What to do when a solution can't be found?

[tXShooter]

Is there a support phone number or email I can use to find a solution to a problem that the forum is unable to resolve?

ref: https://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?p=2197386

[mhuss]

No. Cockos consists of basically two developers - Justin and schwa- and there is no 'support line' other than the (generally very helpful) people here.

[lunker]

Um ... at the risk of drawing the ire of the entire Cockos team for pointing this out, at the bottom of this very page is a "Contact Us" link, as well as a link to "Cockos Incorporated", which has some useful contact information for support.

EDIT: Although I should point out that your problem doesn't really sound like a Reaper problem, so you might not actually get much help beyond what the people here are already suggesting.

[mschnell]

IMHO it would be very appropriate if there would be a group / managed list of "Reaper Certified Engineers": Consultants that offer payed help and education via mail / phone / patronization.

-Michael

[martifingers]

I am interested in whether this is a theoretical inquiry or whether the forum has actually "failed". Given the level of expertise on here ( even the devs and Kenny regularly appear) I am just curious.
I can of course see that some issues (perhaps complex professional applications) might be so specific that they need the attention of a dedicated consultant but as people may be sick of hearing from me, I think the forum is a remarkably efficient channel.

[mschnell]

The sḱills a professional consultant can provide is not only the technical expertise to solve a problem (that is what the forum usually also can do very well), but also the ability to extract the true nature of the problem from the customer. Here a forum is rather hampered.

-Michael

[vdubreeze]

If the forum can't quickly resolve something I would give it a chance to be seen by more for a day or three. The knowledge and graciousness in sharing here is second to none, and the fact that the excellent third party Reaper tutorial sites Kennymania and Reaperblog are active here, make it a very strong support avenue, and that's aside from the fact that the developers regularly prove they are reading the posts by responding when appropriate (try finding that on any other DAW forum )


Sometimes if an answer isn't coming, a deep search turns it up years back, so a variety of searches might solve what a current post doesn't. And, oddly enough, since I may just Google "Reaper xxxx problem" instead of coming here, I've actually found some answers in the weirdest places, like Reddit, old SoundOnSound articles, etc.

At first, years ago, I thought "These forums can't be the main place for getting answers", but they are, and the Reaper community (and devs) does a great job of disseminating information here.If a solution doesn't come, check back, bump the thread with a little expounding maybe, because as formless as Reaper sometimes appears to be, questions about it can tend to also lack the clarity to ring a bell with the one reading, especially when one is asking about something that they are unclear about.

[JamesPeters]

Originally Posted by mschnell

IMHO it would be very appropriate if there would be a group / managed list of "Reaper Certified Engineers": Consultants that offer payed help and education via mail / phone / patronization.

-Michael

So Cockos would need to certify these people, continually train and audit their training, and take responsibility for them?

You seem to continually ignore or forget who Cockos are, and their scope.

As it stands for this instance, it is a problem that seems peripheral to Reaper. It's more about knowing / understanding the limitations and settings of the audio device. Plus I believe the issue is probably resolved, as of the last few posts on that thread linked in the OP.

[SmajjL]

If the user & problem can provide more details other than (Help!) then I think the forum would be happy to help and even succeed, but Cockos support is not overloaded like other DAWs might have it (Justin mentioned that) so, but try the forum first and Cockos as a last resort, depends on the problem ofc (def a cockos issue or not) but it would be funny to me if someone send cockos support ticket about some lasagna reciepe..

[mschnell]

Originally Posted by JamesPeters

So Cockos would need to certify these people, continually train and audit their training, and take responsibility for them?

Not really (mind the quotes). They just would need to communicate with them, if necessary, which would be a lot less effort than directly support end-users.

Anyway it would be beneficial for the end-users to have a choice between searching for support in the forums and accessing payed direct support.

-Michael

[JamesPeters]

Originally Posted by mschnell

Not really (mind the quotes). They just would need to communicate with them, if necessary, which would be a lot less effort than directly support end-users.

Anyway it would be beneficial for the end-users to have a choice between searching for support in the forums and accessing payed direct support.

-Michael

So, not actually certified in any way, but someone has to pay them (either Cockos, or the person who wants support)?

That sounds like a good idea to you? Would you want to pay some random guy to help troubleshoot your DAW if there's nothing official about his support? Especially when a forum like this exists?

Again, I don't understand why you keep missing points like this. You say you're a programmer, right? Whether it's this or your continued expectation for Windows VSTs to be supported by Reaper for Linux (and so on), I don't understand why you can't see the obvious.

[davetbass]

Reaper needs something like Best Buy's "Geek Squad" they actually came to my parents house when my dad was struggling with the ink jet printers driver

[ivansc]

O.P. Go back and check what I just posted in your original thread.
I suspect previous responders had assumed you had a level of knowledge higher than what you actually have. I have tried to drag things back to the basics.

[mschnell]

Originally Posted by JamesPeters

someone has to pay them (either Cockos, or the person who wants support)?
That sounds like a good idea to you? Would you want to pay some random guy to help troubleshoot

Obviously the person who wants support needs to pay for getting what (s)he wants.

I in fact need to pay the ferryman if I want to get to the other side (or the plumber if I want to get my faucet fixed).

Happily regarding Reaper, I supposedly will always get done by researching and forum help. But I do know friends that are in a hurry and can't wait for forum answers or do their own in depth research. Others are technically not educated enough to formulate forum messages in a way that help is (easily) possible. In fact one of them once did hire a "Cubase certified engineer" before he switched to Reaper (due to my advice).

I sometimes do provide personal Reaper-support for them (for free), but of course there only is limited time for such "service" (and right now I don't intend to extract money from such activity).

Originally Posted by JamesPeters

I don't understand why you can't see the obvious.

To me this is very obvious.

-Michael

[ivansc]

Since you dont seem to have picked up on my post in your original thread, here it is....

Lots of back to basics stuff been overlooked here. Don't know how I missed spotting your thread, but here goes.

IF you can use WASAPI (should be a drop down menu in reapers audio device section which you already found) it will offer outputs to your audio device outputs - usually as something like system speakers. If you have a Realtek onboard sound system, it will specify that.

Once you select that, you should see inputs and outputs labelled as Realtek microphone & Realtek speakers.
You should not have to actually change the routing within reaper to send audio to your master out.
Just in case you have accidentally changed something, the easiest way to verify it is to download reaper again & start a new install, but you will see a checkbox offering you the opportunity to do a portable install. What this does is puts a brand new reaper set to the factory defaults in its own separate folder on your C:\ drive. This does not alter your existing install, so you can then safely load the project you are trying to get audio from into the hew reaper install.

Once this is done, see if your audio is audible.
First thing to try if it isn't is to make sure that ALL your tracks in the TCP have the record monitoring set to either off or auto. This should then allow you to hear what you recorded. Also be sure and check in the mixer that when you play your tracks, the meters are moving as expected.

Try this and get back to us. there is no point trying to contact Justin or Schwa on this, as it is 99% certain that the problem lies with your settings within reaper.

Just went back and re-read your earlier stuff. Would you mind specifying what you are actually using as your Audio/MIDI interface?
From your pix it LOOKS like you are using the inbuilt sound card, but then you mentioned using ASIO. Note: NOT ASIO4ALL.
__________________


I hope this helps or at least puts you on the road to a solution.

[tXShooter]

Originally Posted by ivansc

Since you dont seem to have picked up on my post in your original thread, here it is....

Been busy since you responded, and I saw it this morning. Thank you.

Originally Posted by ivansc

Lots of back to basics stuff been overlooked here.

Overlooked? Indeed. Lots?, we shall see.

Originally Posted by ivansc

IF you can use WASAPI (should be a drop down menu in reapers audio device section which you already found) it will offer outputs to your audio device outputs - usually as something like system speakers. If you have a Realtek onboard sound system, it will specify that.

You missed something in my original thread.

Originally Posted by ivansc

Once you select that, you should see inputs and outputs labelled as Realtek microphone & Realtek speakers.
You should not have to actually change the routing within reaper to send audio to your master out.

Again, look at my post #6 in the original thread.

Originally Posted by ivansc

Just in case you have accidentally changed something, the easiest way to verify it is to download reaper again & start a new install, but you will see a checkbox offering you the opportunity to do a portable install. What this does is puts a brand new reaper set to the factory defaults in its own separate folder on your C:\ drive. This does not alter your existing install, so you can then safely load the project you are trying to get audio from into the hew reaper install.

Not going to reinstall Reaper when one project works with the audio settings, and another one does not. Thank you for the suggestion though.

Originally Posted by ivansc

Once this is done, see if your audio is audible.

Audio is audible to the Master Track VU meter, just no hardware to output through.

Originally Posted by ivansc

Try this and get back to us. there is no point trying to contact Justin or Schwa on this, as it is 99% certain that the problem lies with your settings within reaper.

I would think that they would be the two top most persons to contact since they programmed it, and as you say, it's a 99% certainty the problem lies within their program. (scratches head on that one)

Originally Posted by ivansc

Just went back and re-read your earlier stuff. Would you mind specifying what you are actually using as your Audio/MIDI interface?
From your pix it LOOKS like you are using the inbuilt sound card, but then you mentioned using ASIO. Note: NOT ASIO4ALL.

See post #6 in original thread.

[bolgwrad]

Speaking of basics; next time, before you reboot, remove the battery for a minute or two. Just to let the laptop know who's boss.

[tXShooter]

Originally Posted by bolgwrad

Speaking of basics; next time, before you reboot, remove the battery for a minute or two. Just to let the laptop know who's boss.

Just for good measure, I also unplugged the AC cord and whipped it all about.

[Rednroll]

From what I read of your 2 threads, it sounds like you are using your laptops realtek built in sound card with Reaper, and using the Realtek driver.

If that is the case, Realtek is the bottom of the barrel when it comes to drivers and working with DAWs. If you are having playback problems, then I would suspect that driver 1st and foremost as being the source of the problem. 99% of all sound/playback issues are related to the sound device and its audio driver being used. The other 1% tends to be Video card driver related.

What you may want to try is installing the ASIO4ALL driver, to see if that shows up in Reaper and use that driver instead to see if that solves your problem.
http://www.asio4all.org/

[tXShooter]

Originally Posted by Rednroll

From what I read of your 2 threads...

Did you read this?

[Larry Sheehan]

From your user name, I suspect you may be in TX?
If you're anywhere near Austin, I'd be glad to have a look at it if you'd like.

Sometimes a second set of eyes see something previously missed.

[karbomusic]

Can you post both RPP files minus media so we can compare them?

[tXShooter]

Originally Posted by karbomusic

Can you post both RPP files minus media so we can compare them?

Done.

[tXShooter]

Originally Posted by Larry Sheehan

From your user name, I suspect you may be in TX?
If you're anywhere near Austin, I'd be glad to have a look at it if you'd like.

Sometimes a second set of eyes see something previously missed.

Used to live in Dallas, but now in MS. And yes, a second set of eyes would be much appreciated.

[Edgemeal]

Originally Posted by tXShooter

Done.

Try enabling the master output, its off here.

[toleolu]

Originally Posted by tXShooter

Used to live in Dallas, but now in MS. And yes, a second set of eyes would be much appreciated.

There are a number of free desktop sharing apps out there, I use one called TeamViewer, easy way to get a second set of eyes on a problem, as long as you have a fairly decent internet connection.

If you're interested, PM me and I can get you more details.

[tXShooter]

Originally Posted by Edgemeal

Try enabling the master output, its off here.

No joy. See attached.

[Edgemeal]

Originally Posted by tXShooter

No joy. See attached.

Oh sorry, didn't read thread,

[Glennbo]

Right click in the blank area of your mixer panel and tell it to display the master track in the mixer.

[EpicSounds]

Originally Posted by JamesPeters

So, not actually certified in any way, but someone has to pay them (either Cockos, or the person who wants support)?

That sounds like a good idea to you? Would you want to pay some random guy to help troubleshoot your DAW if there's nothing official about his support? Especially when a forum like this exists?

Hi James
I do paid 1 on 1 support. A lot of people prefer it to the forum because they get the problem solved in an hour.
This forum is pretty good but it frequently goes into off-topic and the OP is just sitting there waiting for help while the forum goes off on a tangent.

[tXShooter]

Originally Posted by Glennbo

Right click in the blank area of your mixer panel and tell it to display the master track in the mixer.

Done, but how is that different from a floating master?

[karbomusic]

I don't see how this wouldn't be a global setting but either way...

I can see where the hardware output is missing in the non-working (expected since nothing is in the list) - I tried reproing by removing from a test RPP of mine and I 'think' I saw this anomaly where sometimes "add new hardware send would be blank" but not sure - that said, you could make a copy of the .RPP find the line below (MASTERHWOUT) and manually add the hardware send for the master - basically take whats missing in the non-working from the working (left), copy it over from the right, save and reopen.

If anything it may tell us something...

[tXShooter]

Originally Posted by karbomusic

I don't see how this wouldn't be a global setting but either way...

I can see where the hardware output is missing in the non-working (expected since nothing is in the list) - I tried reproing by removing from a test RPP of mine and I 'think' I saw this anomaly where sometimes "add new hardware send would be blank" but not sure - that said, you could make a copy of the .RPP find the line below (MASTERHWOUT) and manually add the hardware send for the master - basically take whats missing in the non-working from the working (left), copy it over from the right, save and reopen.

If anything it may tell us something...

When you asked for me to upload the .rpp files, I looked into them with Notepad++ Compare and noticed that exact thing too. Problem is... how do you resolve it from within Reaper? I can copy / paste between the files as a potential work around, but something is causing the 'disconnect' in the first place.


EDIT: Copying and pasting into the .rpp file is a working solution, albeit not something a layman would be able to do without potentially harming something.

[karbomusic]

Originally Posted by tXShooter

EDIT: Copying and pasting into the .rpp file is a working solution, albeit not something a layman would be able to do without potentially harming something.

I think it's a bug or corner-case issue. My interest is A) how exactly did it get that way B) why didn't reaper know how to handle it.

Glad you got it working.

[drumphil]

Originally Posted by tXShooter

When you asked for me to upload the .rpp files, I looked into them with Notepad++ Compare and noticed that exact thing too. Problem is... how do you resolve it from within Reaper? I can copy / paste between the files as a potential work around, but something is causing the 'disconnect' in the first place.


EDIT: Copying and pasting into the .rpp file is a working solution, albeit not something a layman would be able to do without potentially harming something.

Chances are pretty low that you'll have the issue again.

If the source of the issue can be found, then the real fix is to stop it happening.

[ivansc]

Now that is funny! I downloaded your "sound doesnt work" project & once I had replaced the plugin VSTis that I dont own, I had it playing happily in about ten seconds.

I did this by going to the routing matrix and inserting a connection between the master and one of my outputs - I have eight at present & it worked on all 8.

I haven`t bothered exploring further, but it does seem to confirm that either there is a bug in the routing info for your project, or it really was down to a routing error.

The OTHER thing I noted was that of course (!) there was MIDI activity on the Master track but no audio metering activity even when all the other track meters were behaving fine. Did you try putting in a secondary sub-master to see if this cured the issue when you re-routed stuff to that?