Sample rate disaster

[khaotic intent]

Once I get something working, especially in pro tools...I leave it alone. I don't try to improve, optimize, or fix ANYTHING. Why? because I know better, change one itty bitty thing and you anger pro tools forever and it becomes completely unusable in every way. I have angered pro tools, and now can't record, at all. My project has been on hold for a couple days now and I REALLY need to get it done. Everything has been running perfectly and without issue until I made this one change.

First ill list all my crap, because I know without doing this, I will get no help or answers whatsoever:

My computer is a dell xps 8300 workstation bought in 2011-12.
it has windows 7, service pack one. It has an I7 2600 processor @3.4 ghz. It has 16 GB of ram. 64 bit operating system. I understand people like mac, but I hate mac, so no, I am not buying a mac. it has a 2 tb hard drive. This is all I know and can find out about it, please dont ask for more.

I have a glyph gpt50 2 tb hard drive in addition to the onboard, this is the read/write volume.

Hooked up, is a M-audio fast track ultra 8R.

To that, are two lindell 500 series channel strips (pre, eq, comp x2)

To that I have 2 mics, a sure 57, and a royer 121

All cables are brand new and fine.

The amp I am recording is a mesa dual rectifier through a mesa rectifier cab.

I understand thoroughly the concepts of mic placement, phase, ect ect.

My cabinet is not in a corner or near a wall, and the room is treated properly.

The guitar is an Ibanez Xiphos loaded with Bare knuckle warpigs (ceramic magnet, alnico on neck)

I have Thousands of dollars in other equipment, but don't feel the rest of it is relevant. Hopefully, this is enough information to continue.


The problem:

I was setting up for a recording and the recorded tone was horrific. After visiting some forums, I saw a suggestion of raising the sample rate even though the argument from most people is that it will make no difference. I rasied the sample rate from 48k to 96k and the difference was night and day, my tone was back to being full, all the low end was there, the mids, highs ect and it no longer sounded like the source was in a giant tin can. I thought this was great until I started hearing all the clicks and pops. So, it was then obvious I needed to raise my sample rate, but for some unknown reason, I couldn't. I wouldn't come off of 256..all I wanted was for the artifacts to be gone, they weren't there until I messed with the other setting. After many hours of frustration, reading forums, ect, I could not find a fix so I decided I will just go back to the lower rates, and just have to deal with my empty tones for now.

So now, pro tools will not open ANY project regardless of sample rate. I get an error message stating the project playback engine does not support it. for example, I will try to open a project I know for a fact was recorded at 48k. I will get an error message saying the playback engine does not support 41,k. I will change the fast track to 41k (the proper way), attempt to open the same project, and then get the same error message, but now it says the playback engine does not support 48k. This makes no sense. Then I will switch it back to 96k, and open my current project expecting to just have to record with pops, and it says the playback engine doesn't support 48k, even though I changed it to 96 k. So somehow, no matter what I change my settings to, pro tools says the opposite settings aren't supported. To be clear, I close pro tools when changing settings, and change the settings directly from the fast track software/interface. I have tried doing this roughly 50 times with no successes. I have tried closing pro tools, changing settings, and restarting my computer half of those times, still no successes. This is beyond infuriating. I just wanted my guitar to not sound like ass anymore, but will gladly take back the ****ty tone over nothing. I am aware, I could import each session into a new project so the sample rates will match whatever my interface is currently stuck on, but then you loose all your work space markers, grids, tempo changes, etc. Doing this to all my projects would take WEEKS. I just want it to go back to working, I am so so sorry I tired messing with it, and will never try to get a better sound again. I will accept any meager result in trade for functionality. I just want it to work again without all the errors. Finally, please do not suggest trashing the preferences. I did this once and REGRETTED it. You loose everything and have to start over, which also takes a great deal of time I do not have. I am going to try a system restore, but I fear this won't help. I also feel I will loose all and any work (and I put many hours into it) from the restore point but at this point I seem to have no choice. Is there ANYTHING else I could try? I don't understand why I can not just put the settings back and it doesn't work. Now I can't record at all unless I want to convert every project I ever did, in which case, I'd just throw my equipment at the curb and be done with it. Please help me. Also please understand I do not have a degree in computers, so explanations of your suggestions would be required. For example: click this specific item, type this specific thing, then click this next thing which is found by following this specific path. I don't need to understand it, I just need to fix it, so please explain it as if you were talking to someone who knows nothing at all about computers, but without talking down please. Any help at this point would be great, I am completely stuck. In the meantime, I will look into the possibility of a factory reset for my interface, if it exists. If that's possible, I will probably have to go through the horror of getting to work again, but at least it's something. Thank you in advance.

[JoelG]

Make sure Windows isn't using the Fast Track as the default playback device (Control Panel, Sounds). Better yet, disable the FT there.

See if that helps, maybe it is Windows taking over.

Joel

[khaotic intent]

Ok, for whatever reason, that worked. As much as I would like to see if I can open my 96k project and see if I can fix the sample higher than 256 to remove the pops for better sound, Ill accept that pro tools is just working and am happy to record my thin guitar tones again, Thank you for your assistance.

[Top Jimmy]

My guess is that if it sounds mushy and "in a can", then you're monitoring both through Pro Tools and through the low-latency path provided by the M-Audio Fast Track Ultra 8R. I don't know how the Ultra 8R works, but you should mute one path or the other to stop this from happening.

[wwittman]

While I am a fan of higher sample rates, and find that 96k almost invariably sounds better to me than lower sample rates on any a-d converter that does it,
It still just sounds 'better' to me

Otoh if it's really night and day for you; as in 48k sounds awful and 96k sounds good, then something is radically wrong somewhere.

[darbyclash34]

So one I agree with the above posters regarding what you're hearing in terms of a difference in your sound, normally the difference is really subtle, certainly not as dramatic as one being described as practically unusable and the other sounding great. Something is not right if you are hearing that big of a difference just from changing sample rates, although two factors could be play. I remember hearing years ago that a lot of people felt this way who were using M-Audio interfaces, and maybe if they are using a clock generator where jitter etc is a lot lower at 96 this could account for it, or possibly the ADC chips themselves that they use performing better at 96. Or if you're using any plugins maybe the plugin sounds a lot better at 96 (many can, and many up sample internally to take advantage of this). On most any decent interface and without processing (no plugs, just the raw recorded sound), the difference between 44.1 and 96 will be subtle to maybe impossible to detect. I personally couldn't tell until after I had treated my room, and even then it was subtle and I didn't feel it was so much better as to incur the storage and processing hit. So you may need to figure out why this is so dramatic in your setup.

I do agree you're description of the sound at 44.1 sounds like two out of phase signals, probably the live input in the Fast Track mixer plus the playback from Pro Tools, the one from Pro Tools having latency on the input throwing the two out of phase. Latency is lower at higher sample rates if the buffer stays the same, so maybe what you're hearing is that the latency isn't as long at 96, so you don't notice that it's out of phase?

[Rich Breen]

Might I suggest hiring a professional recording engineer for a couple of hours to sort out your problems? Everything you're saying indicates you'd benefit from some experienced help.

[Jeff D.]

I have seen the anger of Pro Tools, he can be a merciless overlord.