Bug: Commit, Freeze Crashes Constantly 2024.6

[Darryl Ramm]

Looking at the Crashpad .crash report you uploaded to Dropbox. Omnisphere is sitting in the stack when it crashes. So yes it's very much a suspect. At that point I'm not going to even look at the real details of the stack trace, I just see Omnisphere and I know it should be the next troubleshooting step. That took 30 seconds or so.

Crashpad format .crash files are multi-part files that contain a pile of text, including the contents of the Pro Tools log files and at the end is a binary minidump format file.

You can find the plain text stack trace in the .crash file by opening with a text editor (like vi) and searching for the four letters MDMP which is the header ID of the minidump binary file part of the .crash file. If you scroll back from that you are looking at the very dumbed down stack trace of the crash.

Unfortunately Avid has gone all in with Google Crashpad, ah bloatware to build more bloatware... which makes doing more detailed quick analysis harder than if these were Mac native .ips crash files. You would have to beat me senseless to want to ship a product that relied on Crashpad vs native Mac tooling. But there is already enough to finger Omnisphere to know you need to test remove it from the plugin folder.

(And it looks like your system has multiple problems, it's throwing AAE -9173 errors and it's reporting that the Trash plugin is not meeting Audio processing deadlines. I would have long ago tried to remove the Trash .aaxplugin file/tried to see what can be done about that issue.)

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What you have been doing is not the way to make efficient progress helping yourself.

You've not effectively escalated anything to Avid. I doubt Google Crashpad submitted crash reports get much attention until they pile up and even then I'd be surprised if support ever reached out to any customer proactively based on them. If you are being harmed by a problem you should be opening a case with Avid Support. Then if you are not getting the help you expect from support, describe what here what is going on and include the case number when you post on DUC.

When you suspect plugins you need to do standard steps of troubleshooting by moving plugin bundles out of the plugin folder. It is quick at least to start with. Just move *all* .aaxplugin bundles out of the plugin folder, restart Pro Tools and see if the problem has gone away. That should often takes minutes to tens of minutes. If the problem has gone away you then suspect it's a plugin, if not then you know it's not a plugin.

And in this case we suspect a specific plugin so start by removing that .aaxplugin and testing without it. You already had suspicions of Omisphere, so that could have been tested days ago. If the testing helps finger Omnisphere more then contact Spectasonics support, even if the problem was triggered by a Pro Tools change you will very likely get faster response via the plugin vendor. And when these things break it's often something the plugin vendor needs to change, or maybe help Avid development understand, and/or they are better to escalate within Avid.

[Dizzi45Z]

Darryl,

I appreciate your insights and knowledge here with helping me (sincerely). But please stop criticizing all the things I "should have done" to resolve this issue. I get what you are saying regarding the "ideal" situation in getting to the bottom of this issue and I truly see the value of doing the "should haves" (and I will work on trying to provide more of those in the future). But you are assuming that:

1. I have tons of time to troubleshoot the issues. I am currently swamped and trying to get enough time to eat and sleep (partly because of this issue that has put me way behind). When things slow down, I plan to more thoroughly get to the bottom of this issue and then I can spend hours on the phone with Avid trying to get reports and things sorted out.

2. That I have a programmers degree and knowledge. I have looked at those crash reports multiple times and they are extremely long and nothing makes any sense to me from those (However, I really appreciate your help in trying to read those and I will see if it makes more sense now).

3. That nobody should come and report obvious bugs/issues they have run into with the latest updates until they have fully figured out all aspects of what is causing it.

I have done as much troubleshooting and testing possible in my limited time and knowledge to try to gather as much information as I can to figure this out. It's not like I opened this thread with... "my computer crashed. Help!" kind of post. I've listed my specs, what point this bug started happening, the various commands that are causing the crash, possible culprits and the ability to provide crash reports. I'm sorry if it doesn't currently include every detail at this point. I'm happy to provide more as I have more time to test more things out.

I am here at the forums looking to see if others are having similar experiences and working on gathering information from multiple users to help get information to get to the bottom of this. Thanks to people like you who do have deeper programming knowledge and suggestions to get further into the issue. If this forum is only about posting final results, then what's the point of this community?

My reason for even starting this post was that I was seeing that other users were running into the same issue that I was on the "PT2024.6 | Issues, Bugs and Observations" thread and instead of including 100's of different issues in one post, I felt it would be good to create a focused post on this one issue.

Sincerely, thank you for the help you are providing with getting to the bottom of this issue.

[marianna]

Originally Posted by Dizzi45Z

No messages, Pro Tools completely crashes as in disappears completely and then the crash reporter shows up and I can enter notes and submit. I have been submitting all of the reports. Here is one I saved:

Are these crash reports just as good as Log Files? I don't know if Pro Tools can mark that part in the Log File if it has crashed.

Steps 3 and 4 will have to happen when I have more time to reset my preferences and time to sort through hundreds of plugins.

However, with that being said, I have noticed most of the crashes happening most often in sessions where I do have Omnisphere running. I need more time to run through those steps 3 and 4 and I will report back. Please let me know the answer to my above question about reports.

Hi again Dizzi45Z

Darryl is one of thr best assets we have online here and knows his stuff.... but he tends to respond more technically and want me info up front than someone such as me would due to his background. Good intentions all around.

With regards to the crash reports......

Pro Tools .crash logs get uploaded to our Backtrace.io server if you chooses to upload from the dialog box. We reintroduced that in Pro Tools 2024.6. Prior to that (for a couple of versions), the report would automatically be uploaded with no dialog box. However, if the log is still on the system because you dismissed the dialog, we should have you upload to a case and CS can review it.

Im going to create a case for this as I know who you are and have your email form the helper tool case we did.

stand by for the case to come thru - and if you could respond to it with your log files... that would be great.

Marianna

[marianna]

Originally Posted by Actionmusic

I've seen some crashes/hangs with (suspected or mentioned in crash report) Little Alterboy (using automation) , Trillian, Omnisphere (automation may be a factor in this as well fyi), VPS Avenger, Shaperbox 3.5.2 , Kontakt 7. The reproducible ones I've sent to support. As mentioned in other posts, there is a good possibility other track plugins in the session and NOT the plugin track you are trying to bounce are at fault.

My troubleshooting was to inactive half the tracks at a time, repeat, until I narrowed down the problematic plugins. in my example, Kontakt was hanging commit, but only by Ominsphere being inactive would it commit as expected. So which is at fault ?

Similarly had a Trilian commit problem but this time it actually was the Trillian at fault.

Just flagging for general information

Hi there Actionmusic....

I didnt see a case for you on this with support...... " The reproducible ones I've sent to support." did you have a case going and if so what was the case # so I can tie these together so we can figure out what is causing this.

Marianna

[Darryl Ramm]

I completely get you are under the gun and have very limited time, I am pointing out what you were doing because it is not the best approach for gaining most clarity quickly, especially when there is suspicion about a plugin. And if Omnisphere is confirmed as the issue then the fast options may be rolling back Pro Tools versions or finding a temporary alternative to Omnisphere--not exactly what anybody might want to do in your tight on time situation. But if nothing else knowing that can also help avoid wasting time troubleshooting other possible issues, and helps inform you to keep an eye out for Omnisphere related fixes.

Given how awful the current troubleshooting documentation is I am going to keep reemphasizing how to do plugin troubleshooting in threads on DUC. Who knows Avid might even fix that documentation.

For other folks who find this thread having similar problems hopefully they will be able to use quick tests moving .aaxplugin files out of the plugin directory to help narrow suspicions on plugins. And enough extra info is here on using Crashpad .crash files that might help some folks finger plugin suspects (it won't always). And again, I sure wish Pro Tools still used the Apple crash reports with more obvious lovely text stack traces more easily approachable by users... that in many cases folks could just see a plugin mentioned and know it was a suspect.

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by Actionmusic

I've seen some crashes/hangs with (suspected or mentioned in crash report) Little Alterboy (using automation) , Trillian, Omnisphere (automation may be a factor in this as well fyi), VPS Avenger, Shaperbox 3.5.2 , Kontakt 7. The reproducible ones I've sent to support. As mentioned in other posts, there is a good possibility other track plugins in the session and NOT the plugin track you are trying to bounce are at fault.

My troubleshooting was to inactive half the tracks at a time, repeat, until I narrowed down the problematic plugins. in my example, Kontakt was hanging commit, but only by Ominsphere being inactive would it commit as expected. So which is at fault ?

Similarly had a Trilian commit problem but this time it actually was the Trillian at fault.

Just flagging for general information

Since Marianna reminded me of your post by replying to it...

You did some good troubleshooting, but to try to make more progress here you might try moving suspect .aaxplugin bundles out of the plugin folder (I would also then trash prefs including being sure to trash the new style plugin cache files).

Try moving out the plugin(s) you suspect most (seems like Omnisphere?) and see if things get stable. Inactivating a track may not be enough to stop all interactions with a bad/incompatible plugin. I would hope that might be able to narrow things down more for you.

[Dizzi45Z]

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

I completely get you are under the gun and have very limited time, I am pointing out what you were doing because it is not the best approach for gaining most clarity quickly, especially when there is suspicion about a plugin. And if Omnisphere is confirmed as the issue then the fast options may be rolling back Pro Tools versions or finding a temporary alternative to Omnisphere--not exactly what anybody might want to do in your tight on time situation. But if nothing else knowing that can also help avoid wasting time troubleshooting other possible issues, and helps inform you to keep an eye out for Omnisphere related fixes.

Thanks again for taking the time to respond to my posts.

I originally had other suspicions besides Omnisphere or plugins before I posted. I spent the majority of my troubleshooting time trying to figure out if it was something else. I saw that others suspected Omnisphere and I knew I was using a ton of Omnisphere, so that is why I quickly mentioned Omnisphere as part of my original post. As I said, this is an ongoing process of me trying to figure out what exactly is the problem.

I got an email from Avid today (they apparently have been trying to call me too...Thank you!). I am collecting a bunch of my crash reports to send to them as well as a session that basically crashes no matter what committing or freezing that you do as long as Omnisphere is active. When I remove Omnisphere out of the plugin folder, I no longer have any problems with crashes. I have been able to simplify the session to having no other plugin but Omnisphere and still have crashing issues.

I have been hoping to see an Omnisphere update, but so far there isn't one.

I'm in a weird bind because tons of the tracks in these sessions are Omnisphere and we have also been using ARA for tons of vocal production. To roll back to an earlier version of Pro Tools would remove all ARA edits unless I commit them (which isn't ideal for where we are at in our production). If I stay current, I'm hosed if I ever need to commit or freeze for any reason. There is no way I would be able to convince the band to replace all of their Omnisphere tracks across their song. So while I know I can import session data, roll back, commit and import back into current sessions, it is time consuming and a big mess. So if it is Omnisphere, hopefully Pro Tools/Omnisphere can get this figured out sooner than later.

[noiseboyuk]

Originally Posted by Dizzi45Z

So if it is Omnisphere, hopefully Pro Tools/Omnisphere can get this figured out sooner than later.

Forgive an obvious question, but have you contacted Spectrasonics support? They are excellent, and may or may not yet be aware of this issue.

If an earlier build of PT has no issue then clearly something that has changed on Avid's side, but if only Omnisphere causes the crash then there's clearly something specific to Spectrasonics too - ie either party could fix this. Hopefully the two companies can swiftly work together.

[Dizzi45Z]

Originally Posted by noiseboyuk

Forgive an obvious question, but have you contacted Spectrasonics support? They are excellent, and may or may not yet be aware of this issue.

If an earlier build of PT has no issue then clearly something that has changed on Avid's side, but if only Omnisphere causes the crash then there's clearly something specific to Spectrasonics too - ie either party could fix this. Hopefully the two companies can swiftly work together.

Good recommendation. I'll see if I can send them some of the same info.

[Dizzi45Z]

By the way, I am now seeing this issue with Keyscape as well.

So far, these crashes seem to be related to having Omnisphere or Keyscape running in your session. If I just make those plugins inactive, I seem to be able to commit and bounce again without crashes.

....Still researching more.