Intermittent distortion....

[gfantsimon]

I have this weird bug where out of the blue, something makes my entire audio output distorted.

The only way to clear it is to go to the Playback Engine and change the buffer size and then it's gone - for a while.

I've recreated the bug by using outside audio like Loopcloud - I'll listen to some loops in the Loopcloud app and then go back to Pro Tools, and poof, distorted output...

It's also recreated if I have my Message App and someone texts me. The Text Bell dings through the Native Engine (set to UA Thunderbolt) and when I go back to Pro Tools - there's the distortion again...

It's not UA hardware because I tried it with a different interface and same thing...I've tried resetting prefs, removing plugins, no luck...

Anyone else?

I'm on Monterey 12.6.1 and Pro Tools 22.12.0.326.

Thanks all,

Gina

[lesbrunn]

Originally Posted by gfantsimon

I have this weird bug where out of the blue, something makes my entire audio output distorted.

The only way to clear it is to go to the Playback Engine and change the buffer size and then it's gone - for a while.

I've recreated the bug by using outside audio like Loopcloud - I'll listen to some loops in the Loopcloud app and then go back to Pro Tools, and poof, distorted output...

It's also recreated if I have my Message App and someone texts me. The Text Bell dings through the Native Engine (set to UA Thunderbolt) and when I go back to Pro Tools - there's the distortion again...

It's not UA hardware because I tried it with a different interface and same thing...I've tried resetting prefs, removing plugins, no luck...

Anyone else?

I'm on Monterey 12.6.1 and Pro Tools 22.12.0.326.

Thanks all,

Gina

You really need to provide more info. Many things can cause distortion. I'm assuming your levels are not too high. If you have large sessions, that could happen with low buffer sizes. Are you tracking or mixing? Depending on what you are doing, juggling buffer sizes can help. Freeze is your friend. Try setting up a new session with just a couple of tracks. Does it still happen?

[dominicperry]

This is simple. Don’t play system sounds or notification sounds through the same interface as Pro Tools. In fact, turn them off completely.
What’s happening is that the system sound/notification is working at a different sample rate to your Pro Tools session and is changing your interface sample rate. Pro Tools doesn’t realise and continues to pump sound at the session sample rate but the interface doesn’t change back to the original sample rate. So you get a mess/distortion.

Pro Tools expects exclusive access to the interface while a session is open. This has always been the case and will not change. It’s not the same as other DAWs in this respect. Don’t even bother asking for it to be changed.

Dominic

[Sardi]

Originally Posted by dominicperry

This is simple. Don’t play system sounds or notification sounds through the same interface as Pro Tools. In fact, turn them off completely.
What’s happening is that the system sound/notification is working at a different sample rate to your Pro Tools session and is changing your interface sample rate. Pro Tools doesn’t realise and continues to pump sound at the session sample rate but the interface doesn’t change back to the original sample rate. So you get a mess/distortion.

Pro Tools expects exclusive access to the interface while a session is open. This has always been the case and will not change. It’s not the same as other DAWs in this respect. Don’t even bother asking for it to be changed.

Dominic

Not the case at all, at least on a Mac.

If the interface has multi client drivers (most do), then you can do everything you said not to do without any issues. Been doing it on multiple rigs for as long as I can remember.

Windows - different story. But the OP is on a Mac

By all means try it, but I highly doubt that is your issue.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[dominicperry]

Originally Posted by Sardi

Not the case at all, at least on a Mac.

If the interface has multi client drivers (most do), then you can do everything you said not to do without any issues. Been doing it on multiple rigs for as long as I can remember.

Windows - different story. But the OP is on a Mac

By all means try it, but I highly doubt that is your issue.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

OK, assume I'm incorrect. What is the OP meant to try?

Sudden distortion from nowhere is usually clocking or something upsetting the interface - a bad cable or something screwing with sample rate / bit depth. The fact that it works again after tweaking a setting inside PT implies that it's not a hardware/cable fault but something else messing with the interface. Other applications (including system sounds) are the most likely candidate. You are absolutely correct that multi-client drivers should allow this, but there are many cases where they don't work properly. Pro Tools doesn't request the correct sample rate every time you press play - it just assumes that the interface is set once the session is open. (This totally screws things up with Carbon all the time). Does my RME work in Reaper regardless of what else is going on - absolutely. Impeccable. But not true of PT.

Dominic

[gfantsimon]

Thanks all!

I really appreciate the input.

I'll check and see if I need to update any drivers - but I do think it's something internal and not about the interface - because - I use this laptop at 2 different studios. One studio uses a UA Thunderbolt interface and the other has a Focusrite RedNet using Dante -(but it does have a UA Octo Pre chassis to run my UA plugs...) - But, I am veering it towards being a driver issue.

I am upgrading to a Mac Studio next month and going to start fresh installing everything... so maybe that will fix it?

My current laptop is a 2017 intel - fingers crossed the new system is the fix.

Thanks again all.

Gina

[dankin]

It's been a few years since I've had this happen, but in some versions of PT, it seemed to be tied to "ignore errors during playback/record" being enabled. It started happening when they introduced the dual buffers. If a plugin caused a cpu spike in PT, (which isn't uncommon with AAX) it would result in all the audio suddenly sounding like it was bit crushed/severely distorted. The only fix was changing the buffer setting, which causes the audio engine to reset, or rebooting PT. I would experiment with some of the options under "optimizations" in the playback engine settings. I personally keep "ignore errors during playback/record" turned off, and haven't seen that issue since doing that.