LOUD Audio white noise?

[jflowers]

Has anyone ever seen the issue where some tracks will play fine, but some (especially if they're imported) will play with a loud white noise?

This happens with audio which was recorded in Pro Tools or in another application.

I have a short video, which illustrates the issues:
http://tinyurl.com/PT8Noise

This happened on my Mac Pro with Pro Tools M-Powered 7.4 and a M-Audio ProjectMix io and it's happening with Pro Tools LE 8 and a Digi 003 control surface. I'm running OS 10.5.5 and I've recently re-installed the OS from a clean drive.

More about my system at www.LifeZero.org, where I detail my complete setup.

[Premo]

That's ugly!
White noise is generally, bad ram, incompatible / out of date plug-ins or hard drive that is failing. But these issues are sometimes hard to track down, just be patient and thorough and eliminate all possible variables.

Have you ran an Apple Hardware test?
I would get MemTest and verify your RAM is all passing.
Pull all plug-ins out to a temporary location and see if noise still happens
Mac HD /Library / App Support / Plug-ins (empty this folder out or move it and relaunch PT)

Follow the optimizations here
Repair disk permissions, airport and bluetooth off, Firewire cable direct to back 1394 port on mac pro (not connected to the cinema display if any!)
Remove log-in items, startup items and disconnect all other peripherals connected to the machine.

If still getting noise, try Zapping PRAM, Reset SMC and new 1394 cable.

Good Luck.

[Keybeeetsss]

read though this..
http://duc.digidesign.com/showthread...mn+white+noise

[jflowers]

What makes no sense to me is how existing tracks seem to work, but only in certain sessions.

For example;

I have a session where I recorded a podcast with Pro Tools LE 7.4.2 and all the tracks play fine in that session.

Then, if I import an audio file onto a new track, at 44.1/16 (the same settings as the session), it plays back LOUD static, while the other tracks play normally.

I've done everything that has been suggested. I even purchased a new PCIe firewire card with a TI chipset (which Digi suggests). Nothing seems to fix this bug, which doesn't appear on every track.

I can record new tracks and the waveforms are fine, but they play back loud static if I move them to a new session, regardless of the new session's audio settings.

Those same files play fine in Quicktime, iTunes, Garageband and Apple Logic.

I'm literally losing sleep over this issue. It makes no sense at all.

I've attached an image to a session being played, where Audio #1 is fine and Audio #2 (44.1/16 AIFF) is playing noise. This happens at the same time! One track OK, one track NOISE. ??

Audio WTF

Originally Posted by Keybeeetsss

read though this..
http://duc.digidesign.com/showthread...mn+white+noise

[Keybeeetsss]

Yeah I feel ya man; been thru the whole spill...Thatz why I posted that link for ya...

[jflowers]

I forgot to mention, I went through the link and did everything; from removing plug-ins to permissions repair to resetting PRAM (NVRAM, whatever) to the rest of it.

I've spent literally days trying to track this down and it just crops up without any real reason.

Grrr.

Originally Posted by Keybeeetsss

Yeah I feel ya man; been thru the whole spill...Thatz why I posted that link for ya...

[Keybeeetsss]

Originally Posted by jflowers

I've spent literally days trying to track this down and it just crops up without any real reason.

Grrr.

Well that where "Suckage" comes in because there really is no real reason or it hadn't been technically found yet...Just some Maybe solutions...

[jflowers]

I've contacted Digidesign and they are suggesting the same things you guys have pointed out. I've tried moving sessions to "supported drives" (they say my RAID isn't support) but still no luck.

Any audio, which worked in an old session, when copied into a new session, even at the same 44.1k/16bit settings, causes loud white noise audio to be produced. Again, this is audio that worked in a session created with Pro Tools even earlier that day.

Seems like adding audio files to a session, through drag-and-drop, import or whatever method causes this problem to crop up again.

The stupid thing is I can record audio in a new session (using a Mic and the Digi 003), play it back and do whatever edits, but if I move it into a new session, it is just white noise, even though the audio wave form looks perfectly fine.

Massive, epic, major grrr on this issue.

[jflowers]

Un-f***ing-believable.

I figured out the problem.

I was using a RAID (connected to the Mac Pro via a Highpoint RR 2322 adapter) as my audio drive. Because I'm recording large sessions (podcasts and more) and this is my primary drive for all my media, including Avid, it made sense (to me, anyway).

Then, I moved sessions from the RAID, but - like an idiot I didn't move the audio files from the RAID to another drive.

Apparently, both the SESSION and the previously recorded AUDIO cannot be on a RAID. They have to be on a non-RAID device. Even the already recorded, existing AIFF files. Even the ones that playback in the import audio window, but then don't play on the session timeline.

Now... I just purchased an external Firewire 800 drive for all my Pro Tools work. We will see if that fixes the problem.

Note to Digidesign; Not supporting a RAID, which works with every other piece of software on my Mac, which works with Apple Logic, Quicktime, Soundtrack Pro, Garageband and every other thing I can think of, is so seriously lame. Having this be the problem; inconsistent audio noise on playback -- is even more lame.

I've never, in two decades of computer use, experienced such frustration with a piece of software before. Your "unsupported drives" list seems arbitrary and like some problem I would have had in 1985, with my Amiga.

[Keybeeetsss]

Originally Posted by jflowers

Un-f***ing-believable.

I figured out the problem.

I was using a RAID (connected to the Mac Pro via a Highpoint RR 2322 adapter) as my audio drive. Because I'm recording large sessions (podcasts and more) and this is my primary drive for all my media, including Avid, it made sense (to me, anyway).

Then, I moved sessions from the RAID, but - like an idiot I didn't move the audio files from the RAID to another drive.

Apparently, both the SESSION and the previously recorded AUDIO cannot be on a RAID. They have to be on a non-RAID device. Even the already recorded, existing AIFF files. Even the ones that playback in the import audio window, but then don't play on the session timeline.

Now... I just purchased an external Firewire 800 drive for all my Pro Tools work. We will see if that fixes the problem.

Note to Digidesign; Not supporting a RAID, which works with every other piece of software on my Mac, which works with Apple Logic, Quicktime, Soundtrack Pro, Garageband and every other thing I can think of, is so seriously lame. Having this be the problem; inconsistent audio noise on playback -- is even more lame.

I've never, in two decades of computer use, experienced such frustration with a piece of software before. Your "unsupported drives" list seems arbitrary and like some problem I would have had in 1985, with my Amiga.

Kool...Yeah I was gonna say to ur prior post that u can't just import, but u literally have to get it of whateva drive it was on totally...But kool u got it...