Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

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godofguns13
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Joined: Sun Oct 12, 2008 7:10 pm

Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by godofguns13 » Sun Apr 08, 2012 1:13 am

I have a Live 8 session that decided it didn't wanna save anymore. Now every time I try to open the session it crashes instantly. It doesn't even appear on the screen. Abelton start up screen comes up, Mac pinwheels and then nothing. Other sessions open with no problem. A vst wouldn't let me save and that is what started the problem. Help?'

Machinesworking
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Joined: Wed Jun 23, 2004 9:30 pm
Location: Seattle

Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by Machinesworking » Sun Apr 08, 2012 2:52 am

First thing to do is to remove the VST from the VST folder, put it on the desktop etc. Then try to start up the Session/Set again.

godofguns13
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Joined: Sun Oct 12, 2008 7:10 pm

Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by godofguns13 » Sun Apr 08, 2012 10:18 pm

I used AppZapper on the som'bitch (the vst in question) and the session still won't open. This thing is 6 days worth of work and would have been money as all hell.

Valiumdupeuple
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Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by Valiumdupeuple » Sun Apr 08, 2012 10:27 pm

Drag each one of its tracks in a new live set directly from the Live browser. That way you'll be able to identify the problematic track.

godofguns13
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Joined: Sun Oct 12, 2008 7:10 pm

Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by godofguns13 » Sun Apr 08, 2012 11:19 pm

Now to find where those live... Not being steve jobs kind of sucks. Aside from that not being dead thing.

Machinesworking
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Location: Seattle

Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by Machinesworking » Mon Apr 09, 2012 2:43 am

godofguns13 wrote:I used AppZapper on the som'bitch (the vst in question) and the session still won't open. This thing is 6 days worth of work and would have been money as all hell.
From your description it sounds like the VST you thought was the problem wasn't the problem....
You don't need to uninstall your VSTs, just move them from the the two VST folders on your computer.
The easiest way to do this is to create a folder in this location /library/Audio/Plug Ins/, call it "VSTs Disabled".
After this drag all your VSTs into this folder from the /Library/Audio/Plug Ins/VST folder.
There's also another VST folder in your User library at Users/(your user account)/Library/Audio/Plug Ins/VST so check that one too, and create another VSTs Disabled folder there to drag VSTs into if you have to. This sounds difficult at first, but it's not, and 90% or more VST plug ins get installed at the root level, not in your user account.

After you remove the VSTs another thing to do is move your Preference file for Ableton Live onto your desktop to make sure it's not corrupt.
This is located at User/(your user account)/Library/Preferences/Ableton
On my system this is a folder with Live version preferences in it.
You can safely put this on the desktop and after doing that restart the computer.
Doing both things you should be able to open the Live Set.

Now once you do you'll see all the VSTs you used in the Set and can move them back into the VST folder, restart Live and in this way figure out which one is crashing Live.

infrared72
Posts: 4
Joined: Sat Jun 02, 2007 10:38 pm

Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by infrared72 » Mon Apr 09, 2012 5:57 pm

Getting fussy ableton files to load is an issue I've had off and on. I'll agree that taking some or all of your vst's offline to a disabled folder is a good method. Also, I've had success with starting Live with the Audio disabled. Sometimes that seems to work with old projects, or projects that just crash live when you try to open them. I usually have a pretty good idea of what plugins I used, so once you get your project loaded re-save it somewhere else on your drive under a totally different name. Hopefully whatever the weirdness was with the original live session won't follow through to the new file.

Valiumdupeuple
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Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by Valiumdupeuple » Mon Apr 09, 2012 7:34 pm

Now to find where those live
??
Don't you know where your live set is saved? Just access it from live's browser. Then you'll be able to access every track of your set independantly.

scotchtape800
Posts: 4
Joined: Wed Jun 01, 2011 3:29 am

Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by scotchtape800 » Wed Apr 11, 2012 4:59 pm

Valium is right, I used this to "recover" a few sets.

In live's browser, find your set (where you saved it on your hdd).
This is the exact same process as finding it in windows explorer (or whatever the mac equivalent is).
Then you can expand the set, and drag in individual tracks.

If you go sequentially from the first track, you will be able to find out which track is causing the issue...

One problem is you will have to re-do the track routing (for example external instruments into Kontakt), but it is better than starting from scratch!

PhunnkMunk
Posts: 17
Joined: Sun Mar 31, 2013 3:39 pm

Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by PhunnkMunk » Sun Jul 21, 2013 10:29 am

was searching for answer to same problem - found part of it, and then rest through exploration - sharing what worked for me here, in case of value to someone else...


yesterday, Ableton crashed, project wouldn't reopen, just kept crashing. thankfully, had made backup - loaded fine... redid 2h work, made another backup - then, same thing, except no backups would open...


found suggestion that sometimes deleting the "preferences.cgf" file in "users/library/preferences/ableton/live 8.4.1" folder (on mac) sometimes work...
---- note - this directory is hidden - to see, open Finder - click on "Go" menu at top of screen - click option key, which will add "library" to the list that pops down... is in there


did this - project file opened, but all plugins disabled... as went into preferences and did rescan for plugins, it crashed. reasoning: one of the plugins being used in the project was causing it to crash...


note: as soon as you rescan for plugins, it creates a new preferences.cgf file, which must be deleted to open project again.


- went back to original project file after deleting preferences - made note of ALL plugins being used in the project

- create new fresh project - test plugins on empty track one-by-one...


found the culprit when a reverb cause it to freeze up...


- reopen project file again after deleting preferences.cfg
- delete all instances of the troubled plugin
- rescan for plugins in Ableton preferences

now, project can open again, no issues, right where I left off.


odd thing is, the troubled plugin was there in the project for a week, and I had made NO adjustments to it - just seemed to go haywire out of the blue, unexplainably. oh well.



hope this finds someone well who may experience the same issue... nearly f^ck!ng lost my marbles for 22h after two weeks on the project... yet, all works out in the end. persistence pays.


;-)

jumbomonkey
Posts: 30
Joined: Sat Aug 23, 2008 2:29 pm

Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by jumbomonkey » Fri Aug 02, 2013 1:31 pm

Great advice guys, like it a lot. I have these issues intermittantly, and admitedly i don't follow up on things as i should, sometimes just move on and do another project for the time being.

One thing to mention though is the crash log that is there, and how to read it. I'm not sure how to do that myself, but other than going through things manually, when you send your crash file to live, it seems like they can come back and tell you confidently which devices are causing the issue. Perhaps we could find out how to read that file so it has a definative answer that we can keep track of as and when issues occur. This could be faster and more reliable when you have a lot of crashes and a lot of projects i reckon. What do you think?

Cytomorph
Posts: 5
Joined: Wed Sep 20, 2006 1:48 am

Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by Cytomorph » Sun Jan 12, 2014 4:30 am

Hey guys,

This problem was happening to me so I decided to attempt one last solution before pulling the tracks out of the project folder and starting from scratch. Good news is it worked for me, but I'm not going to say this will work for everyone. Simply "ADD FOLDER" and choose the contained project folder you're experiencing the crash with. Once you have that and see the folder in the browser window select it and choose the option to "MANAGE FOLDER". Now the right window pane should open and near the bottom of the manage project panel you should be able to see the option to "CREATE PACK". Select that and wait for the packing to finish. Now once that is finished you will have to install the pack from the location you selected to save the packed project.Once installed open that project only. Good luck and I hope this works for all of you.

dylanbowes
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Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2019 6:54 pm
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Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by dylanbowes » Sat May 16, 2020 6:25 am

Cytomorph wrote:
Sun Jan 12, 2014 4:30 am
Hey guys,

This problem was happening to me so I decided to attempt one last solution before pulling the tracks out of the project folder and starting from scratch. Good news is it worked for me, but I'm not going to say this will work for everyone. Simply "ADD FOLDER" and choose the contained project folder you're experiencing the crash with. Once you have that and see the folder in the browser window select it and choose the option to "MANAGE FOLDER". Now the right window pane should open and near the bottom of the manage project panel you should be able to see the option to "CREATE PACK". Select that and wait for the packing to finish. Now once that is finished you will have to install the pack from the location you selected to save the packed project.Once installed open that project only. Good luck and I hope this works for all of you.
BLESS U!
This worked for me.

2 things to add:

1. Make sure you collect all the external files before creating the pack.
2. After you create the pack, simply drag that pack file into Live and it should open right up.

Thanks Cytomorph.

SteveRawcliffe
Posts: 2
Joined: Wed Jan 20, 2021 10:02 am

Re: Any secret to opening session that crashes instantly?

Post by SteveRawcliffe » Tue Mar 23, 2021 3:28 pm

Cytomorph wrote:
Sun Jan 12, 2014 4:30 am
Hey guys,

This problem was happening to me so I decided to attempt one last solution before pulling the tracks out of the project folder and starting from scratch. Good news is it worked for me, but I'm not going to say this will work for everyone. Simply "ADD FOLDER" and choose the contained project folder you're experiencing the crash with. Once you have that and see the folder in the browser window select it and choose the option to "MANAGE FOLDER". Now the right window pane should open and near the bottom of the manage project panel you should be able to see the option to "CREATE PACK". Select that and wait for the packing to finish. Now once that is finished you will have to install the pack from the location you selected to save the packed project.Once installed open that project only. Good luck and I hope this works for all of you.
You are a freaking hero! This worked like a charm. Many thanks.

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