel and Volume Mixers all look OK.

When I first booted up BIAB worked visually (cursor went from measure to measure) but no sound. I even did a Reset to Factory Settings, now the cursor won't move and no sound. It's Wednesday so I don't thing they've snuck and overnight W10 update on me.

I'm a (very) long-time user. Maybe I need another cup of coffee. What simple and obvious thing am missing?

Are you using an audio interface or is your sound going out your internal computer speakers?

Do any of your RealTracks say N/A in them in the mixer?

And I just reloaded and updated BIAB 2021. No joy.

John,

Microsoft spreads out updates throughout the week so you shouldn't necessarily disregard the idea that an update might have reset the computer and program audio settings.

I'm confused about the symptoms you're currently experiencing. Do you mind repeating the current symptoms and the troubleshooting steps you've performed with the current symptoms?

As a wild guess, I like the Windows Update explanation. But I also would like to hear more details about the ‘usual’ steps, including info about your sound card.

Then look at Device Manager, Sound in your Control Panel, and look for additions and changes. Windows Updates can do that and cause problems for digital audio.

Yes, the updates sometimes mess with the audio settings. Not sure why it would but they do.

There are so few of us, relatively speaking, that I think we are overlooked.

Well, it's understandable, I also don't want to run in the morning.

Anyhow you can check:
- Windows/Settings/Update & Security, if there has been any updates
- Device Manager, to see if there are any warnings on Sound units
- BIAB Audio Driver settings

I've had a couple of instances where a Windows update ends up with a message that no drivers are installed.

Reboot or run driver installation worked for me.


cheers Thomas

Everything was fine last night at about 9pm. I shut the entire system down with no issues.

First thing this morning booted up and loaded BIAB and Chrome browser. No issues with bootup. Initially BIAB worked visually (cursor would move bar-to-bar) but no audio. YouTube audio works fine.

I'm running W10 on a ThinkPad laptop with an M-Audio Fast Track C400 via USB (oldie but very quiet interface). Most of the files I use are Realtracks.

Looked at BIAB audio settings, they all look fine (WAS driver, "Audio Driver" points to the M-Audio in and out, "Output Always On" box checked, "Use Default Device" box checked. "Exclusive Mode" box not checked. Latency says 30ms, but since I just use BIAB for backing tracks I've never cared. Looked at Windows Settings, Devices, Audio. The C400 shows up active. I've pointed the drum and realtracks to the external drive and all the mixer track selections are in green, showing they're connected correctly.

Right clicking on desktop lower-right speaker icon pulls up windows volume mixer where I see the M-Audio Device, the System Sounds icon and the BIAB icons, all with their volume controls max'd and nothing muted.

When I left click on the lower-right windows speaker icon it shows the M-Audio is active. I can click on that again and see the laptop speakers option. I can select that and the audio (from YouTube) goes to the laptop speakers, no problem. When I go back and select the M-Audio the YouTube audio goes there, no problem -- except BIAB still not working. I tried running Cakewalk/Sonar, that works fine.

I did BIAB "Return to Factory Settings", still would not work even with the default preferences. It seems interesting that after I've done that BIAB loads fine but now nothing at all happens when I hit Play or Generate and Play. All the BIAB icon buttons react visually to mouse clicks. When I click on "Pianos" in the mixer and click on a piano key I see the key visually react to the mouse click, but still no audio.

I run the Audiophile version with the BIAB (64 bit) app running from the laptop's SSD and the Realtracks etc. from the external drive PG sent (Option 2), so I reloaded BIAB. Note that I did not delete or uninstall anything before I did this. No change. Tried right clicking on the BIAB desktop icon and "Run as an Administrator" to be sure that wasn't the problem. No change.

It now occurs to me to perhaps try reloading BIAB and use the option that runs the BIAB app itself from the disk PG sent me might be a next troubleshooting step?

Usually with audio interfaces ASIO needs to be selected instead of WAS. Try going to go to Options | Preferences | Audio (tab). Then change the Audio Driver Type to ASIO and see if that helps.

So, it seems this is a little bit trickier.
When I lost audio even YouTube was quiet (for a while ...)

Check sound device output properties and the tab Advanced
with bits and sample freq e.g. 24 bits 44100Hz

two check boxes below with rights for programs to take control
i have both of them checked

Thanks Chantelle. Interesting, did that and now the BIAB cursor moves measure to measure, but still no audio from BIAB. Audio from other apps still work.

Thanks Chantelle. Did that and now the cursor moves bar-to-bar but no audio from BIAB. All other audio apps still work.

And ... things such as keyboard clicks in the mixer panel as well as the Big Piano now produce notes, so midi is now working. And also ...I have a few BIAB files with imported audio tracks and they work. So at the moment I'm only having problems with files that are totally RealTracks.

And so now I just re-re-reviewed where the RealTracks/Real Drums were expected to be found, expecting to see that BIAB was looking appropriately to the BB folder in the D drive, as they were earlier. But the fields were blank. So I've now re-pointed them to the correct directories on the D drive and all is well.

So it appears my original problem was somehow this morning BIAB was using the WAS driver and as I tried horrible things like returning to factory settings and reloading I'd somehow simply wiped out the field that points to the Realtracks/drums files on the D drive. An interesting aspect of this is, at least on this machine, when you try to use the WAS driver BIAB stops. Must be waiting on something?

Anyway, I just knew this was somehow something simple I was overlooking. I've used this program for many years here at home and on live gigs and once again I've proven to fail it far more often than it's ever failed me.

It's a great program and since the pandemic an important part of my day-to-day life. Thanks to Chantelle and all the others at PG and your all out there for your support and help.

Thank you for the detailed steps. I know they took longer to write than do.

Two quick reactions:

Windows often updates after you shut down. You see drive activity for awhile when you think the computer should be fully off.

BIAB should be set to play on 16-bit 44.1K stereo, not 24-bit.

I've been getting Window updates regularly. Once installed, all audio related programs resulted into the BSOD! Had to restart the computer, start out with one audio application (Cakewalk) and running it. I was fine. Then I move to the next such as BIAB - another BSOD! Reboot again and it works. The list goes on.

Then M$ came out with 21H1, believe it was and everything worked fine after the install of that version. No issues.

You may want to update to this Windows version and it might just do the trick... maybe - unless there are other issues we're not aware of.

Glad that you were able to determine what the issue was! Although your external device should have still worked with WAS if the correct inputs were selected, they tend to work better with whatever ASIO driver they come with - if they came with one at all. The loss of the RealDrums and RealTracks directories makes sense if you did a full or hard return to factory settings as it would have cleared out your program preferences. Did you use the Options | Return To Factory Settings menu? If so, it should have given you the option to back up your settings in a file that could be reloaded. But if you deleted the mysetup/intrface files in the preferences folder within the bb folder, this would make sense as to why those directories would have needed to be reset.

Regardless of my musing and what exactly caused it, we're glad you're up and running again!

John,

While your computer, audio interface and Band-in-a-Box are all working as they should you should save your Preference Settings. Then it will be quick and easy to restore your settings in the future.

You can save your Preference settings by navigating to Options > Save Preferences As ... to open the BB File Save window dialog. Make up a file name and select Save.

To load the saved Preference File navigate to Options > Open Preferences File ... to open the Open File window. Select your saved file and press the open button.

Boom! You're instantly back in the business of making music with Band-in-a-Box.

John...to add to jims nice idea.
also use a phone camera and take pics of all your recording settings..in various daw software and your interfaces control panel, and anything else relevent.
---------------------------------------------------
all.
Re putting recording rig on the net.
as ive said before , it was a given years back by recording studios not to put ones recording rigs on the net.
(read various reasons why in old posts on such sites as gearslutz and other recording pro forums.)
i have, for example 2 i5 laptops here. both same hw config.
both refurbs that cost very little. one for recording work that never sees the net , and other that is used solely for the net, and as a sandboxer/tester plus an amazon fire 80 bucks tablet thats great for surfing.
the i5 on the net is loaded with typical protection/anti virus stuff and takes rather a time to boot obviously,
even though its stripped down <<one reason i like refurbs.
by comparison the i5 recording rig that never sees the net and is optimised for recording (per such sites as audient and focusrite re optimising a pc, and per the guys that do the refurb...) runs like a champ day in/out with no lag or problems running bb/rb/reaps daw combo and boots in a few seconds from cold.
thus from my own experience (and people can argue with me all they want) if you want a peacefull life recording....keep your rig off the darn net, and buy a refurb pc for that purpose <<you can find them now for under 150 buks.

what a lot of people really must understand is , when your running a daw rig with say one drive (which a lot of people are..) thats servicing windows AND multitracking /bb generating traks AND GOD KNOWS WHAT ELSE thats happening on the net, ITS ALL ADDED TASKS AND PROCESSES.
what i'm saying is it becomes a resource fight, particularly if you THEN introduce big sample libraries,
and goodness knows what else on a one drive pc that is underpowered for the job to start with anyway.

different story if one is running a high end pc like a threadripper probably. but even then i would
probably keep such a nice high end pc off the net.

anyhoo...if anyone vehemently disagrees with me, just ask companies that specialise in building high end recording pc's costing thousands for high end recording studios their opinion on this topic. cos it used to be a given , years back, in the music industry that a studio kept its recording computers off the net.

why people are putting them on the net now baffles me , given a simple solution is just buy a 120 buk refurb for the purpose.
best/happiness to all.
om