Voicemeeter Potato - Random crashes (Windows 10)
Posted: Thu Apr 01, 2021 12:11 pm
Hello.
So it all started like a year ago, when I first began using then decided to buy Voicemeeter. I've never been happier with its features, but for the regular crashes I kept having. Until recently, it wasn't too much of a bother, though, I just had to restart the app and, since I wasn't doing much besides listening to music, playing games and the like, it was manageable.
But I started playing online more, having Discord calls quite often, also started streaming and recording a bit on my own. Said crashes were much more of a PITA then, so I figured I would look into the issue more seriously.
My setup is as follows :
- USB audio interface, Focusrite Scarlett Solo 3rd gen
- Input 1 : microphone (more on that below)
- Input 2 : Music, through a virtual cable from my music apps
- Input 3 : Calls (Discord, Skype, Mumble), through a virtual cable from such apps
- Input 4 : Brower, through a virtual cable
- Input VAIO : Windows default
- Input VAIO 3 : Games, through Windows Advanced audio settings and setting it as output
- A1 : Focusrite ASIO
- A5 : virtual cable toward OBS for music
- Output VAIO : Mic to OBS
- Output AUX : Other to OBS (Windows sounds, games)
- Output VAIO 3 : Mic to everything but OBS (Discord & co, voice recording, etc.). That's my default Mic input in any app except OBS
I actually found quite a few things to sort out :
- consistency between all elements of the audio chain, regarding sampling and bitrate
- audio interface buffer
- uninstalled everything and restarted from scratch, with reboots between each installation (Voicemeeter, Audio cables), since apparently Windows 10 updates were bound to mess things up sometimes
But, more recently and more importantly, a major breakthrough/realization, when like 3 weeks ago I found out that I was using the KS entry from my Focusrite to input on Input 1. Big mistake, as you experts will probably immediately see, so instead I obviously setup the PATCH ASIO feature, and things started to look better for a couple weeks. No crashes at all from March 14th until March 31st, and I was sure I had it sorted.
That was until yesterday, when I began to see the return of the dreaded random crashes.
To elaborate, those usually happen when I start an app or a game. Sometimes it's OBS, sometimes it's the Epic Games Store, sometimes it's my audio player, sometimes it's when I launch this game or that. No real pattern here, except that Voicemeeter crashes at the exact moment I launch something, apparently randomly.
If the app has been running long enough, I can also trigger it simply by clicking on any Ax button (A1 through A5), which would normally bring up the list of devices to chose from, but in my case it can sometimes make the app crash...
I checked the Windows Update log, there was nothing in sight which could explain this sudden change of behaviour. I'm at a loss now...
I think that, at this point, my audio chain is as clean as it will ever be, and the software part / settings are finally OK. I just don't see where to even start looking from there, so any insight/help would be much appreciated.
Below I'll provide as much details as possible, don't hesitate to ask if you see anything else which might be relevant.
In Windows' Event log, those striked are not voicemeeter crashes. All the others are.
So it all started like a year ago, when I first began using then decided to buy Voicemeeter. I've never been happier with its features, but for the regular crashes I kept having. Until recently, it wasn't too much of a bother, though, I just had to restart the app and, since I wasn't doing much besides listening to music, playing games and the like, it was manageable.
But I started playing online more, having Discord calls quite often, also started streaming and recording a bit on my own. Said crashes were much more of a PITA then, so I figured I would look into the issue more seriously.
My setup is as follows :
- USB audio interface, Focusrite Scarlett Solo 3rd gen
- Input 1 : microphone (more on that below)
- Input 2 : Music, through a virtual cable from my music apps
- Input 3 : Calls (Discord, Skype, Mumble), through a virtual cable from such apps
- Input 4 : Brower, through a virtual cable
- Input VAIO : Windows default
- Input VAIO 3 : Games, through Windows Advanced audio settings and setting it as output
- A1 : Focusrite ASIO
- A5 : virtual cable toward OBS for music
- Output VAIO : Mic to OBS
- Output AUX : Other to OBS (Windows sounds, games)
- Output VAIO 3 : Mic to everything but OBS (Discord & co, voice recording, etc.). That's my default Mic input in any app except OBS
I actually found quite a few things to sort out :
- consistency between all elements of the audio chain, regarding sampling and bitrate
- audio interface buffer
- uninstalled everything and restarted from scratch, with reboots between each installation (Voicemeeter, Audio cables), since apparently Windows 10 updates were bound to mess things up sometimes
But, more recently and more importantly, a major breakthrough/realization, when like 3 weeks ago I found out that I was using the KS entry from my Focusrite to input on Input 1. Big mistake, as you experts will probably immediately see, so instead I obviously setup the PATCH ASIO feature, and things started to look better for a couple weeks. No crashes at all from March 14th until March 31st, and I was sure I had it sorted.
That was until yesterday, when I began to see the return of the dreaded random crashes.
To elaborate, those usually happen when I start an app or a game. Sometimes it's OBS, sometimes it's the Epic Games Store, sometimes it's my audio player, sometimes it's when I launch this game or that. No real pattern here, except that Voicemeeter crashes at the exact moment I launch something, apparently randomly.
If the app has been running long enough, I can also trigger it simply by clicking on any Ax button (A1 through A5), which would normally bring up the list of devices to chose from, but in my case it can sometimes make the app crash...
I checked the Windows Update log, there was nothing in sight which could explain this sudden change of behaviour. I'm at a loss now...
I think that, at this point, my audio chain is as clean as it will ever be, and the software part / settings are finally OK. I just don't see where to even start looking from there, so any insight/help would be much appreciated.
Below I'll provide as much details as possible, don't hesitate to ask if you see anything else which might be relevant.
In Windows' Event log, those striked are not voicemeeter crashes. All the others are.