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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 46
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OP
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Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 46 |
I just installed 2010 and applied the 292 build and Real Tracks patches. If I use any Real Tracks, either BIAB totally freezes up or alternates between freezing and short spurts of stuttering playback. Either way, I wind up having to either kill BIAB or reboot. Any help is appreciated.
Thanks,
Paul
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: Oct 2008
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Are you using MME or ASIO for audio playback? I seem to recall Silvertones mentioning an increase in buffer size can potentially solve this problem if you are using ASIO. It's also worth switching to MME if you are using ASIO and seeing if that makes a difference. (Audio >> Audio driver settings >> Audio driver type)
Also, others have found that tidying up your hard drive can help. Namely, remove temp files, empty recycle bin, defragment, and reboot. (CCleaner.exe is a handy little freeware program, easily found with Google, that will allow you to clean up your disk painlessly.)
MY SONGS...Audiophile BIAB 2026
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: Jan 2001
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Last night I had a similar problem with 2010 on a generic XP system. Was playing a song using one of the Bluegrass RT's in a standard 32 bar song. Around measure 16 the system started to sputter and slow down from 165 BPM to around 90, then 70 then 50 with stops and starts. Changed back to MME from ASIO4ALL and the problem immediately went away. Changed back to ASIO4ALL and the problem started again. Went back to MME and the programs runs just fine. What is interesting is that I have been using ASIO4ALL for about a 2 weeks with zero problems. The key is to tweak this and that to see what you can make work. Just found out that ASIO4ALL has an updated version available as of 12-3-2009 which I did not have. V2.10 (Beta 1) http://www.asio4all.com/Will download and try it with BIAB2010 to see how it performs. Also check out their support forum at: http://mtippach.proboards.com/index.cgi?Joe
BIAB2026 Windows 10 Pro (Never Windows 11!) WA6NCB
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: Sep 2004
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OP
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Thanks for the replies. I'm using MME when this happens. I ran pcclean as well, but no luck. This never happened with BIAB 2009, just since I installed 2010. Have CPU or memory requirements increased with BIAB 2010?
Thanks again,
Paul
Paul
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: May 2000
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I would recommend trying a Return to Factory Settings, button number two, found under the Opts menu inside BiaB.
--Mac
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Thanks for the suggestion Mac. Tried it and it's still happening. I'm going to try re-installing. If that doesn't fix it, then I think I'll try the 30-day money back guarantee and just stick with 2009. I'd much rather play music than spend any more time troubleshooting this...
Paul
Paul
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 10
Newbie
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Newbie
Joined: Jan 2009
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I had the same trouble and I went to Opt.-Preferences-Real Tracks and turned off the 'Speed up generation of Real Tracks' under Opt.-Preferences-Real Tracks. It fixed my problem. Mac also said try turning it back on after running BIAB with the option off. See the thread titled 'Band-in-a-Box 2010 and RealTracks updates available .'
Jim
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: May 2000
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Paul--
Try what jkline recommends next.
This version is very much worth the effort.
--Mac
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 10
Newbie
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Newbie
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FYI: I turned the speed up generation back on and the arrangements immediately began having the same problem as before turning it off. I agree, this version is definitely worth using.
Jim
Last edited by jkline; 12/28/09 09:49 AM.
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: Sep 2004
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OP
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Turning off the 'speed up generation' seems to clear the problem, but like Jim, I also cannot turn it back on without it occuring again. Been using BIAB since 97, love the product and never had any issues with any other release. Mac, I'll have to take your word that 2010 is worth it, although so far I'm not quite feeling it yet  Thanks for all the assistance, I really appreciates it
Paul
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: May 2000
Posts: 15,976
PG Music Staff
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PG Music Staff
Joined: May 2000
Posts: 15,976 |
Paul and jkline,
The issue might be CPU speed. Or other programs running, eating up CPU usage. Looking at CPU usage in task manager (Ctrl-Alt-Del) might shed light on that.
What O/S (?XP) and what CPU speed, RAM, and how old is the PC?
Have Fun! Peter Gannon PG Music Inc.
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Another test that is easy and informative is the DPC Latency Checker. It can tell you if there are other routines running that interfere with running digital audio on your PC. Read about it and download it from http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml
BIAB 2026 Win Audiophile. Software: Fender Studio One 8, Swam horns, Acoustica-7, Notion 6, Song Master Pro, Win 11 Home. Hardware: Intel i9, 32 Gb; Fender Quantom HD8 & Faderport 8, Royer 121, Adam Sub8 & Neumann 120 monitors.
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: Sep 2004
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OP
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Thanks for the link Matt, nice little tool! I downloaded it and it showed conflicts, and after disabling a few devices it turned out to be my network card. I got the latest driver for it and now it shows green, saying that "This machine should be able to handle real-time streaming of audio and/or video data without drop-outs." Unfortunately the BIAB issue still persists as far as playback when fast generation is turned on.
Peter, thanks for your reply. It's an older PC, 1.4 Pentium, just under 1GB of RAM (768MB). When I look at task manager, bbw.exe has 98% of the CPU while the problem is occuring. Nothing else is running. Are there minimum system requirements listed anywhere? Have CPU or memory requirements increased with BIAB 2010?
Thanks again,
Paul
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: May 2000
Posts: 15,976
PG Music Staff
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PG Music Staff
Joined: May 2000
Posts: 15,976 |
>>> It's an older PC, 1.4 Pentium, just under 1GB of RAM (768MB).
That's likely the issue. For the speedup Realtracks feature, BB is doing 2 things at once. It is (1) playing back the RealTracks, while it is also (2) assembling them in memory. So a slow hard drive, or a slow CPU (e.g your 1.4 Pentium), could result in item (2) taking up most of the CPU time. In future we might have a setting for the speedup feature, to see if it can be throttled down on slow machines, but for now, you should disable the speedup feature.
I program Band-in-a-Box on an 3.5 year old HP Laptop (XP, AMD Turion 64 single core) , 1 GB RAM), and it works fine on that.
Have Fun! Peter Gannon PG Music Inc.
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Quote:
It's an older PC, 1.4 Pentium, just under 1GB of RAM (768MB).
768mb of ram.
Is your motherboard DDR capable?
Is that a P4 chip?
If so, you could be taking a big hit in the ram dept. with that "odd" number of ram forcing the mobo BIOS to revert to single-density ram operation. Double-Density will give you 2 readings per clock cycle instead of one, effectively doubling what your ram can do. In that instance, 768megs of ram will not do as much as two 256m sticks that are DDR (equivalent of 1gig of single density).
--Mac
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 46
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OP
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Mac, it's a Dell Dimension 8100 with a P4 chip and uses Rambus RDRAM. It came with 256K (2X128) and I have since added another 512K (2X256) which accounts for the 768 number. The motherboard does not have Dual Channel memory support.
Paul
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Posts: 38,502
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Got it. was worth the shot, but oh well.
--Mac
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: May 2005
Posts: 1,992
Expert
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Expert
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PaulD just an idea to consider. for 200 buks you can find nice refurbed dual core desktop pc's around eg amd 64 with warranty. add a dedicated drive to record to for 70 buks.. 7200 rpm 32 mb cache. and for 270 buks youll have a pretty decent system. not an i7 of course. but i have such a system and have done tons of songs on it. good for 70 traks or so if one doesnt go bonkers with plug ins. just make sure you try out your music software and your sound device on it prior to purchase. if your not the kind of user that wants to run 200 traks n plug ins.. thus requiring an i7..lol...this type of cheap solution you can do a lot with. and is a nice stop gap solution till new powerfull quad and possibly octo core systems hit the market at cheap prices. which is what i'm waiting for.
another possibility is there are quad core bundles on newegg for example. quad processor plus mainboard for 260 buks or so. eg amd 620 quad. some people are rolling their own systems with these.
retired puter engr....powertracks on amd......NICE ! "what is the black art of audio engineering ?" my silly songs...motagator.com/bmanning see my tips in the tips section.
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Expert
Joined: Mar 2006
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Quote:
Quote:
It's an older PC, 1.4 Pentium, just under 1GB of RAM (768MB).
768mb of ram.
Is your motherboard DDR capable?
Is that a P4 chip?
If so, you could be taking a big hit in the ram dept. with that "odd" number of ram forcing the mobo BIOS to revert to single-density ram operation. Double-Density will give you 2 readings per clock cycle instead of one, effectively doubling what your ram can do. In that instance, 768megs of ram will not do as much as two 256m sticks that are DDR (equivalent of 1gig of single density).
--Mac
Mac, it seems that just about everytime I read your posts, I learn something new! Thanks for that. I'm starting to think that Peter and company should just hire you as the Tech "Go Too" guy when people have issues!
Ed
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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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Joined: Dec 2005
Posts: 493
Journeyman
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Journeyman
Joined: Dec 2005
Posts: 493 |
If your hard drive is getting full, it might be the culprit. The Windows swap file might be set too small (if you have an older version or Windows and changed it) or your hard drive just too slow to keep up. Is your hard drive activity light flashing constantly while this is going on?
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Ask sales and support questions about Band-in-a-Box using natural language.
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Last Chance! The Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Mac® Special Ends Today (May 31, 2026) at 11:59pm PDT!
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Rock & Pop (Sets 476–482):
Our new rock & pop RealTracks bring a powerful mix of requested favorites, fresh genres, and modern chart-inspired styles! We have more of our popular “Producer Layered Acoustic Guitars (15)” featuring Band-in-a-Box favorite Brent Mason. We’ve continued our much-requested disco styles (10), and added new Celtic guitar (5) with a more basic, accessible approach than our previous Drop-D or DADGAD offerings. There are also highly requested yacht rock styles (17), inspired by the smooth, polished soft-rock sound of the late ’70s and early ’80s — laid-back grooves, silky electric pianos, warm textures, elegant harmonic movement, and pristine production aesthetics. Fans of heavier styles will love our new glam metal (13), capturing the flashy, high-energy sound of ’80s arena-ready guitar rock. We also have a set of rootsy modern-folk rock (18), with a warm, organic sound combining contemporary folk textures and driving acoustic strumming. And we’ve added lots of new modern pop styles (16) — the kinds of sounds you’re hearing on the radio today, featuring exciting new drums, synths, and cutting-edge RealTracks arrangements.
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- MIDI Styles Set 92: Look Ma! More MIDI 15: Latin Jazz
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- RealDrums Stems Set 9: Cool Brushes
- SynthMaster Sounds Set 1 (with audio demos)
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