Hi, when I playback audio file(s) with audioplayer and asio driver there are always crackles. Its getting better when the buffer size is higher, but not satisfying. Even on 512 Buffer size they appear sometimes. More when vvvv gamma (7.0) seems to work on opening or writing something, but also when nothing is happening. I also have the feeling that is doesnt depend on how big the vvvv program is (us). Is there a chance to lock the activities or buffer the audio or something like this to get good results?
Best regards Helmut
Nobody any idea? Tried already different machines, different soundcards. There are still unregular crackles playing some mp3 files with audioplayer in vvvv gamma 7.0, all daw work perfect.
probably framerate stutters. how is your perfmeter looking, see stutters there? think most file writes are blocking too → stutter. dont think there is any real solution if the main loop does not run smoothly, would be very interested though if there are any.
vvvv runs with about 50 frames. There are framerate stutters, then there are crackles, but there are also clackles when there are no framerate stutters. Its a bit better when I reduce the mainloop to 10 frames, but there are also crackles with no framerate stutters. so, still no idea. I also tried wavs instead of mp3s, but same same
what if you export the app? Is it still happening?
another idea: Maybe try to have a vvvv app for everything audio and send OSC messages from the main app to the audio app.
I cant even export a primitive patch with one audioplayer. Dont know why…
Now I use vvvv beta (Vaudio) to playback the audiofiles which works fine. But the idea was to only use vvvv gamma with vst3 plugins, but no good results until now.
I have exactly the same issue. If I have a new patch with just an Audioplayer it runs fine, but in our patch which is very large, there are terrible crackles all the time when playing back audio files.
There must be something fundamentally wrong with how it interacts with the buffer when other stuff is running.
I tried putting it in a ManageProcess region, but that doesn’t make any difference.
I would say in its current state the Audioplayer is unuseable, especially for any sort of production environment. I am looking for alternatives..
I am evaluating to use NetCoreAudio GitHub - mobiletechtracker/NetCoreAudio: Allows playback of audio files on .NET Core with minimal dependencies for playback.
I added it as a Nuget and then tried a minimal patch:
What’s really strange is that it says it is playing, but nothing is happening. But when I stop the patch (F8) it starts playing. I will continue to investigate..
Update:
Ah, figured it out. “Play” is a task and if you don’t cache it, it will constantly be triggered.
NetCoreAudio.vl (19.4 KB)
If you want to try it make sure to add the nuget first: Quadmenu > Manage Nugets > Commandline and then “nuget install NetCoreAudio -pre” and enable the .NET nuget:
NetCoreAudio seems like an okay workaround for when you just need to play a sound file. It actually uses native Media Player APIs to play a file so it should be completely independent of anything happening in vvvv, but of course it has a lot of drawbacks compared to Audioplayer:
- you don’t get information of how far along the audio track you are
- can’t set in/out points
- no direct output of audio signal, you have to use the AudioIn
So its not REALLY an alternative in our case, but an okay workaround nontheless.
Is this a new phenomenon? I haven’t had these kind of crackles in earlier vvvv versions. Did anything change on the audio player or the audio threading?
Maybe this?:
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Ah yes, I had forgotten about that thread. The thing is I am still using gamma 5.3 for our large patch.
I will try and copy over the new AudioPlayer and report back.
We have the same issue in vvvv 5.3. So no, I actually thought its an old problem that was fixed in newer versions, but it seems that the issue is still the same.
Would it be possible to send us a patch showing those issues? Did a quick test with various files and driver settings but couldn’t get it to “crackle”.
I have them in every configuration on any PC, even on the demo “Audioplayer”. You have to use a headphone and wait for a minute, but they will come, mostly only on one channel at the time and very short. They become more and longer if you:
create bigger patches
save or open a patch
recuce soundcard buffer
play multiple audio files
@chromachroma Does the sample rate of the audio file match the sample rate of the soundcard?
If not, try changing the sample rate in the driver to match the audio file and check if the crackles happen then as well.
This would help to understand if the resampling is the issue.
From my tests around this a while ago matching the sample rate was not the issue. All the mp3 files we use are 44.1KHz and the soundcard is also set to that.
Recently I was patching and I was hearing a crackle every time I edited the patch. Weird.
Something dumb you can try is pass the audiosignals through the Audio.Resampler, even if the ins and outs will come to the same result. Some of my files simply were not playing while others had glitches. I haven’t heard the glitches since
The sample rate matches. Also when autosave is active I have crackles.