PG Music Home Forums PG Music Product Forums Band-in-a-Box for Windows BIAB crashes too much!

I have purchased Band IN A BOX POWER TRACKS,REAL BAND,ever since I had my Atari 1040 ST. The program ran on one floppy disk,the program was as was fantastic and so ahead of it's time. In those Days you had to watch Peter Gannon videos to do the setup. If I still had my Atari ,I would run it off the floppy long story short in my opinion the program has not improved that much since the original version. I have been a DELL/MAC certified computer tech since 1998.I am fortunate enough to own the AVID PRO TOOLS QUARTET by Apogee,one of the highest priced PC interfaces on the market. I do not buy Avid it is very over priced in my opinion. I have the free version PRO TOOLS FIRST.I got some decent plug ins with my AKAI MPK88. VIP 32 and 64 bit thousands of patches etc. My computers are usually top of the heap at least 32GB RAM 6 or 8 core processor,but in reality for me BIAB/REAL BAND has become too complicated and crashes when I try to transfer a song from one program to the other.I spend more time restarting than getting any music done.I set the inputs and outputs on BIAB then the song won't play in REAL BAND the inputs and outputs are different. Windows 10 latest version 64bit, Then I get the inputs and outputs set in REAL BAND not enough memory resources and it crashes do you need 64 gigs of of ram and a 16 core processor to run the programs? Too bad my Atari quit working I gave it to the Good Will and now they cost a small fortune. I converted my original Atari files from 20 years ago so I can play them back .Honestly they sounded just as good on Windows 95 version6?. Went all out last year bought the AUDIOPHILE no more until I can actually use the programs without pops, hisses,hesitations and crashes. I always run the updates. If anyone can give me a heads up on what I am missing I would appreciate it. Happy,Safest and Warm Holidays To All!

Hi. There is a lot of info here but it’s missing some that we need. So the Avid is your audio interface. Does it use an ASIO driver, and is that what you selected in BIAB? Have you experimented with ASIO buffer sizes? Yours might be too small.

Have you explored whether other processes are running in the background?

Is this a laptop? If so, there are adjustments in Windows power settings that are necessary.

Please tell us more specifics about your system and settings. What you are experiencing is not typical. And, could you elaborate on what you are doing to ‘transfer song from one program to another program’? I don’t know what that means. Thanks.

Hi Matt ,thank your reply and Happy Holidays yes it is ASIO driver, and yes is what I selected in BIAB? Have you experimented with the buffer sizes a little but ,but really?As a computer tech for one of the largest School Districts in CA 5000 Macs-5000 PCS that is the truth we had 39 campuses and 15 full time computer techs,that is why I will not consider a Mac to this day. You soon realize the software companies write for the PC first,Why? because there is a lot more money in it. The second thing you learn to do is shutdown any unnecessary programs running in the back round. I am running an 8 core AMD 8120 with 32 gigs of ram. AMD you get more bang for the buck generally. I have a faster processor I can put in the board,but not to drift from the point. I run a lot of Animation Software,Maya,3dMax these require huge amounts of memory and processing power,they may slow down when they are rendering but they do not crash. I know a wav file is fairly memory intensive. When I listen to the songs I wrote twenty years ago on the Atari they might not accept a few Real Band instruments , but it was sure a lot easier to get from point A to point B. What good are sampled sounds if they dog down and crash the program?I worked on a domain as an Network Administrator for 1000 plus students,saving their work each day to a server Mac or PC. The Mac servers always crashed because they really had no server boards at the the time,They were just desktop PC's loaded with memory that could not buffer the incoming info ,bandwidth probably,I lost interest. It made our job very difficult when the MAC supposed servers were crashing at all the High Schools at the same time. So now back to BIAB.I Have a six core Xeon Processor 32 gigs running downstairs. I basically get the same results. BIAB is an excellent program original in thought and concept as far as I am concerned. I am not a programmer ,but I fixed their computer crashes for ten years, they were always high and mighty compared to the hardware dudes in their mind anyway. We had attendance programs they wrote that at first worked with horrible results,resulting in the inferior 15 techs running around to 39 campuses trying to run the
God Sent programmers updates so the teachers could take attendance for the day. If the update didn't work which 75% percent of the time it didn't,back to pen paper and apologies from 15 embarrassed techs. Apologizing for the programmers mistakes that we had nothing to do with. Remember they were the programming Gods(according to them)and we were the physical hands on idiots. Run Program as Administrator is an absolute necessity to understand when you are working with a 1000 students on a Domain. If BIAB is running successfully anywhere in the world as a server based program, I would love to see it. I can't even transfer a song from BIAB To Real Band with out having to change the inputs and outputs and even then it will probably crash. The program is fairly expensive especially the Audiophile version. The only thing I can think of is and independent Sound Blaster Card, which I already have .Getting ready to move to DDR4 and icore7 processors bought two new gaming boards recently ,not for gaming because the are built tough. Another thing you learn in a network like the one I worked on is stay one step back. You will save a lot of money. Half the time the latest software or hardware hasn't been debugged or vice versa. Any way I will install my Independent Sound Blaster Card , play My BIAB songs converted from 20 years ago and if I get anymore crashes I will more than likely be an ex customer,If anyone can enlighten me including Peter Gannon himself please let me know.There has to be some major programming errors as far as I am concerned for the programs to be so erradic.I am not resting on my laurels at all if anyone can help me seamlessly transfer a song from BIAB to REALBAND the pricey stuff with the real samples please,any advice or comments are appreciated.After all the only dumb question is the one never asked.Happy Safe And Peaceful Holidays To All

Two ways to "seamlessly transfer a song from BIAB to REALBAND" without worry of crashing.

First way:

1. Save your song, close BIAB
2. Open RB
3. Open the saved BIAB song.

Second way:

1.Export your BIAB individual tracks as WAV files to a known location.
2. Open RB
3. Import the saved BIAB tracks onto tracks in RB.

Good Move

Thank you Brother for taking the time,I will try exactly that!. Trying to send a song as a Christmas Present MP3 style,“Alrighty Then”, Have a Blessed and Safe Holiday!

No problem. Wishing you and your family and friends the same.

No one really has time to read all that. Give a simple answer to what is not working and how you tried to fix it.

Make sure under preferences in both Band in a Box, and Realband chose the same Avid ASIO drivers as both input and output. Make sure that you start with at least 512 for your buffer settings. For simplicity bit 16 and sample rate 44,100 keep both BiaB the same.

When you create a song in BiaB and save it then open it in RB it should open natively. You don’t need to transfer. Just in RB chose file, open and click on the file from BiaB

If you have crashes I would imagine it is a driver or plugin issue. Opening a BiaB file in RB is straight forward. It has always worked properly.

Is you keep it simple and open and close files as Charlie said you should find success

Success what is that? I HAVE HEARD THE WORD.So kind of you to respond on Christmas Day.I am out here in LA where the big boys play,You cannot afford an accident ,It is an unforgiving place,so make sure you have your songs lined up straight,before you hit the big time nothing in LA Merry Christmas!

I went back and reread some of your story. If I have it right you generate something in BIAB then with BIAB still open you load RB. I can only speak for my system but if I do that my ASIO driver barfs. For simplicity, ensure only one program using an instance of the ASIO Driver is open at one time. This has nothing to do with BIAB, RB or whatever DAW you might be using.

If you don’t require a fast turn around time I.e. you are only playing back sound (not recording and/or playing along with the song via the computer) then you can usually get away with using a Windows driver (assuming Windows) say WAS or even MME.

That might end the “crashes”.