Hopefully someone has an idea to help.

I am running biab 2021, audiophile version. I’ve had it since it came out and never had a problem. It’s an upgrade from 2020 audiophile.

I recently installed a new, clean version of Win 10 from Microsoft. I am running a Dell PC, 64 bit, Win 10 Home, 32 GB ram, i7, 4.2 GHz, 200 GB available for Local Disk C.

I am installing, using Option 1, from the 2021 biab disk. The biab folder goes to C:\\bb and the real tracks, real band and drums go to I:\\, which is the external disc with biab. And I know that the real band folder is not in the bb folder like real tracks and drums. I verified the info is on the biab disc where it should be, in the bb folder – there are about 74 gigs of drums and more than a Tb of real tracks and I have double checked this. I also installed xtra paks 1-10 and a 2021 bonus pack, which show up as installed on the Style page after a rebuild. There is a long list of "[N/A]" on the styles page.

Before this new install, I had about 8300 styles after a rebuild. Now I get 4337. I have installed and uninstalled this many times. I have all my music software on this PC, and I have a lot. All the rest is functioning properly.

I have the report from running Verify in the Preferences/Real Tracks box, but I don't see an option to attach it here. There are 8887 lines of errors. There are 2 types of errors and I give an example of each below:

INSTALL ERROR: RealTracks # 361(Set #1), RealTracks NOT found here C:\bb\Soloists\RealSax.ST2, but RealTracks folder IS found here: I:\bb\RealTracks\Sax, Tenor, Jazz Sw 140\ . Re-install r*.st2 r*.xt2 files to BB folder

Error, WMA date is newer than WAV I:\bb\Drums\AmericanaSlow8thsFred\AmericanaSlow8thsFred_75_Style.WMA, time difference = 312 seconds.

And at the end it says "RealTracks WAV - no date errors."

It seems something big has gone wrong that if corrected, would fix these 2 classes of errors (I hope).

I also did an Option 1 install with the biab 2020 version. In that case, I get 7452 styles, about a thousand fewer than before. And I have directed Real Drums and Real Tracks in the Preferences dialogue box to both the 2020 and 2021 external drives with biab. I always get 4337 for biab 2021 and 7542 for 2020, whether I use the 2020 drive or the 2021 drive.

Finally, installing biab 2021 from the external biab disk doesn't work. Biab won't open and doesn't appear to get installed. So the installation I am referring to here is using the setup file from my account at the PGMusic site.

Anyone able to help?

Thanks in advance! Doug

Not sure if/how this is related, but check that you have identified where the RealTracks and RealDrums are pointed to in Options > Preferences settings:

Thanks - yup, I know (and did) this and it's not the problem. But thanks!

Please make sure that you have the latest 838 build downloaded and installed from here and see if that helps: https://www.pgmusic.com/support_windowsupdates.htm#838

Yes, I already have the latest build installed.

It sure looks like a bad install, but you say you have done it a few times so ...? I would speak with support. I am not at my home/music computer but there is a tool that allows you to check to make sure you have everything you are supposed to. Run that and report what it says. I can't give you the exact instructions for that since I am not on the computer that has BIAB, this is my work machine!

Yup - I have installed, uninstalled, reinstalled, many times trying any variation possible. I'm doing option 1, which is the simplest!

And yes, I ran the report I think you're referencing and it says a ton of stuff is not found.

But again, I have verified that biab is looking at the correct folders for real tracks and drums, and that those folders have more than a terabyte of data, as they should for the audiophile version I have.

I would think my biab hard drive might be corrupted, but I have the same issue when using the 2020 version I have, which is a separate hard drive.

Hello Doug,



Option 1 does not install the program to your C: drive at all, that's just a basic setup option to use if you will run the program directly from the external drive.

You want Option 2. This installs the Band-in-a-Box program, support files, .ST2 files to your C: drive. This is about 20-30GB of files. The folders on the external drive that Band-in-a-Box still uses (the 'custom' folders) are just 'RealTracks' and 'Drums', which contain the RealTracks audio source.

I was sloppy with my word choice. I want to use option 1 and run from the setup drive. My drive is "I" and in a biab install, I have tried both C:\bb and I:\bb for the program location, with the location of real band, real tracks, and drums all pointed to I (real band) and I:\bb.

Any suggestions?

This one is a toughie to do remotely and not able to look at your setup etc. I suggest a call to tech support. Could be a drive problem.

This message...



...says that you are running Band-in-a-Box from C:\bb (C:\bb\bbw64.exe), or at least you were when you got this particular message.

If you were running Band-in-a-Box from I:\bb (I:\bb\bbw64.exe) you would not get this message because it would look in I:\bb\Soloists for the ST2 files.

If you open I:\bb\bbw64.exe (first close any other instances of the program to be sure), and have not selected custom folders, then you should have ALL RealTracks available in the RealTracks Picker.. In other words if you check the "Show n/a" box at the bottom of the RealTracks Picker, you should see no N/A RealTracks.

On the other hand, to answer your question about the StylePicker, you may be missing some styles (STY's), since Xtra styles are not included in any Band-in-a-Box package and there are a few thousand of them. This would not be the cause of the error messages you are seeing. If you had Xtra styles from an earlier year, you should install those onto your new drive. The StylePicker knows about all available styles which is why you have perhaps 4000 out of a possible 8000 (rough numbers).

Andrew - thanks. You got me half way there.

I have one remaining problem - many pages of the following error:

Error, WMA date is newer than WAV E:\bb\Drums\118Rock3332^\118Rock3332^_088_Style.WMA, time difference = 25 seconds.

This is only for RealTracks - everything else is good.

The way I got BIAB to work was to put the BIAB folder, which is typically at C:\, on one of my other internal drives, and I set Preferences/RealTracks to E:\bb\RealTracks, which is drive from you guys.

In case it matters, the setup program I used for this is from my account at PGMusic. The setup file on the BIAB Drive, E, does not work. I know there is more than one setup file on that Drive and I tried both.

Thanks for any suggestions you have.

You can ignore this error and all other date errors like it. It should not be flagged as an error, and I'm not sure why the files are 25 seconds different, but this is not related to any other problem you might be having. I checked my copy and I get the same 'error' reported when running the Verify function.




I'm not sure if this makes sense to me, however if what you did is working for you then that's great. The main thing you need to understand is that it is ONLY the RealTracks folder and the Drums folder that can be moved outside of the bb folder. If you do that it's called using a custom folder location and you need to set that location in Preferences (as you know). All other files and folders need to always be located in the bb folder - specifically in the bb folder that you are running bbw64.exe from. If you have a drive that happens to be assigned the letter Q, and you run Band-in-a-Box by double-clicking Q:\bb\bbw64.exe, then all Band-in-a-Box files need to be located in Q:\bb.

Great - you've been an incredible help. Thanks!