Error -20021

[Cheesehead]

I opened a case about it too.

[Cheesehead]

I received an update on this from Avid asking me to try disabling Tailspin and Spindump.
My method of disabling and re-enabling my dialogue tracks works on some sessions and not others, so no win there sadly.
I was working in a facility last week and they are having exactly the same problems, so it must be common across a lot of rigs?
Anyone else heard anything or had a breakthrough?

[GCScott]

We've always seen automation too dense errors. We jump through the usual cut automation' loops seeking out conform points which seem to be the worst for it.
Since upgrading from 2018.4 to 2019.6 however, they're accompanied by -20021 and as others have mentioned - refuse to go back into play without a bit of deactivating/reactivating or closing/opening.

They didn't have such a dramatic impact on the session until the upgrade. Are you still seeing this in 19.10?

[Frank Kruse]

Over here it started this summer (19.6 I guess). But as stated earlier I have seen this 1-2 years ago on a large Atmos mix with multiple HDX rigs running as well.
This time we're all HDnative. No HDX involved but my colleague who's currently on a huge block-buster with hundreds of tracks mixed on HDX is having the same issue. The temp fix I mentioned does avoid the relaunch but it's not a cure for the issue.

[Cheesehead]

Are you still seeing this in 19.10?

Yes I'm running 19.10 and its happening a lot on one particular session.
I can repair it sometimes by de activating and reactivating one dialogue track. The track has DNS One, Fabfilter Pro Q 2 and an avid EQ on it all with automation.
Does that match up with whatever you guys have as plugins?

[Frank Kruse]

Originally Posted by Cheesehead

Yes I'm running 19.10 and its happening a lot on one particular session.
I can repair it sometimes by de activating and reactivating one dialogue track. The track has DNS One, Fabfilter Pro Q 2 and an avid EQ on it all with automation.
Does that match up with whatever you guys have as plugins?

No sorry, Channel Strip, Slapper, Spanner, Phoenix Surround 2.0.9, Lowender, Softube TSAR, McDSP SA-1 and some more.

I found that sometimes ChannelStrip behaves weird. I tweak something in preview but nothing happens. Even the most extreme settings don't change a thing. This will at some point stop and the plugin suddenly works but then when writing to selection shortly after that I get the too dense and 20021 thing. But this is rather rare but I've seen it quite a few times. Usually it's the too dense and 20021 out of the blue but definitely in certain sections of the sessions and then in others no issue at all.

[Cheesehead]

Hmmmmm...
There goes my theory then.
I have channelstrip, slapper, spanner and phoenixverb that match yours but not on this channel.
I only have one channelstrip in the whole session.

I'm installing digitrace today, so maybe we'll get a bit further?

[leopod]

Did you manage to find anything with digitrace? Is that kind of an avid logging system to trace errors?

We have another problematic session, with random "automation too dense" + 20021 happening twice or more every hour. Deactivate/reactivate all tracks seems to work all the time to restore playback. Deactivating/reactivating all plugins on our 2nd insert (mostly channelstrips in our case) seem to have worked once also, but I've been told it hasn't work in another similar situation. All these workarounds only reestablish playback until the next "automation too dense" error, so none of those carry hope towards definitely eliminating the problem.

I really hope you'll be able to pinpoint something. Also I'll make sure to report here if I find anything else on my side.

[bassmagnetic]

Did anyone find out what precisely is causing the error?

Avid say its some sort of corrupted automation which makes sense as the error is only happening on certain projects at certain places in the project, and in other projects not at all.

It'd be great to know which plugin is causing it, if that's what it is.

[Cheesehead]

Still no solution from Avid, my case is ongoing.
I've sent lots of logs.
If they've seen anything, they haven't let me know what it is.
I have a bit of downtime now, so I might try re-building my template in the latest version of PT.
I remember similar things being related to templates from previous versions.
Shot in the dark really.