AAE 6 errors - for future forum searchers...

[noiseboyuk]

Out of nowhere got this today. 2019.6 system running nicely, no changes to hardware or software, working on an ongoing project. Suddenly an AAE 6 error popped up - it happened when I auditioned an auto-generated clip in the clip window. After then the error popped up with increasing regularity, until essentially the session was unusable over period of about 30 mins. Restarted PT, restarted OS, no change. One other curiosity - enabling the Disk Cache didn't work on the project, it never loaded anything into RAM.

Trawling the archives, the two most common solutions were removing then re-installing all AAX plugs, and copying all files into a new blank session, copying all the media. I tried the latter (still on the same audio drive), and problem solved, seemingly. Disk Cache working again, AAE 6 errors gone. However Task Manager has hung on one file copied from the original AAF file it seems, saying "The system cannot find the path specified". That gave me an idea - was it in fact an audio file it didn't like for some reason?

That turned out to be the case. The effect mentioned above was a multichannel one, with a very long file name. I'm not sure which of these attributes PT took exception to, or why it was perfectly ok when tracklaying and only several weeks later at premix stage did it vomit it back in my face. I had to obliterate all reference to it, then the original session was happy once more.

Wanted to post it just in case someone ever finds themselves in the same boat. One tricky thing though - it wasn't in any way obvious in the original session that this was a problem WAV, it was only when I imported everything into a new session PT threw its metaphorical hands up at it. Also, the clip I auditioned that originally set the whole ghastly chain of events going WASN'T the one that proved itself the problem.

Another day in the life of a happy Pro Tools user...

[musicman691]

Good sleuthing. I thought the old character limit on file names went away in Windows?

[The Weed]

Was 256 usable characters, but W10 allows more with a "hack" according to this article from ITPro Today:

"In the past the maximum supported file length was 260 characters (256 usable after the drive characters and termination character). In Windows 10 long file name support can be enabled which allows file names up to 32,767 characters (although you lose a few characters for mandatory characters that are part of the name). To enable this perform the following:
Start the registry editor (regedit.exe)
Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\FileSystem
Double click LongPathsEnabled
Set to 1 and click OK
Reboot
This can also be enabled via Group Policy (W10Pro) via Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > System > Filesystem > Enable NTFS long paths."

[noiseboyuk]

I've just looked a little more closely at the problem file. Originally it had 211 characters in the file name including spaces, 185 without, and 172 after import in the Audio Files folder. Here's the mutlichannel audio original name:

Trucks Specific-2003 Iveco Powerstar 6700-Constant Driving Series,Take 1,A Set,Onboard,Drive Steady,Medium Slow,Long Run,Stop Off,A1 Cabin A2 Muffler Close A3 Muffler Pole A4 Rear Wheel A5 Engine A6 Transmission.wav

Catchy, huh? And here is the centre channel in Audio Files:

TrucksSpecific-2003IvecoPowerstar6700-ConstantDrivingSeries,Take1,ASet,Onboard,DriveStea dy,MediumSlow,LongRun,StopOff,A1CabinA2MufflerClos A3MfflrPlA4RrWhlA5EngnA6Trnsmssn.C

It is obviously stripped out spaces, and after Muffler Close A3 it seems to strip out all vowels too. I think PT does do odd things to long file names sometimes as a matter of course, right? Or has something gone wrong in that process here and PT got confused? FWIW, I tried resaving a WAV as an AIF then converted back again, but PT still wasn't having it. Doing the same as an MP3 and then renaming made it work ok.

Clearly this is under the 256 limit so in theory its not an OS thing. Would be interested to get folks takes on what PT does with long names, and if it is known to cause issues sometimes. Again, part of the oddness is it was quite happy initially, it was only days / weeks later that that the problem occured.

[JFreak]

Clearly the problem is Windows does not carry good enough metadata within files? I mean, if someone sent me file(s) named like that I would kindly ask them to clean up the mess while I have a cup of coffee.

[Reckless Erik]

It is a bit on the long side! Also if one leg of the multi channel file has its name truncated it is unlikely to fit with the other legs, if you get my meaning.

[noiseboyuk]

Originally Posted by Reckless Erik

It is a bit on the long side! Also if one leg of the multi channel file has its name truncated it is unlikely to fit with the other legs, if you get my meaning.

I probably should have said, the names of the PT-generated files are all identically changed, it's just the last letter(s) that changes for the different 5.1 allocations - C, L, LFE, Ls, R, Rs.