AVID incredibly poor customer service
 

Hi all - sorry to put this here, am pretty desperate and annoyed with my current plan.

AVID are jerking me around with support, or more accurately lack there of. Long story but in short, how the hell do I actually contact the company to make a complaint? There is a contact option to handle support or sales, nothing else that I can see.

I'm 5 weeks in on one support case and they just keep dropping the ball, with no workable solution in place yet.

While I'm here, has anyone else had to complain to AVID or been dissappointed with the so called support they offer? I don't think I've ever dealt with a company this hopeless at communicating.

Thanks.

Re: AVID incredibly poor customer service
 

What’s your actual issue?

Perhaps the community could help and get you up and running.


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Re: AVID incredibly poor customer service
 

Sorry to hear you're having issues. The community here is excellent and very willing to help (and they're usually more knowledgable, if not more unbiased) than Avid support.

What's the issue you're having?

Re: AVID incredibly poor customer service
 

Wow - you guys are far more interested than Avid have been, a big thanks in advance! I actually didn't want to trouble you good folks here as I figured with an active support subscription it was Avid's responsibility, but that really hasn't worked out :confused:

It's the same boring issue I think many here have had - crashes, hangs and 9173 error.

My system is pretty clean and well-spec'd for the mixing work I do:

Native system with AVID Quartet interface
Mac Pro trash can
10.13.6 High Sierra
16Gb RAM
3.5GHz 6-core Intel Xeon E5
Pro Tools 2018.12

The usual plug-ins, Slate, Waves, Massey etc.

Issues:
- I get a lot of CPU overload errors, even when the CPU usage indicator is around 20-30%.
- The crashes and hangs are erratic, a few times a day when operating medium sessions. Could be when adjusting a plug-in, importing a track, just playing, anything. Avid blamed the Slate plugs but it happens when they're removed from the plug-ins folder altogether. Pro Tools sometime crashes when sitting idle with no session open.
- When I remove all plug ins from the folder the system seems stable, but obviously useless for mixing.

I've optimised the system to Avid's specs, and also had similar problems with earlier versions of 2018 on Sierra. Using internal SSD or external HDD same, wifi on or off, same.

Now as the crashes are only a few times a day I can't add one plug-in at time, wait for hours, then keep adding until there's a problem - it would take weeks. It might well be a plug-in but which one, under what circumstances, well I've got very little chance of ever actually figuring that out.

I've sent Avid at least a dozen crash reports, besides blaming the Slate plugs they have offered no other further help and simply do not respond to emails.

If the crash reports were readable I could do some digging but we've probably all had that thought.

I'm basically out of ideas, and now that Avid have given up I'm left with an unstable system that is sh*tting me to tears.

Any help or ideas much appreciated.

Re: AVID incredibly poor customer service
 

How big are your sessions? tracks? how many plugs?

16gigs of Ram is what throws a red flag for me. With a Mac Pro there's no reason not to go with more ram(32 is optimal), particularly if you're running all Native plugs. I run a 2015 Macbook Pro which is locked at 16GB of Ram and I generally get one or two 9173 errors a day.

Also, drive health can throw up the 9173 error or even an interface bandwidth bottleneck.

Re: AVID incredibly poor customer service
 

Maybe trie to disable Hyper Threading on your Mac...
Some CPUs have problems with Hyperthreading and Protools...
Some say especially Xeon e5v2 (the ones in the trashcan Mac Pros)

Re: AVID incredibly poor customer service
 

How many monitors? The ram seems under spec'd to me. As mentioned.

I remember reading an article about some of the trash cans have faulty graphics cards. Intermittent issues. And imo protools has serious graphics issues that throw up CPU errors. On my cheese grater I fixed the CPU errors by getting a high spec graphics card.

Re: AVID incredibly poor customer service
 

+1 on graphics and hyperthreading.

Do you use a lot of VIs? There are a lot of people offloading VIs to Vienna Ensemble Pro see this video https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jGP7-bxPJXU

Also try closing both the mix and edit windows (keep the system usage window open) to see how much that reduces CPU usage (mine drops by about 10% on my cheese grater Mac).

You can also check how much your graphics card is being taxed while running your sessions using the activities monitor window.

Be aware that pro tools is only optimized for 1080p so try a lower resolution or if you have a screen with a max resolution of 1080p try that.

Best,
James


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Re: AVID incredibly poor customer service
 

Look for CPU setter to enable/disable hyperthreading on the Mac.


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Re: AVID incredibly poor customer service
 

Sorry about that, aside.
I've alerted the team handling your supported case. They should get back to you on this soon.


-Tope