Transport controls stop working

This is a weird one. Only started happening recently, since the 2.1.2 update but not immediately. I’m on an M1 12.9” iPad Pro with 16GB RAM, latest iOS 14.7.1

Sometimes the transport controls stop working, no rewind, no play and no record. Almost everything else remains functional, the only other thing I’ve spotted that stops working with it is the tempo, you can see me trying to change it in the video, but it just immediately snaps back to 120.

I’ve not yet worked out steps to reproduce, it just happens while I’m working sometimes. I’ve also not yet worked out how to fix it, quitting and relaunching NS2 doesn’t seem to help, rebooting the iPad fixes it some of the time, but it also just came back to life at one point without me doing anything.

Video here: https://streamable.com/mt2zi7

Comments

  • A little bit more info, I’ve discovered that the audio / midi fx on/off toggle stops working too. Switching between tracks lags a bit.

  • Were you switching to another app before it happened?

  • I've not run into this but it smells like something LINK related (since LINK start/stop was added in the last release). I'm assuming LINK is always enabled when this happens? If so, what other LINK-enabled apps do you have running? I guess that would need to include LINK-enabled apps on other devices as well, because, LINK.

  • I suspected Link too so I switched that off but it still happens. As for the app switching, nope, it just happens in the middle of working. It does seem to eventually come back to life after a while - anywhere from about half an hour upwards.

  • A couple more videos. Here’s a clean start, no other apps running, transport is non-functional from launch…

    https://streamable.com/tqy5t3

    And in this one it’s frozen during playback. It suddenly stopped playing and the transport controls were non-functional again.

    https://streamable.com/ut7m98

  • Does it happen without any AU devices?

  • edited August 2021
    • when it happens, what shows cpu meter and right top audio device information ?
    • does mixdown work correctly in that case ?

  • Just started a new clean project to test these things with, switched to Safari to check what everyone’s questions were, switched back, and it’s frozen. So…

    Does it happen without any AU devices?

    Yep. My test project here has one Slate track, no FX

    when it happens, what shows cpu meter and right top audio device information ?

    CPU meter is showing nothing at all. The audio device info is the same as in your screenshot.

    does mixdown work correctly in that case ?

    Just successfully mixed down this test project while frozen.

    When it froze last night, i left it alone to see how long it took to unfreeze but after 4 hours it hadn’t. I’m yet to work out a pattern.

  • There’s a bunch of files in my analytics logs named Nanostudio 2.wakeups_resource with a timestamp, though none with today’s date so I’m not sure if they’re relevant.

  • edited August 2021

    Is Background Audio enabled in NS2 settings?

  • Same happens with bg audio on or off. However, I HAVE MADE A DISCOVERY…

    I was trying to get an idea down in NS2, it froze, so I wondered if BeatMaker 3 was usable yet, but BM3 won’t even launch. So, I tried Cubasis 3 which launches but won’t play, essentially the same as NS2. This looks like an OS level issue, rather than NS2 specific. Gonna have to take this to the AB forum and see if anyone there has experienced the same.

  • Dammit, I spoke too soon. If I reboot the ipad and launch either BM3 or Cubasis 3 without launching NS2, it doesn’t happen, so it does look like it’s an NS2 problem.

  • I’ve sent this to Matt, but if you want, you could try reinstalling NS just to check if that helps.

  • Happening to me also

  • First started when I attempted to load a second copy of the mulitrack recorder au as an effect.

  • @bubbasRig said:
    Happening to me also

    Ok, what’s your setup? OS, device, AUs used in the project. Does it happen when you don’t use AUs?

    And of course, have you tried killing Nanostudio in the app switcher and restarting the device?

  • New iPad Air 2020 with 256G.
    IOS 14.7.1 Latest
    Doesn’t seem to matter what instruments are loaded.
    First happened when loading a second instance of Mastertrack into an effects slot.
    Tried restarting multiple times.
    Just tried loading NF2 after letting it sit for an hour and now it works.

  • Now experiencing transport issue with AUM.
    Play arrow says engine is not running. Maybe a phone call or video interrupting.
    Close all background apps and restart. Intermittent operation after rebooting.

  • edited September 2021

    @bubbasRig said:
    Now experiencing transport issue with AUM.
    Play arrow says engine is not running. Maybe a phone call or video interrupting.
    Close all background apps and restart. Intermittent operation after rebooting.

    Do you mean AUM is showing the same behaviour without Nanostudio or are you seeing the same thing happen when you use NS with AUM?

    And thanks for your effort, I appreciate it!

  • Yes same transport lockup behavior with AUM and NF2 is not running. I am thinking it’s an iOS issue.
    The play arrow of AUM becomes red and nothing can play, audio is dead, transport will not move, need to kill the app and then it is intermittent if it will fix itself.
    I believe it fixed itself once after just sitting for an hour.

    KeyStage just quit on me yesterday also for no reason that I can figure.
    Never seen that before.

    I have installed and tried to use Pure Piano and MasterTrack in this last week.
    That is when I experienced these issues.
    Seems like it possibly could be related to these but I’ve not used those in KeyStage.

  • Ok, thanks again @bubbasRig what an annoying issue!

  • Found the issue on an AUM blog.
    Took off my new Magnetic case and no more problems with transport issues.

  • Amen must have worked.

  • @bubbasRig said:
    Amen must have worked.

    That’s odd, usually Amen just breaks things 😀 glad you found a cure!

  • Cross post from the AudioBus forum, but possibly a solution for some...

    Based on stuff in the AB forum thread, I wondered if one of my many dongles and audio interfaces was possibly responsible, so I dug all of them out of various desk drawers and started plugging them in. Eventually I got to one headphone/PD dongle, plugged it in, and could hear music playing through the headphones even though NS2 wasn't playing. When I hit play in NS2 I suddenly had two songs playing. I used the app switcher to kill every running app and still the music played, but thankfully I remembered the last time I used that dongle was checking a master on it (which was what was playing), which I'd done using the preview in the Files app, so I opened Files, started playing something else in there and it replaced what had previously been playing. I stopped that, killed the Files app and opened NS2 and so far everything is back to working properly.

    Looks like yet another reason that removing the headphone jack was f***ing stupid.

  • If there is something where one can always rely on Apple, it is that they always fuck up something new in every OS update and with every new HW device ...

  • I've ended up installing the beta OS15 as there was no way it could be worse. Not had any issues at all so far, NS2 running like a dream and I've actually been able to spend more than 5 minutes making music!

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