Errors Getting Worse

[PatriotsBiker]

Hi all, I've been having some issues running Pro Tools 11 and now 12. I really like 12.4 and want to keep it. I get AAE 6 errors most of the time, and can really get them in rapid fire progression if I use a MIDI keyboard and a VI. (pick one - Minigrand, Kontakt, Hybrid, etc) However, I do not need to be doing anything with VIs even loaded to get these errors.

I've got quite a few plugs. The Plug In Alliance plugs seem to be a focal point. If I have them in my plug-ins folder, I get the errors during playback. For testing purposes, I have only the Maag EQ4 in that folder. I get the errors when it's in the folder, and do not when it's not in the folder. My current session has three instances. With them active, it's quick work to get the errors. When inactive, it may take a few minutes. When inactive and not in the folder, it seems to last quite a while.

For any old school Windows platform developers out there, this is behaving just like "Invalid Handle" or other misaligned resources and pointers.

I'll paste my set-up details and a fresh Sandra right after submitting this post.

Thanks

[PatriotsBiker]

My current set-up:
Windows Professional 64-bit
32GB RAM

Pro Tool 12.4
mBox 3 is main interface
Eleven Rack is used via SPDIF thru the mBox 3
Eleven Rack also hooked in VIA USB to enable using of the GUI and for switching Rigs thru PT.
Seperate Hard Drives used
c: (SS) System and application
D: (WD-B)Download storage and documentation
F: (WD-B)Audio samples and big file storage for virtual instruments
G: (WD-B)Pro Tools Session data including all of the folders created when new session is created.

Plug-in companies
AIR (incl current versions of what was IEP)
AVID (frequent)
BBE
Blue Cat (frequent)
Exponential Audio
IK Multimedia
Izotope
McDSP
Metric Halo
Native Instruments
Nomad Factory
Plug In Alliance (frequent)
Plug and Mix
Softube (frequent)
toontrack
Waves (none installed at the moment)

As normal practice from PT10 days, I "record" anything I do via virtual instrument to audio and deactivate or mute VI, Inst Track

and MIDI. In other words, VI's only in use when actually using or testng patches, etc.

I've done over and over again the optimization and troubleshooting guides.

[PatriotsBiker]

SiSoftware Sandra

ID
Host Name : RoyPT
Workgroup : WORKGROUP

Computer
Model : OEM System Product Name
Serial Number : System Ser**********
Chassis : Desktop
Mainboard : ASUS SABERTOOTH X79
Serial Number : 1302079********
BIOS : AMI (OEM) 3305 12/25/2012
Total Memory : 32GB DIMM DDR3

Processors
Processor : Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-3930K CPU @ 3.20GHz (6C 3.21GHz, 3.2GHz IMC, 6x 256kB L2, 12MB L3)
Socket/Slot : FC LGA2011

Chipset
Memory Controller : ASUS Core (Sandy Bridge-E) DMI2 100MHz
Memory Controller : ASUS Core (Sandy Bridge-E) Integrated Memory Controller Registers 100MHz, 4x 2GB DIMM DDR3 1.6GHz 256-bit

Memory Module(s)
Memory Module : Crucial BLS8G3D1609DS1S00 8GB DIMM DDR3 PC3-12800U DDR3-1600 (9-9-9-24 4-39-12-6)
Memory Module : Crucial BLS8G3D1609DS1S00 8GB DIMM DDR3 PC3-12800U DDR3-1600 (9-9-9-24 4-39-12-6)
Memory Module : Crucial BLS8G3D1609DS1S00 8GB DIMM DDR3 PC3-12800U DDR3-1600 (9-9-9-24 4-39-12-6)
Memory Module : Crucial BLS8G3D1609DS1S00 8GB DIMM DDR3 PC3-12800U DDR3-1600 (9-9-9-24 4-39-12-6)

Video System
Monitor/Panel : LG IPS235
(1920x1080, 23.1")
Video Adapter : NVIDIA GeForce GTX 760 (6CU 1152SP SM5.0 1GHz/1.24GHz, 512kB L2, 2GB 6GHz 256-bit, PCIe 2.00 x16)

Graphics Processor
CUDA GP Processor : NVIDIA GeForce GTX 760 (1152SP 6C 1GHz/1.24GHz, 512kB L2, 2GB 6GHz 256-bit)
OpenCL GP Processor : NVIDIA GeForce GTX 760 (1152SP 6C 1GHz/1.24GHz, 96kB L2, 2GB 6GHz 256-bit)
Compute Shader Processor : NVIDIA GeForce GTX 760 (1152SP 6C 1GHz/1.24GHz, 512kB L2, 2GB 6GHz 256-bit)
OpenGL Processor : GeForce GTX 760/PCIe/SSE2 (2GB)

Storage Devices
WDC WD1002FAEX-00Y9A0 (1TB, SATA600, 3.5", 7200rpm) : 932GB (F:)
WDC WD2002FAEX-007BA0 (2TB, SATA300/600, 3.5", 7200rpm) : 2TB (G:)
Samsung SSD 840 Series (250GB, SATA600, SSD, SED) : 233GB (C:)
WDC WD1002FAEX-00Z3A0 (1TB, SATA600, 3.5", 7200rpm) : 932GB (D:)
ASUS BW-12B1ST (SATA150, BD-RE, DVD+-RW, CD-RW, 8MB Cache) : N/A (E:)

Logical Storage Devices
Samples (F:) : 932GB (NTFS, 4kB) @ WDC WD1002FAEX-00Y9A0 (1TB, SATA600, 3.5", 7200rpm)
Projects (G:) : 2TB (NTFS, 4kB) @ WDC WD2002FAEX-007BA0 (2TB, SATA300/600, 3.5", 7200rpm)
System Reserved : 100MB (NTFS, 4kB) @ Samsung SSD 840 Series (250GB, SATA600, SSD, SED)
Volume Data (D:) : 932GB (NTFS, 4kB) @ WDC WD1002FAEX-00Z3A0 (1TB, SATA600, 3.5", 7200rpm)
Hard Disk (C:) : 233GB (NTFS, 4kB) @ Samsung SSD 840 Series (250GB, SATA600, SSD, SED)
Optical Drive (E:) : N/A @ ASUS BW-12B1ST (SATA150, BD-RE, DVD+-RW, CD-RW, 8MB Cache)

Peripherals
LPC Hub Controller 1 : ASUS Patsburg LPC Controller
Audio Device : ASUS Patsburg High Definition Audio Controller
Audio Codec : Realtek Semi High Definition Audio
Audio Device : MSI GK104 HDMI Audio Controller
Audio Codec : nVidia GeForce 6800 Ultra [NV40.0]
Serial Port(s) : 1
Disk Controller : ASUS Patsburg 6 Port SATA AHCI Controller
Disk Controller : ASUS Asmedia 106x SATA Controller
Disk Controller : ASUS 88SE9128 PCIe SATA 6 Gb/s RAID controller with HyperDuo
USB Controller 1 : ASUS Patsburg USB2 Enhanced Host Controller #2
USB Controller 2 : ASUS Patsburg USB2 Enhanced Host Controller #1
USB Controller 3 : ASUS ASMedia XHCI Controller
USB Controller 4 : ASUS ASMedia XHCI Controller
USB Controller 5 : ASUS ASMedia XHCI Controller
FireWire/1394 Controller 1 : ASUS VT6315 Series Firewire Controller
SMBus/i2c Controller 1 : Intel ICH SMBus
SMBus/i2c Controller 2 : Intel SNB/IVB/HSW-E XMB Ch 0 SMBus
SMBus/i2c Controller 3 : Intel SNB/IVB/HSW-E XMB Ch 1 SMBus

[Wall2Wall]

If you are coming from 11, my advice is a wipe and reinstall of Windows, PT, drivers, etc. A colleague of mine chased ghosts for a week updating 11 to 12. Only thing that worked was the clean install of the OS, PT, drivers, plugins, etc. He's been solid since. He's convinced remnants of 11 leave some serious incompatibilities with 12

A recent thread earlier had a guy coming from 10 to 12 with serious issues. It has now been marked "solved". He had remnants of 10 disrupting 12.

You will obviously have to do your windows optimizations over.

http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/e...oting/en349411
http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/...for-windows-7/

After that, run it without the eleven rack hooked up for bit. Your hook up is different. Could be clocking issues or something similar.

[The Weed]

IIRC there is at least one thread about issues with Plug In Alliance plugs.

Cheers,

[PatriotsBiker]

Thanks, Wall2Wall.

I'm in agreement so far that I need to do a fresh OS install and everything else that follows. This started as a 10 install a few years ago. I've got my disk out and ready to roll. Got some holiday season company rolling in within the hour for a couple of days, so will likely do when they split. (collecting any other tips and pointers in the meantime.)

Use the system without the 11R for a while? I'm not doubting this strategy, but am curious about the why. (fwiw -My hook up is different only to utilize the mic-preamps for acoustic recording as suggested I think over in the 11R section of the forum. )

Thanks again for replying.

(ps - agreed about the PIA plugs. Think something is not getting basted away on uninstalls, leaving pointers and identifiers around to get mis-matched within system apps.)

[PatriotsBiker]

A related question that came up while doing some research on all of this. Is there a way to identify the mBox as the default audio device in windows? If so, I'll want to do when I set the new build up. I know about setting it up for default playback or default recording, but it sounded like something different.

[The Weed]

On Windows, since PT 11, the interface for Pro Tools should not be used for Windows sounds/audio, it should only be for Pro Tools. Use your onboard soundcard as the default for Windows sounds/audio.

Cheers,

[PatriotsBiker]

This is long as heck, but it was one huge, long process to get to where I am now, and it's possible that I am not the only one getting some of the errors codes that lead me down the right paths to fix a few issues. I'm hoping all of this can help someone.

OK, so I went through all of the steps to clean-up my machine. I did a fresh, clean install (with format, of course) of Windows 7sp1. I had a few issues with the install. Most of which, the latest chipset drivers from Intel did not get along with mine. I ended up going with the last version I had. I did all of the optimizations.

The beauty of a new system is that the Event Log is fresh and recent. Keep that in mind.

After setting everything up, I went through all of the optimizations that could be done before installing PT. I then installed pace, mBox3, PT12-4, AIR First Effects and Plugs, Xpand2 and Plug In Alliance plugs. I tested what I could after PT-4 before going on to PIA plugs. I did not have to wait long after the PIA plugs to have issues. Maybe about 10 seconds? I might be kind. It just plain crashed, leaving only the 'PT crashed, send lo to Avid?' message box.

I probably was not clear earlier on the typical errors I was getting before going through this exercise. Here's the run down.

#1: PT crashes with no error message aside from the "....PT quit, send report to Avid?" dialog.
#2: PT crashes with an error about not having permissions to auto backup, which was bogus.
#3: I had that invalid namespace or handle error just a few times. (I've forgotten which it was...sorry)
#4: Audio tracking behavior was messed up when recording audio by playing my MIDI keyboard thru Mini-Grand. More description below.
#5: DAE 6 errors would sometime pop up in place of #1 from above, but were followed by a crash quite soon afterwards.
#6: A slight hesitation in starting playback at times. Even with very low plug count. A similar glitch on the screen visually.
#7: The I/O mysteriously changes when doing the set to default regimen in specified order. Not so much of a renaming as a re-ordering. Even with brand new bus I/Os I created with my new test Session after rebuilding.

All of that is pretty self explanatory except for the audio recording irregularities (#5). The audio track sometimes disappears from the edit window track after it stopped recording. On top of that, only the left side appears in the clip-list. Revealing it in Explorer showed that both L & R wav files were saved. Looking at file properties, I noticed two properties on the wav file were not populated. bit-rate and Length. I can import that right channel audio into PT and drag it onto a track. I think I have to change the name first.

As one would expect, that does indeed go away when successfully setting the I/Os to default. It comes back after rebooting sometimes. Not sure if the amount of reboots varied, but I'm pretty sure it was more than one time, more than once. My best guess on that WAS the existence of the 11R via SPDIF and USB (for the editor to function.)

So, there I was this morning. Getting crashes every few minutes of use. The obvious solution is to remove the one plug from PIA that I know I was having issues with before and seeing if that caused anything. As before, I had much longer periods of calmness without that plug. I did not get these issues popping up until afterward installing all of my PIA plugs yesterday. That doesn't really fi anything, though. yes, some users are having issues with PIA plugs installed, but many more are not. I left the plug in there and went hunting.

Event Log is nice when it's all spiffy-clean. Very little clutter. Little bits and hints. As any old school developer knows, Windows does not have to have obvious reasons for apps to bomb. One can sometimes find seemingly unrelated events listed and solve issues.

First, a real life error. This one I actually had tracked down the night before.

Issue A: I had a small series of errors produced by a Service. It's from the WMI Service. Event code 10. The text starts with "SELECT * FROM __InstanceModificationEvent ....." and ends with. Searching the error landed me on a MSoft page that promptly discredited any notion of a real error. It was accompanied by a Hotfix link and a link that offered to assist with diagnosing memory errors. This particular error blamed DVD disc imaging errors, which subsequently put a faulty file onto the disc. Don't worry about it, but download this hot fix if you really, really want the event log error to go away. Funny thing, is that I've seen that song and dance before. As with before, I downloaded the fix and ran error free for the next hour, including several reboots for good measure.

But as I said, I was back to having errors this morning. Strange. Back to the event log to see what happened this time.

Issue B: Somehow, upon start-up this morning, my system time decided to go back 3 hours. I had errors that hit me at 9:30 show up on the log stating 6:30. Sure enough, I look on the bottom right and see the time as 6:30. I discovered my time-zone had somehow changed. I changed it back to EST and booted for good measure.

I opened PT after booting. PT did not like having a license appear at a time that didn't jive. It offered to fix things. I accepted, and it started back up. PT ran for longer periods of time than it was before fixing the time issue. I was still getting crashes, though. Back to EventLog.

After chasing the rabbit down a few empty holes, I found salvation in the form of an information event. Seems that Windows is doing it's best to clean up the registry when it can. Pretty much to clean up after crashed apps, I guess.

Issue C: The events are entered under User Profile Service, which, basically stated above, gets uie a few entries. As before the rebuild, I was getting them with Pro Tools application as the disgraced exe. This event appeared in there regardless of how PT went down. (crash or graceful exit). Not cool!!!

I did my search and rabbit-holing. I found another MS article that offered up very little other to say that it could be a corrupted user account or a trip to clean-boot land to see if any service(s) could be hosing up the works. I've done the latter enough before. I tried the corrupt user account method. basically, I had to create two new accounts, log in on one and copy most of my users' folder from my regular account to the other new one, and then log in as that one.

The act of logging in on the new user account triggered an error from my motherboard manufacture, Asus. the error box was entitled, "Error on Asus Setup" ad complained of a file not being there, something named <xxxxx>log.iniis. Searching a fix for that one had me delete a task in the system's Task Scheduler. It was an Asus task.

How much it helped is what I do not know. I continued with the MS article to create the user, copy the folder over and try with the new user. Under the new user account, the PT crashes reduced greatly. To make sure the new user account somehow worked and the old account was hosed, I went back to my old account and tried PT again. No crashes.

I was still getting the very odd issues with audio recording as I described above. Again, I verified it would behave properly after defaulting the I/Os. It behaved. I rebooted. Uon reboot, I discovered my I/O changed back. Same audio recording issues. Grrrrr

So, I did part B of the MS article and did the clean boot. Why? Pretty much to say that I did as the article said. I did the clean boot, which pretty much turned off all non-MS services, I got back into PT and tried the audio. Sure enough, same issue. I changed the I/O, tried again to make sure it worked and rebooted again.

This time when I got back in, the I/O had stayed at the default. I tried some more tracking and it all worked.

Fast forward many hours later and after a whole bunch of installations later, I'm still going 15 minutes without a crash. I've not sat down to a regular session yet, but I'm feeling better about it. Keeping fingers crossed. Tomorrow is more installations. Big ones, like Native Instruments and all my ToonTrack drum stuff. I'm glad all my data is on separate HDs and ready to roll. I'm hoping to just have to do the plugs, for obvious time reasons.

So anyhow, I hope all this rambling helps someone. It seems like it was several issues hitting me at once. It also seems like it's typical error handling in Windows' systems applications. Write all the error handling code you want. the OS is going to return whatever it wants to the user.

I hope to post back in a day or two with continued success.

[Wizzoboy]

I have posted this before but will again as it may point people in the right direction.