Windows10 update and now Balance doesn't work

[jappe]

I encountered the truly bizarre ransomware-lookalike experience today when the windows10 laptop brought up a big blue nonresponsive screen saying "All your files are exactly where you left them".
So some major Windows 10 update apparently happened. And after that, my Balande audio interface doesn't work.

Any of you experienced the same?
I'l try to reinstall the driver I guess.

EDIT: yep it works. But my Clavinova 401 driver is messed up too; Another reinstall...what are the tiny soft people doing!? If a driver is compatible with the new update then they should take care of regression issues.
Though it DOES seem like my files are EXACTLY where I left them, I haven't checked all yet though.

EDIT2...and end of drama; reinstalling Clavinova driver made it work again.

[EnochLight]

I've noticed that within the past 2 weeks, I 'm suddenly having a problem with Balance playing any compressed audio back (such as MP3's, AAC, MP4, etc) in both Chrome and in Windows 10. It also affects playback in Adobe Audition. I'm guessing it either has something to do with an update Microsoft pushed or my hardware is failing.

[jappe]

I've noticed that within the past 2 weeks, I 'm suddenly having a problem with Balance playing any compressed audio back (such as MP3's, AAC, MP4, etc) in both Chrome and in Windows 10. It also affects playback in Adobe Audition. I'm guessing it either has something to do with an update Microsoft pushed or my hardware is failing.

Hm, compressed audio seems to work fine here; Playing this from Adobe Audition v 1.5:

File Type: 44100Hz, 16-bit, Stereo
Uncompressed Size: 44.86 MB (47,047,680 bytes)
File Format: mp3PRO® (FhG)
MPEG Layer-3, 320 Kbps (Stereo)

In Audition Device Properties it says "Balance Out WDM interface" selected, and not ASIO as expected though.

Perhaps there's some clash with your motherboard audio device and Balance after the Windows patch? Perhaps disable onboard audio in BIOS?
And also check WIndows Device Manager if there are any problems nodes shown in the device tree.

Checking my Playback Devices also brough up this error message for me:



I don't know how important it is, but Before installing the Balance driver again, I removed the balance Cable, uninstalled the failing balance drive, installed the balance driver again, and finally plugged in the balance cable

[normen]

Compressed audio is decompressed on he CPU and then sent as normal PCM data to the audio driver, certainly doesn't have anything to do with the driver or interface itself.

[EnochLight]

Compressed audio is decompressed on he CPU and then sent as normal PCM data to the audio driver, certainly doesn't have anything to do with the driver or interface itself.

True, yet my issue seems indicative to just playing back compressed audio. Wave playback seems to work OK.

[normen]

True, yet my issue seems indicative to just playing back compressed audio. Wave playback seems to work OK.

I guess windows is trying to be smart somehow ^^

[jappe]

Compressed audio is decompressed on he CPU and then sent as normal PCM data to the audio driver, certainly doesn't have anything to do with the driver or interface itself.

Ok. I guess the Windows Event Viewer could perhaps reveal some indication of the problem

[jappe]

I'm thinking perhaps it's best to reinstall all model specific drivers as well, motherboard drivers/chipset whatever there is.

[EnochLight]

I'm thinking perhaps it's best to reinstall all model specific drivers as well, motherboard drivers/chipset whatever there is.

Yeah, this is my next step. In fact, I never have installed my motherboard specific drivers. That said, I've been running both Windows 8 and now Windows 10 without issue, so never felt the need to do so. I'll likely do that after trying to reinstall my Balance drivers first.

[EnochLight]

*UPDATE*

Well, I decided to update my motherboard chipset and SATA drivers. No change. So I uninstalled and reinstalled Balance drivers. It improved a little, but still seemed a tad wonky. So I changed the audio driver in Windows from Balance ASIO to WDM, and then back to Balance. Did the same in Audition and Reason. Now things seem to be playing back OK.

*shrugs*

Have no idea what really did the trick, but it seems to be driver/OS wonkiness of some sort.

[Wook]

When did you guys get this update? My Win10 did update couple of days ago but I'm not experiencing issues with Balance.

I'm running i7 4790k, Asus Z97A motherboard, MSI GTX 970 gpu and 8 gigs of ram.

[EnochLight]

When did you guys get this update? My Win10 did update couple of days ago but I'm not experiencing issues with Balance.

I'm running i7 4790k, Asus Z97A motherboard, MSI GTX 970 gpu and 8 gigs of ram.

I'm not even sure. I've got Win10 set to auto-update, so it could have happened anytime within the last 3+ weeks (which is about when I started having the issue).

[Wook]

I'm not even sure. I've got Win10 set to auto-update, so it could have happened anytime within the last 3+ weeks (which is about when I started having the issue).

Ok, thanks. I guess I got off easy. I see you have issues with Balance quite often. Good luck with getting something less whimsy.

[EnochLight]

I see you have issues with Balance quite often. Good luck with getting something less whimsy.

Hmmmm... not really. Aside from this hiccup things usually go swimmingly. I am in the market for a new interface though. It's just hard to find something that makes me want to dump Balance. I've never worked with a sound card that has such a perfect form factor before Balance.

[gak]

Yeah, this is weird one. No idea what to offer but if two of our more "knowledgeable" peeps are having issues, something disturbingly not happening.

[pushedbutton]

Currently to use Balance I go through the ritual of 'power-cycling' the usb port to get the ASIO drivers for balance to be selectable then flicking the line 1 mic's 48v button on and off about 10-20 times until the signal is picked up.
Now I realise this isn't a very scientific approach to resolving the issue but it's ok once it's working.
There's probably someone out there who can fix it, it's just that nobody will tell me who it is.

[Grumbleweed]

Giving my Balance to my son was a wise move .
Life is better with a Focusrite Saffire (which works perfectly okay with a cheap firewire card from the local pc shop).

Grum.

[EnochLight]

Giving my Balance to my son was a wise move .
Life is better with a Focusrite Saffire (which works perfectly okay with a cheap firewire card from the local pc shop).

Grum.

Which Saffire did you go with? What sort of latency can you achieve with heavy projects? I'm kicking back and forth going back to a PCIe Firwire card and interface.

[Grumbleweed]

Giving my Balance to my son was a wise move .
Life is better with a Focusrite Saffire (which works perfectly okay with a cheap firewire card from the local pc shop).

Grum.

Which Saffire did you go with? What sort of latency can you achieve with heavy projects? I'm kicking back and forth going back to a PCIe Firwire card and interface.

The Pro 14. I use it at 128 until there is a problem and then go up a notch . Generally I just leave it be.
I run it at 24/48000 as it likes 48000 more than 44100 (all audio plays at the right speed no matter what is playing whereas 44100 can be flakey).
The Balance was forever having the USB cable ripped and replaced to keep it running but the Saffire's cable has never been removed.
The only thing I don't like is using the software to change from instrument to line input rather than a button.

Grum.

[EnochLight]

t at 128 until there is a problem and then go up a notch . Generally I just leave it be.
I run it at 24/48000 as it likes 48000 more than 44100 (all audio plays at the right speed no matter what is playing whereas 44100 can be flakey).
The Balance was forever having the USB cable ripped and replaced to keep it running but the Saffire's cable has never been removed.
The only thing I don't like is using the software to change from instrument to line input rather than a button.

Grum.

Thanks. When I say latency, I mean how many milliseconds?

[normen]

Which Saffire did you go with? What sort of latency can you achieve with heavy projects? I'm kicking back and forth going back to a PCIe Firwire card and interface.

Again, if you want low latency don't go USB, don't even go FireWire - PCI or Thunderbolt is where it's at. Or just go to external DSPs (ProTools / UAD Apollo etc.).

[EnochLight]

Which Saffire did you go with? What sort of latency can you achieve with heavy projects? I'm kicking back and forth going back to a PCIe Firwire card and interface.

Again, if you want low latency don't go USB, don't even go FireWire - PCI or Thunderbolt is where it's at. Or just go to external DSPs (ProTools / UAD Apollo etc.).

Again, Thunderbolt is not an option on my PC, sorry. I'm considering PCIe or FireWire at this point - but if Arturia's AudioFuse does indeed hit 3ms roundtrip on USB, I might consider that as well. I was just curious as to what sort of latency Grum was getting on his Saffire .

[normen]

Again, Thunderbolt is not an option on my PC, sorry. I'm considering PCIe or FireWire at this point - but if Arturia's AudioFuse does indeed hit 3ms on USB, I might consider that as well. I was just curious as to what sort of latency Grum was getting on his Saffire .

TB and PCIe are virtually the same. The main point is that they have DMA.

[EnochLight]

TB and PCIe are virtually the same. The main point is that they have DMA.

Indeed, but the portability of a USB interface is still very tempting.

[Grumbleweed]

t at 128 until there is a problem and then go up a notch . Generally I just leave it be.
I run it at 24/48000 as it likes 48000 more than 44100 (all audio plays at the right speed no matter what is playing whereas 44100 can be flakey).
The Balance was forever having the USB cable ripped and replaced to keep it running but the Saffire's cable has never been removed.
The only thing I don't like is using the software to change from instrument to line input rather than a button.

Grum.

Thanks. When I say latency, I mean how many milliseconds?

I knew what you meant but if I can play a guitar and not detect any latency then that is fast enough for me .
I'm sure I saw Massive or Kontact say something about a 4 point something ms total latency a couple of days ago if that helps.

Grum.