Noise Blasts up through PT 12.4 [FIXED IN 12.5]

[Arionas]

Thanks mr xy.
It's really a shame, after spending so many years on Cubase, Nuendo & Logic, when I decide to go with the "industry standard", to put myself in this risk.
I also have noticed that the most of the times the blasts are related with uad plugins. However, not always.

[midnightrambler]

People who are getting this : are you monitoring through an audio track routed from a bus on input?

i.e. like this [attached]

[mr xy]

Yes. Generally I'm monitoring from an Aux which i use as my master, then when it's time to print, I'm monitoring from a print track, as shown in your screenshot.

However, as part of my troubleshooting I tried using just a master fader and was able to reproduce the noise burst/ explosion, so that in of itself is not a cause.

However, I do think the more complex the routing used in a session, the more likely it is to occur.

Similarly, the more complex the automation in the session, the more likely it is to occur too. On my system at least, I'm 99% certain I've never had the issue until I've started using automation.

[midnightrambler]

Ah ok yes thanks. Agree that it seems to occur with dense automation on more complicated sessions.

[dankin]

I do monitor from a record armed track when mixing. But I've also had it happen with just a master fader. 2 plugins that I think are possibly a factor for me are - DMG Equilibrium and Exponential Audio Phoenix. I've been mixing without those plugins the last few weeks and haven't had a noise blast. I see that Exponential has an update for Phoenix that is related to this, so I'm going to give that a try.

Another thing that I occasionally get is a loud spike, kinda sounds like a MPC click, then the output will mute. The only way to get sound again is to reopen the session. Sometimes it's just one pop, then silence, other times it's like a feed back loop. I don't get it as often as the noise blast, but it does happen.

I personally think PT11/12 still has some deep bugs. I still get random AAE errors, even with a session that only uses 15% or so.

[midnightrambler]

Originally Posted by dankin

Another thing that I occasionally get is a loud spike, kinda sounds like a MPC click, then the output will mute. The only way to get sound again is to reopen the session. Sometimes it's just one pop, then silence, other times it's like a feed back loop. I don't get it as often as the noise blast, but it does happen.

Oh yeah I've been putting up with this one on and off ever since I got my first 001 back in 2001 and it still happens on my HD system now. I'm pretty sure I've never experienced it on a TDM system though.

[mr xy]

Originally Posted by dankin

I do monitor from a record armed track when mixing. But I've also had it happen with just a master fader. 2 plugins that I think are possibly a factor for me are - DMG Equilibrium and Exponential Audio Phoenix. I've been mixing without those plugins the last few weeks and haven't had a noise blast. I see that Exponential has an update for Phoenix that is related to this, so I'm going to give that a try.

Another thing that I occasionally get is a loud spike, kinda sounds like a MPC click, then the output will mute. The only way to get sound again is to reopen the session. Sometimes it's just one pop, then silence, other times it's like a feed back loop. I don't get it as often as the noise blast, but it does happen.

I personally think PT11/12 still has some deep bugs. I still get random AAE errors, even with a session that only uses 15% or so.

On my system at least I can reproduce the noise blasts with only stock plugs installed. Of course some 3rd party plugins may be more problematic, but they are not the cause of this bug.

I also get the spike/ click followed by silence - only since 11 though. I really don't get how this stuff gets past beta testing. I understand little bugs here and there slipping past, but as you say, it seems there are deep problems with the core functionality of the audio engine in PT 11/12.

10 was very stable for me, but I was constantly hitting the 32 bit ram ceiling, otherwise I would have stuck with it.

It would not be acceptable for any audio application to have a bug that generates huge spikes of noise under certain circumstances, let alone an expensive professional product like pro tools.

The person I've been talking to at support, who has been excellent, assures me that the programming team is aware of the bug, and this thread, but it would be great to have some official acknoledgment of this bug from Avid, with a timeline for a fix. We've already seen one report of hearing damage from this, so if nothing else, now Avid have admitted it's reproducible on their test systems, they should warn users of the potential for it to happen.

[WombatStudio.Org]

Originally Posted by mr xy

[...snip...]Avid have admitted it's reproducible on their test systems, they should warn users of the potential for it to happen.

... or possibly how to avoid it in the interim.

I'm OS X 10.10.5, PT 12.2.1 ...

Was working on a session for several hours, no issues with all plugins in place. I then automated a reverb Send from an Aux to basically max out the send (+12) while the audio faded. When I hit the spacebar to stop, BOOM! But I was stopping and starting quickly working on this edit, so I don't know if a double hit on the space bar allowed full signal into the send?

You know how you have the setting where whenever you stop, the cursor goes back to where you started from? I always forget what that's called. But as you cursor through the session without even playing, you see the faders move due to automation. I think this has something to do with the blast on starts and stops - the audio engine doesn't "stop" or something before the faders flip to that cursor position's settings.

Just a guess - and for me this started when I added this one little automation move.

[midnightrambler]

Originally Posted by WombatStudio.Org

... or possibly how to avoid it in the interim.

I then automated a reverb Send from an Aux to basically max out the send (+12) while the audio faded. When I hit the spacebar to stop, BOOM! But I was stopping and starting quickly working on this edit, so I don't know if a double hit on the space bar allowed full signal into the send?

Yes I've had this EXACTLY and I mean EXACTLY as you describe it, where you're fading the track into a reverb wash. And then the reverb is still "maxed out" when the cursor jumps back when you press stop/play quickly. Hmmm.....

[stevegalante]

Been having this issue since I updated to 12.2.1 HD, but tried to downgrade to 12.2.0 with no success... MacPro 5,1 2010 8core 2.4GHZ 32G Ram, PT HD 12.2.1 with HD Native card.
Sometimes after I have one of these blasts the audio output shuts off completely and I have to close and reopen the session.
Tried everything, opened a "case" with Avid but they think it's my "officially unsupported" 192... By following this thread I wanna try not to monitor through auxes, it's maybe the only thing I haven't tried yet...