Beat Wizard crashes everytime

[michael.farney]

I installed S2 gamma today for the first time to start sequencing for 2008. I have my 26 minute audio file ready to go, but no matter what i do, the beat wizard crashes the entire program every time. Sometimes it will convert then crash, and other times it will crash immediately. Does s2 gamma support large files?

I'm disappointed I can't start sequencing yet. I wanted to check out all the new features!

[bob]

What operating system are you using? How much memory does your computer have? Could you send me a copy of the audio file causing the problem? Thanks.

[michael.farney]

bob, my airplane just landed, so I'll try to get you the info today or tonight. It's my company laptop (shhh..don't tell anyone ) and it crashes with memory errors. It's xp; I'll have to get you the specs later. I know the same audio plays fine on lor1. Audio plays fine on lor2 as long as you dont open beat wizard. Tried both mp3 and WAV formats. Both crash lor2 software completely with memory read errors when opening beat wizard. I used audacity to trunk the audio to 5 minutes, and the beat wizard worked ok with this file. I havent had a chance to try installing lor2 on a different computer yet.

[michael.farney]

Bob, you have PM. Here's an edited version for you forum surfers out there!

All the info below is FYI. I thought I found the source of the problem, but it looks like not. S2 is severely misinterpreting the total time of the sequence. My file is 21:55 long, yet S2 thinks it's over 26 minutes long. The file has an a lot of blank "silence" at the end of the track (severals minutes), and this causes S2 to have issues. Once I removed all the extraneous silence from the end of the track, S2 beat wizard would get the furthest it's ever gotten, but still crash. It finished converting OK and started the second step, but then it crashed again with the same memory errors. A curious thing is sometimes it does get the file length right on occasion. I created a new musical sequence and used the VU wizard, and it got the total time right. I create a new musical sequence and used the tapper wizard, and the tapper wizard told me the total time was 21:55.03, but when I actually ran the tapper wizard, it just kept running at the end of the file. It ran to 22, 23, 24 minutes before I finally stopped it and clicked finished. I'd check your algorithm to see how it handles silence. I'm not sure why it's miscalculating the length of the file by over 4 minutes in some cases.

Here's the other info:

The computer is a HP laptop, XP service pack 2, 1.66ghz processor, 1 gig ram.

I have not attempted LOR2 (S2) on any computers prior to today. Here is a brief summary of what I did:

1. 
   
2. Downloaded S2 Gamma from LOR site
   
3. Installed Gamma - successful.
   
4. Opened the sequence editor -- very surprised to see it was still 1.6.1
   
5. Upon closer inspection, I found I have 2 lightorama entries on my start menu: lightorama (1.6.1) and Light-O-Rama (S2)
   
6. Control panel add/remove software shows 3 lightorama entries: Light-O-Rama; Light-O-Rama; and Light-O-Rama (d:Documents and settingsxxxxxxxxxxxxMy DocumentsLOR) This is the original 1.6.1 installation as I choose to install here instead of program files. No lightorama files exist in program files. The S2 installation has placed the files in D:Documents and SettingsxxxxxxxxxxxMy DocumentsLight-O-Rama.
   
7. Open my existing LOR1 sequence started from 2008. (xxxxxxxxx.lms )
   
8. Open beat wizard --> says converting. the blue bar moved all the way to end, then it crashed. (this was using .wav)
   
9. Open LOR1 sequence, save as LOR2 sequence, open beat wizard -- crash.
   
10. Create a new sequence, select the wave file and choose to use the beat wizard for how much time in between timings. Click OK -- crash
    
11. Converted .wav to mp3. Repeated above scenerios. All still crash.
    
12. Used audacity to truncate the file at 5 minutes. Beat wizard runs fine.

Here are the files:

/audio/5.mp3 - This is the 5 minute trucked file that worked
/audio/wav_xxxxxxxxx.wav - My original audio file
/audio/mp3_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.mp3 - converted to MP3 to see if it would help -- it still crashed.
/audio/*.lpx -- I didn't make these. Did S2 make these when it tried to convert the audio? LPX??????

/sequences/xxxxxxx.lms - Original LOR1 file - has very few things sequenced.
/sequences/xxxxxxxxx.lms - Saved as LOR2 file

BTW - I thought S2 automatically backs up LOR1 files when converting to S2. Where is my backup? I did a "save as", so does that mean it won't do a backup?

[files removed]


I am curious if it is this my computer or if you can reproduce the results.

Also, I got the error: "Can't show non-modal form when modal form is displayed." This occurs when you have a dialog box open in S2, but you double click on a sequence file in in windows explorer. While i can appreciate the software not being able to load the sequence while a diaglog box is open, I'd suggest a more user friendly and meaningful message. "Modal" is not a word anyhow unless it's some techie programming speak.

Here's another unusual quirk. I opened the S2 sequence using windows explorer. The sequence was set for the 21 minute mp3, and S2 crashed again when openng the beat wizard. I double clicked on the S2 sequence in windows explorer again, and now it opens in version 1.6.1 every time. I can't get the S2 sequence to open in S2 unless I open S2 program and choose "open" from the file menu. However, as soon as I opened the file in S2 by choosing File-->Open, using double clicking the file in windows explorer started opening the sequence in S2 again.

Finally, here is my gripe in both LOR1 and S2. I use windows explorer a lot to open files. However, when the computer is not conntected to a controller, the software generates that port error telling you it can't find the controllers. This is fine, except it means I have to open the sequences twice. Try this:

1. Double click a sequence file in windows explorer without any controllers or hardware connected to the com port.
2. LOR opens, generates the can't open com port error, and then the sequence DOESN'T open. I have to go back into windows explorer and double click the file again. This only happens when opening a file for the first time, and I think it's very related to the "modal" error I was getting above. This is a huge annoyance! Every single time i use the software, I have to open the sequence twice! I used to this because it has happened ever since 1.6.1, but I believe 1.5 never did this. I rarely (if ever) navigate to the start menu and open LOR first.

Let me know if I can be of further assistance. If I lost you anywhere, I can take screenshots or video. Let me know.

Thanks,
Michael

[bob]

Hi Michael,

First, thank you. I will try to figure out what's going on.

Do I understand correctly that you currently have both LOR 2 and LOR 1 installed? And that you can run both of them (for example, open up the Sequence Editor of both LOR 1 and LOR 2)?

What operating system are you using, and how much memory does your computer have?

Now, answers to your specific questions (please let me know if I missed any):

Yes, LOR created the *.lpx files. They contain information that was determined about about the audio file.

LOR 2 saves copies of LOR 1 files, but only when you would otherwise overwrite them. So, since you did a "save as" to a new filename, you weren't going to overwrite the LOR 1 file, so LOR 2 didn't bother making a copy of it.

Thanks again.

[bob]

OK, I just tried it on my PC. It works fine here. Doesn't crash, and the length of the sequence is correct (21:55.03 or something like that). Plays all the way through, and stops automatically at the appropriate time.

What version of Windows Media Player do you have? You can tell by running WMP, then selecting "About Windows Media Player" from the "Help" menu. It will say a bunch of stuff, including a version number (in my case, for example, it says "Version: 11.0.5721.5230").

What happens if you open the file directly in Windows Media Player? Specifically, what length of time does it say?

I ask because LOR gets the time of the file from WMP.

You mentioned that you had not yet had a chance to try it on another PC. Would you be able to try that?

Thanks again.

[michael.farney]

michael.farney wrote:

The computer is a HP laptop, XP service pack 2, 1.66ghz processor, 1 gig ram.

Bob, I sent you a video of the crashes. The most notable is around 4:50 where the memory usage for LOR sequence editor spikes to 251k, is erradic, then crashes.

Video:

1. Note the computer specs: xp service pack 2, 1 gig of ram.
2. WM player version 9.0
3. LOR1 file opened in S2, beat wizard crashes
4. S2 file opened in S2, beat wizard crashes
5. New S2 file created, beat wizard crashes
6. Create new audio file with Audacity
7. S2 crashes in new manner, note memory usage at 251k.
8. LOR1 opened and works.

Windows media player is 9.0 and yes, LOR1 is still on this computer and works fine. I thought LOR1 and S2 couldn't run on the same computer...?

I am in the process of trying S2 on my production computer via remote desktop. It will take some time to move the large audio via remote desktop.

[michael.farney]

Unbelievable! Installed S2 Gamma on the home PC tonight. Audio still crashes S2. Bob you have PM.

Noone else has encounted this issue?

[dslowik]

michael.farney wrote:

Unbelievable! Installed S2 Gamma on the home PC tonight. Audio still crashes S2. Bob you have PM.

Noone else has encounted this issue?

Back during the beta I had an audio file that caused a crash when using the beat wizard. I tried it on 2 or 3 different machines and each machine crashed. I worked with Bob on the problem for a few days, but it never did crash on his machine. After some debugging, he made some code changes in LOR 2 and the problem went away and I've never seen it since.

[Dan Dameron]

I don't know if my issue is related... but I had an 8+ minute song (4 pieces of songs I strung together to make a medley) that would crash gamma 12 when I tried to use tracks... It crashed on one computer, but not another...

I ended up breaking the song down into its parts and sequencing that way...

[michael.farney]

michael.farney wrote:

Unbelievable!  Installed S2 Gamma on the home PC tonight.  Audio still crashes S2.  Bob you have PM. 

Noone else has encounted this issue?

Sorry, I didnt mean to be so negative. I was frustrated last night. Bob is working on this through email.