2 Problems after Upgrade PT9 to PT10: "Controller-Personality MBox3" and "MP3.dll"

[Eviltubbie]

Hi there,
I used to work with PT9 and an MBox 3, connected via USB. No problem so far. Yesterday, I upgraded to PT10.0.1. The installer requested to deininstall PT9 first. So I deinstalled PT9 and installed PT10 and 10.0.1-Patch. I also installed latest MBox 2 Driver (Version 1.0.19).
After starting PT10 I get an error, saying in German:
"Beim Laden der Controller-Personality MBox3 ist ein Fehler aufgetreten".
In English it means "An error occured during loading Controller-Personality MBox3)".
I ignored that to see what happens next. I opened an existing session and tried to bounce it to MP3. Next problem occured, saying
"Die MP3-Option kann nicht aktiviert werden. Grund: Modul-Initialisierung fehlgeschlagen für MP3.dll. Möglicherweise ist der MP3-Demo-Zeitraum abgelaufen".
In English it means "MP3 option can't be activated. Reason: Modul-Initialisation failed for MP3.dll. Probably MP3-Demo test timeframe has expired".
I started working with PT9 last year and haven't had an earlier version. So I did not have to buy the MP3-Option so far. And in PT9 I never ran into this problem.
The Controller-Personality-Problem is new, too. I checked Windows Device Manager and Mbox is installed correctly.
Then I uninstalled ProTools and MBox-drivers and started reinstalled the whole stuff. This the same 2 problems.
Additional info:
My Windows system drive is C: (it's an SSD). PT is installed on D: in a subfolder: D:\<folder>\Avid\... I checked "D:\<folder>\Avid\Pro Tools\DAE\Codecs\MP3" and I found an MP3.dll there (Version 10.0.1.58 from 19.01.2012).
I really appreciate any help because I'm running out of ideas and have to to some recordings with PT during the next days.
Thx in advance,
ET

[Eviltubbie]

Hi,
MP3.dll problem solved. Problem was that Pro Tools did install the mp3.dll
in "D:\<folder>\Avid\Pro Tools\DAE\Codecs\MP3"
But obviously PT doesn't search this folder during run time. I copied the "Codecs" folder (incl. subdirectories) to "C:\Program Files (x86)\Avid\Pro Tools\DAE\" so that this "DAE" directory on drive C: has a copy of the "Codecs" folder from my D: drive, where PT has been installed. That means the whole path to the copied mp3.dll is now:
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Avid\Pro Tools\DAE\Codecs\MP3"
After that PT bounces MP3 and the error doesn't show up. That means that PT looks into that path under C:\Program Files (x86) and not where PT has been installed. Looks like a bug in the install routine...

The problem with the controller-personality still exists.

[Eviltubbie]

2nd problem (Controller-Personality) also solved!
As I said, my PT is installed on D:-drive. During installation PT created a folder
"D:\<folder>\Avid\Pro Tools\DAE" which includes not only the mp3.dll but also controller drivers for Audio interfaces. But as with the mp3.dll, PT does not use that folder in D:-drive during runtime. Instead, it access a folder "C:\Program Files (x86)\Avid\Pro Tools\DAE" which also has been created during installation. But it includes less files than on D:-drive.
So what I did is, I renamed the DAE-folder on C: to DAE_Backup and copied the whole DAE-folder from D:-drive to C: and restarted PT. Voila! Not only MP3 works now. PT also recognizes my MBox now and executes the MBox-Setup dialog (menu Setup->Hardware), too (what it did not prior).
So it's pretty obvious, that PT10 installation process is buggy! Probably, it does work if PT will be installed on C: drive. But on Notebooks it's not unusual to have a SSD-drive as C:-drive for Windows system only (due to the capacity of the SSD) and to have all software and data on a harddisk as D:-drive.
Avid-Support should be able to reproduce this problem. Simple install PT to D: and connect an MBox. Hope, this issue will be solved in the near future.

ET

[WorshipMaestro]

EvilTubbie,
I'm so glad I found your post! I downloaded the PT10 trial today. Was a little concerned when it told me to uninstall PT9.0.6 because I'm not sure I want to make the jump to 10. That's why I wanted the trial!

Anyway, it installed fine, found all my plugs, but wouldn't find a profile, or "personality" for my Radikal Technologies SAC-2.2, which emulates a HUI for Pro Tools purposes. I did a whole uninstall just like you, and manually went through all my drives, deleting everything Avid and Digi except for the folder the plugs were installed in. No joy!

Your problem sounded similar to mine: my programs are installed on my P:/ drive because my C:/ is an SSD dedicated to OS only. I noticed that there were newly created folders on the C: drive which I was sure I'd deleted in the uninstall. Sure enough, there were only 2 folders in the DAE folder, whereas my P; drive had 7. I copied the folders and all their contents to the C: drive and, VOILA! It solved the missing control surface issue, and no doubt more I hadn't gotten to yet.

This is definitely something Avid needs to address. I'm going to explore making a bug report.

Thanks for your sleuthing!

[Eviltubbie]

WorshipMaestro,
good to hear that my investigations are helpful. Took me half of the last weekend.
I already created an ASC request to AVID and yesterday they I received an answer from their support. They informed me that PT requires its installation on the Operating System drive. An installation on another drive is not supported. Their suggested workaround is exactly, what I already figured out (Copying the DAE-folder to OS-drive).
From my point of view that's definitely a defect! It's a common hardware setup to have an SSD as OS-drive and an HDD as Application- and data drive. And due to its nature SSDs have a lower capacity. Would be great if you could create a bug report for that issue.

[Guitardojo]

^ Agree with above. Had numerous problems from Ilok to Pro Tools 10 to the Mbox Pro 3 load. After grabbing all the fixes from the forums here...I am working (jamming)!!!! Thanks!!