Audio stops working

#1

every now and then i play music and there is no audio. The first install i did from the app store simply didn't play audio. The song played and moved, but no matter what settings or devices I chose there was no audio stream at all. I downloaded the installer from your site instead and that seemed to fix the problem. But right now I was playing music in vox, paused it to watch a youtube video, and when I returned there was no audio. Nothing I do brings back the audio. I'm afraid I might need to reinstall it again or something.

#2

Sean,

Are You using built-in audio output device?

Please make sure the VOX volume is not minimum, and that VOX is mot muted (menu Controls->Mute)
Also note to what output device VOX is currently assigned - is this the one ou are expecting the sound from?

Other than this, please try to turn off the "Fade on Play/Pause" option in Preferences.

Please report if this helps or not.

#3

I have done and tested all of that unfortunately. It's working now, but I'll try more things next time it happens. I'm using built-in output, volume in vox is full, it is not muted and I've alternated the fade setting... Didn't help.
~Sean

#4

I've had similar issues. Vox 2.4 was great, but when I upgraded to Vox 2.5 all audio would route through the internal Mac speaker output, not via Airplay, whatever I did. Downgrading back to 2.4 fixed that, and I've stuck with that ever since. It's annoying, because I want to register and pay for the app (not that I need Internet radio), but it seems just too 'fragile' to warrant paying for it. I had a 'funny' today too -- Vox would only stream to the internal device, even though the external Airplay device was clearly selected. I got round that by re-setting my hi-fi unit and re-starting Vox. All very strange. It plays Flac files brilliantly, but is just not stable enough at present, but it's a far better choice to iTunes, as I don't have to convert my Flac audio to ALAC/whatever.

Sigh.

Clem

#5

Clem,

Thank You for letting us know.
We are investigating into what might cause this.

What You could try to do is fully erase VOX's preferences and try once more.

Both USB and Airplay devices work just fine for us here and for our testers.

Regarding instability - we are improving the app every day and will releases once per week or two so You can be sure VOX/Loop will become more and more stable and useful.

Also, please, could You make a screenshots for me for diagnostics:
1) List of output devices in VOX 2.5, when its malfunctioning
2) VOX 2.5 preferences Audio Basic settings
3) VOX 2.5 preferences Audio Advanced settings

Tanks for help.

#6

Soundguy:

Thanks for the reply. I really like VOX and want to pay for using it,
but, as I said earlier, it just seems a bit fragile, hence my reticence
at present. For example, using VOX 2.4 just trying to move an item in
the playlist causes the Airplay output to disappear.

I'm happy to try VOX 2.5 again. This time, I've installed it in a local
directory for now, as VOX 2.4 still works, albeit with careful usage. Do
you see any problems with me running VOX 2.5 from a local directory as a
test, rather than installing it in /Applications? Last time I upgraded
from VOX 2.4 to 2.5 Airplay no longer worked, so I had to re-install
2.4, which is where I am now.

Best regards

Clem

#7

There's no problem with putting VOX somwhere besides Applications, the only requirement is that should be a dir You have access to (so Sandbox system does not prohibit it to work), therefore, best way to do it is create one more "Applications" folder, but this time inside Your home directory, and use it for "secondary-version" apps You use.

Airplay does not depend on version here, there's no difference between 2.4 and 2.5 on how AirPlay devices are detected. In both versions, VOX just uses a list of output devices supplied by OSX. Please make sure Airplay device You want to access is available in System Preferences->Audio->Output when You see it disappear from VOX device list.

#8

OK, I'll check this out at the weekend, when I'm next at home and report
back.

Thanks for the prompt response.

Best regards

Clem

#9

The discussion has been closed.

#10

Hi Soundguy. Apologies for not replying sooner but I haven't had much
time to listen to music recently as my mother-in-law has been in
intensive care. Anyway ....

I installed VOX 2.51 in a directory on my MAC called
/Users/Clem/Local_Applications. If I run that version, audio is played through my Mac's internal speakers and I can't seem to change that in
the VOX settings. If I use VOX 2.4, installed in the /Applications
directory, Airplay playback works as expected.

What next?

Regards

Clem

#11

Why You can't change device in settings? Is required device there in the list but doesn't get selected?

#12

I'll need to re-check this at the weekend, when I'm next at home, but as I
recall the settings were correct, but I wasn't getting any Airplay output
from Vox 2.51 - the sound was going via local audio even though Airplay
was selected. When I dropped back to Vox 2.4 the settings were the same
and it just worked as expected.

Cheers

Clem

#13

Have You tried a complete cleanup then re-install? (completely remove VOX including preferences, then install anew)? It might be a problem with preferences saving process.

#14

Ah, looks like I found where the problem might be... Are You switching to Airplay device from Preferences or directly from VOX main window?

#15

Everything is done via the Vox interface. System Prefernces for audio
should route local sounds to my monitor's speakers, everything else via
Airplay. I set those settings once, then haven't touched them since.

Vox 2.4 seems to work once set, it's Vox 2.51 that seems unwell. Bear in
mind that Vox 2.4 is installed in /Applications, whilst 2.51 in
/Users/Clem/Local_Applications. When I tried upgrading version 2.4 to 2.5, it failed to work via Airplay, so I used AppDelete to remove Vox, then I
reinstatted version 2.4 where it is now, and 2.51 in a separate directory
(for now), because of the issues that I'd run into.

HTH, Regards

Clem

#16

Please remember that even though You have two VOX instances they use the same preferences record, and can potentially conflict due to this.

I didn't understand from Your last message wether You change device from Prefs or from main panel. Please describe the procedure You used to set VOX 2.5 to play via Airplay.

#17

I'm working away from home right now, so will follow-up later this week
when I'm back home. The point that I was making (badly, obviously) was
that after I'd used System Preferences to split where sounds go, all
further changes were made via Vox settings.

What I don't understand here is if Vox 2.4 & 2.51 share the same
preferences, why does 2.4 handle Airplay playback properly, but 2.51
doesn't? 2.51 certainly picked-up the playlist that I'd last used in 2.4,
but nothing else that I could see.

I'll get back to you on Friday, all being well.

Regards

Clem

#18

2.5 differs from 2.4 in a way it identifies the devices, so they indeed do
interfere.

#19

Result! I've just downloaded the latest VOX 2.52 version, 2520.17, and,
using the controls on the black play panel, I now have playback working
via Airplay to my Yamaha CDN-301 networked CD player. However, things
are still a little odd though. I dropped a track onto Vox and it started
playing -- the front panel on the Yamaha shows an |> icon (sorry, poor
representation of the icon!) on its front panel to show that it's
receiving data, but I wasn't getting any sound. Only when I stopped
playback via Vox, selected the correct Airplay target for a second time
(listed as Yamaha CDN-301) did playback recover. I certainly didn't have this issue with Vox 2.4x, nor do I get it with iTunes. I only have one
Airplay target on my network, so device mis-selection is definitely not
the issue for that as a possible cause.

I'll do a little more testing when I get time next weekend, and if
things work as expected when I fire things up again clean (as it were),
I'll certainly be buying a licence for the software. I love the fact
that I can create on-the-fly playlists, as I tend to pick and choose
tracks, rather than play entire albums.

One thing that I think is a little odd with Airplay is that there is a
strict discovery process. If I start my Mac before the Yamaha is
powered-up then the device isn't listed anywhere. Do it the other way
round and everything seems OK. I know that I can restart the coreaudio
service to fix this if I start the Mac before the Yamaha, but it's a bit
of a fudge. That's not a Vox issue per se, but I wonder if that's part
of the problem that a number of your users run into. It certainly caught
me out when I first started trying to use Airplay via an Apple Airport
Express unit connected to my A/V system.

HTH

Regards

Clem

#20

Clem,

Thank You for sharing this with us.
The difference between 2.4 and 2.5 is how VOX stores current device - 2.4 did it by name (very odd), 2.5 is doing this using UID of the device. There have been also some improvements/optimisations that should not interfere with device selection, however, who knows, maybe in Your case, they did. But for now I am unable to re-produce, and, hence, fix this.

Regarding discovery process - actually there is some problem in Your network or software, Airplay devices should be discovered regardless of the order You turn things on. I don't know if it plays a role in a devise selection problem with VOX.

I will appreciate if You continue Your reports from time to time on how it goes.