Pro Tools 9 HD freezes opening new session. Help!?

[innerbooty]

Hi all,
Been about six months since I had to post about a problem with my 14 month old HD2 system. But the quiet streak has ended. Pro Tools 9 HD, Mac Pro Quad Core 2.66, 2 Apogee Rosetta 800's connected via X-HD cards. 1 Core and 1 Accel card.

Almost out of the blue, starting yesterday, I started getting all these weird freezes, usually when opening a new session, having just closed another session. I was opening and closing lots of small sessions yesterday, none of them very big or DSP intensive. Up until now I've easily opened sessions with 4 or 5 times more DSP stuff going on. Upon opening a session I would suddenly notice the progress bar that says "Creating Insert Blah, Blah" moving slower and slower, even on tracks with almost no plugins on them. Usually these messages zip by. Then finally just freezing on the Spinning Beach Ball of Doom.

Another time the session finally opened, but then gave me the Insufficient System Resources message for a whole list of plugins that should have been easily available. Another time a session opening and even with Playback stopped, I was getting these weird pulses coming through the two instances of Revibe I had setup. Making the Revibe tracks inactive then active again didn't help.

One time the system froze right at the tail end of having bounced a file. The only premonition of this was that two days ago I got a couple of instances of this weird that has happened to me off and on - but not for six months or so now - where Pro Tools hangs when I go to rename a region. After most of these freezes I have to force quit Pro Tools, and completely reboot. Sometimes, even if I initiated the restart, the computer would come back up with the gray screen saying "Your computer restarted because of a problem. Press any key to continue." They are pretty nasty freezes.

Near the end of yesterday I started purging the DSP cache every time I closed a session, before opening the next one. Not sure if the DSP management is somehow messing up. Don't think I had a crash after that, but didn't do enough work after that for it to be a real test.

For troubleshooting - I ran Disk Warrior on the system disk and my 2TB working disk, and it didn't find anything egregious, but fixed what was wrong. I fixed permissions on the system disk. I deleted Pro Tools preferences. But I was still getting these errors after all that. I want to try running on my Snow Leopard disk, but I need to install all the plugins I use, and a few of them are not iLok plugins (PSP Audioware) they actually authorize to the disk, so I'm not sure how I'm going to get them installed on the Snow Leopard disk.

I would greatly appreciate any tips! You guys have been a big help in the past. Thanks! - Steve

[Craig F]

DigiTest and a PRAM clearing would be my next to testing items

As for moving OS you will need to deactivate the disk based licensees, manufactures website should have instructions on the proper procedure, then reinstall on the new OS (might take the as an opurtunity to upgrade the System Drive to a SSD drive)

[innerbooty]

Thanks. Will run DigiTest and zap PRAM. (Will need to look up how you do that on a Mac Pro...) Deinstall / Reinstall sounds like a pain, but I suppose that's the only way...

Funny that you have the link to Little Primal Tap in your profile. A Pro Tools friend of mine says that he has heard of these errors coming up after a problematic plugin has been installed, and Primal Tap was the last plugin I installed, last Thursday, before all this began happening. So if it starts happening again that is the next thing I will try, removing Primal Tap. (It's pretty cool though...)

Today I've been doing a "Purge Cache" from the System Usage window every time I close a session, before I open the next one. May be totally unrelated, but no crashes yet today.

[Craig F]

PRAM Control+Option+P+R when booting up

That's why I like the iLok, I've dealt with to many dead system that were disk and/or mobo s/n based authorizations

Bad Plugs can cause problems but Sound Toys has been in the game for some time and has a good rep but something could have slipped through beta

[innerbooty]

Thanks, I'll try the PRAM. And yeah, wish everything was iLok. Not sure why not everyone uses that now...

Do you happen to know what the .DLOG file is, and/or how to read it? Based on a couple of other threads it seems like it can have clues as to what might have caused a crash or freeze. But they seem to be in an unreadable format - at least unreadable by me...

[Chief Technician]

Originally Posted by innerbooty

Do you happen to know what the .DLOG file is, and/or how to read it? Based on a couple of other threads it seems like it can have clues as to what might have caused a crash or freeze. But they seem to be in an unreadable format - at least unreadable by me...

All .dlog files are encrypted. Only Avid can decrypt those files. Indeed, they can contain useful data. The only way I know of to get a .dlog file decrypted for analysis is to open a support case with Avid.

[innerbooty]

If I posted them here would someone from Avid decrypt them for me, or at least tell me if there is some obvious glaring error that is bringing things down? In the thread on the DUC where I initially heard about .DLOG files an Avid tech took the .DLOG file the guy had uploaded and came back and told him which plugin was causing his crash. The OP didn't post again, which I assume means that his problem was solved. Do I really need to open a $75 (or whatever amount it is now) support ticket to have them do that for me...???

[Shan]

Originally Posted by innerbooty

...Primal Tap was the last plugin I installed, last Thursday, before all this began happening...

Did you remove the buggy plug-in?

Shane

[innerbooty]

I haven't removed Little Primal Tap yet. After crashing about 6 or 7 times on Saturday, in various ways, even after running Disk Warrior and trashing prefs, etc., I have not had a crash since then. (Which I am hesitant to even say out loud...) The only thing I have been doing differently since Saturday's crashes is that after I close a session, before I open the next session I "Purge Cache" from the System Usage window. Clear out all the DSP. Maybe that has nothing to do with it, but I'm waiting to see if I start having crashes again, then I will certainly take out Little Primal Tap as my first move.