I'm Really Getting Tired of the Problems with Amarra

[khollister]

I was using Amarra Mini and was happy with the sound, but the track display quit updating as play progressed through the playlist (cache mode & playlist on).

 

I updated to the full version (with a complete new install of OS X 10.6.6) and now I have the following problems

 

1) Track info and playlist window do not update - the track displayed is always the track first selected to start playback of the playlist.

 

2) Track info no longer displays the artist - filename only (and yes, the files are tagged - ALAC or AIFF)

 

3) While cache mode is on (indicator is green), the middle display box that is supposed to show the memory used (line above the interface/sample rate display) is blank and the playlist loads instantaneously, which makes me suspect memory playback isn't really working. Looking in the log shows a message stating memory playback is on, but there is always a message of "Amarra using 0M" which seems to indicate nothing is being cached.

 

I feel stupid for spending money on this thing when nothing seems to work.

 

Does any of this stuff actually work for anyone else?

 

UPDATE - I did discover that if I add tracks from iTunes to a playlist, that all of the metadata comes across. If I add them from the finder, I just get the filename. Is this the behavior other folks are seeing?

 

UPDATE 2 - Got the memory display working by choosing a cache setting other than the 512M default in Preferences. I now get 2 messages in the log - "Amarra: Using 165M Memory" followed immediately by "Amarra: Using 0M RAM". Go figure. Still no update of the track info as the playlist progresses.

 

UPDATE 3 - Spoke too soon - the cache settings don't seem to stick. If I shut down Amarra and restart, it appears to not cache anything and the display is blank. I have to change the settings in Preferences and restart for it to work. What a POS - buggiest software I have used in a long time. And I can't try Mini to see if does the same thing now, as the license doesn't let you run the lesser versions of the software! I did have the track info update exactly once - have not gotten it to repeat since.

 

[khollister]

Installed Amarra on my Mac Pro - exact same bugs as on the mini.

 

[diogenis]

Demand your $$$ back and stick using itunes/audirvana.

 

[wgscott]

I also suggest you demand your money back. They charge an outrageous sum for what you get. Audirvana and Decibel deserve our support far more I believe.

 

 

 

[khollister]

I think Amarra Mini was working on 10.6.5. Not certain but I think things went to hell when I updated to 10.6.6. I will send another email or two and see what I get back on Monday. I have also verified it isn't just a display problem. By monitoring the memory usage I am certain it is not caching the tracks regardless of the settings.

 

I love the sound when it works but to charge $700 and it doesn't even operate correctly 90% of the time is bordering on fraud.

 

[SteveS1]

I have a MacBook 2.4Ghz Core 2 Duo with 4Gb RAM and Amarra Mini, Pure Music, Audirvana and Decibel. Amarra Mini is the most clunky to use and has a couple of issues for me, in cache/iTunes mode it sometimes shaves a little of endings or beginnings. Other than that, it's working fine and sounds the best of the bunch to me.

 

I agree it should be flawless in operation and if you would like to compare information on settings for the Mac, let me know. I hope they sort it next release. I prefer PM's operation and consistency but it doesn't sound quite as good. The other two don't support Apple Remote which for me is a deal-breaker. If I wanted to load playlists I'd stick with a CDP.:-)

 

The joy of computer audio to me is great sound combined with total remote flexibility. If I get an iPad soon then a VNC type app may bring the others into play.

 

Steve

 

[The Offenbach Kid]

On installing Amarra 2.1.1 I had no problems and the cache worked fine. A few weeks down the road and sometimes the "loading cache" message appears and sometimes it doesn't, and even when it does it's there for less than a second and I know the music is being read directly from the external drive because the light on the drive is continually flashing.

 

I saw on another thread that another release of Amarra is due, possibly during February, and the cache problem is on the list of things that have been addressed.

 

Neil.

 

[khollister]

Neil - that is exactly what happens with me. Amarra Mini probably wasn't working either, but I upgraded to Amarra when I decided to primarily use the playlist mode, and the missing memory display was the trigger for me to investigate what was happening.

 

I also agree with Steve that it does sound better (and even better when it actually does cache stuff) which is why I paid the ridiculous price. Of course, that was when I was under the impression that all of the major features actually worked as advertised.

 

I think I will install 2.1 and see what I get

 

Keith

 

[khollister]

After unistalling 2.1.1, installing 2.1, and going back to 2.1.1, I have found the secret handshake:

 

Using a cache size of 512M or 2GB (didn't try 1GB) in Preferences, the caching function works and survives reboots. There is a substantial time period where the "Loading Cache" panel displays and the memory used is always displayed above the interface info.

 

What breaks it is selecting 4GB as the cache size - it will work until the next Amarra restart and then it is broken until you set the cache down to 2GB and restart Amarra. This actually makes some sense as I also discovered Amarra is NOT a 64 bit application! And regardless of what cache settings used, Amarra always starts with some console log messages identifying malloc and pointer addressing failures, so their memory management seems to have some issues.

 

Two other curious discoveries:

 

1) Amarra 2.1 always crashes if I try to load a saved playlist (this works in 2.1.1). I had to rebuild the playlist by loading the tracks from iTunes.

 

2) For the same tracks, 2.1 used significantly lower memory by the cache display in the UI (163M vs 406M for the same 5 ALAC 16/44 tracks)

 

Track info updating to follow the playlist is broken in both versions (I think this might be a 10.6.6 thing - I'm certain this worked back on 10.6.5). I got a single random occurrence of this working in each version, but 99% of the time it doesn't.

 

And yes, you can hear the difference with or without the cache.

 

Keith

 

PS - 2.1 seemed to remember that you disabled EQ and would start with it disabled. 2.1.1 doesn't and always starts with EQ enabled but set to "flat". However, I could detect no sonic difference in the EQ light being on with it set to flat versus disabled with the light off, so this is an annoying bug with no functional consequences.

 

PPS - I think 2.1.1 sounds a little different from 2.1, but it was hard to tell because of the time to uninstall and reinstall. It occurs to me that the difference in cache size for the same tracks might be due to 2.1 caching the ALAC versions and decoding on the fly and 2.1.1 might be decoding (and maybe padding to 24 bits) before caching. While I haven't done the math to see if the size differences are in the ballpark, that could explain the size difference in the cache as well as the sound difference/improvement.

 

[The Offenbach Kid]

Keith

 

Very grateful for the update.

 

Now that you've identified the problem it makes sense because I upped the cache to 4Gb recently when I was playing some 24/192 files that were greater than 2Gb.

 

I'll reduce it down to 2Gb again to see if that cracks it.

 

Thanks again.

 

Neil.

 

[khollister]

Just noticed in the README that a recent change was "Add Automatic setting of EQ Preset based on Setting in iTunes Track Info". I suspect this accounts for the EQ always being enabled on startup - they turn the EQ on so it can follow the track EQ in iTunes.

 

"That's not a bug, it's a feature!" - the software developer's mantra :-)

 

I also see in the changelog that when play from memory was added back in 2.0, there is a not that it uses up to 1GB. I need to add a bunch of tracks and see if I can get it over 1GB with 2.1.1

 

[khollister]

 

Neil

 

I manage about 170 software engineers in a research and product line development capacity for a very large aerospace company as well as direct the product line architecture for several lines of business. This kind of thing drives me crazy - we spend a lot of time on design, development and testing methodology to avoid exactly this kind of thing. I realize the software staff of Sonic Studios is probably a handful of people, but still ...

 

Keith

 

[khollister]

Got the cache to 1203M indicated with 18 16/44 tracks. Amarra is up to 1.61GB RAM in Activity Monitor

 

[khollister]

Got a note back from Sonic Studio support thanking me for the cache observations and saying they will investigate the matter. We'll see what happens.

 

[cosmuk]

Generally, when there is an update to the OS or iTunes I will go the the extras folder and run the "Delete Amarra preferences command".

(applications / Amarra / extras / Delete Amarra Preferences Command)

 

Next time you have an issue give it a try.

It worked great after the most recent iTunes 10.1.2 update.

 

 

 

 

[The Offenbach Kid]

Hi cosmuk

 

This is a great tip.

 

I tried it this morning and now cache is working again.

 

Thanks,

 

Neil.

 

[fjmcsu]

Fresh install of latest version of Amarra; Playlist loading crashes or gives error code. Unable to use it reliably so uninstalled it and will wait for next version to see if it is more reliable on my system than the current version. Using PM & Fidelia for the time being; Mac mini 2010 8GB ram, SSD.

 

[blueixus]

Just for some balance here I am pretty happy with Amarra, particulay the latest release.

 

I am not a computer buff, infact almost opposite and despite some very hamfisted behaviour it is working well.

 

I can't say the same for Audirvana which bought my Mac to a grinding halt, but that is probably my fault. Decibel which I think used to be called Ayrewave is OK - works very solidly but does not allow me to use the itunes remote which I love.

 

PM also seems to drift in and out of reliable operation.

 

They should all be better but I think one of the issues is that many of us set up out computers in slightly different ways hence everyone having different views about the reliability of the software.

 

I think Amarra et al should try and address this problem by having their software take a diagnostic look at you Mac and making reccomendations about the environment it is operating within.

 

[cosmuk]

When updating make sure you have run the Uninstall Amarra command then the delete Amarra preferences command, before you install an update.

These are found in the extra's folder with the Amarra app folder.

 

[Lars]

The latest Amarra has worked reasonably well for me. Some problems with Gapless high-res. I would love to see an app like Fidelia that would allow me to run Playlist mode with a remote.

 

Playist is a bit clunky to use; the remote would help.

 

[ianmacc]

Hi

 

I have had no problems loading 44.1k or 192k files directly from Finder or adding files from iTunes (10.1) into Cache with Amarra 2.1.1. I always get a delay while they are loading into Cache, confirmed by a pop-up window and if I have Activity Monitor open I can see the Active Memory figure increase as Amarra loads in the tracks.

 

The Memory figure always shows in the Amarra interface window. And importantly, I get instant response when I press Play even if it has been stopped for 10 minutes whereas there is a delay while the HD wakes if I am not using Cache.

 

In Amarra preferences I have Memory set at 2Gb.

 

I wonder if my stable set up is because I am running OSX 10.6.3? For sure, I have no desire to upgrade to 10.6.6 while everything is running so well.

 

Kind regards, Ian

 

 

 

[khollister]

The caching is reliable for me at 2 GB as well - it turns out the problem is with larger cache amounts. SS acknowledged receipt of my bug report and said they would investigate.

 

[Lars]

I also had to limit the cache to 2GB. I have a total of 8GB, but the program would lock up with settings above 2 GB.

 

[The Offenbach Kid]

Lars

 

Does that mean that if you have a file that is more than 2GB, like some of the 24/192 downloads from people like Linn and 2L, the music just cuts off at the 2GB point?

 

 

Neil.

 

[Lars]

That's a good question! I don't know. I believe that it will load what it can. I don't know of any files that are 2 GB

 

Memory management is very difficult to execute.