Musescore 3.6.2 reproducibly hangs on entering score
While entering a new score for choire I got MuseScore to hang reproducibly (three times until now):
- Start MuseScore 3.6.2
- New, Title="School's out"
- Choral => SATB, #, 12/8, 102 measures
- click on first break in Soprano and set "Tempo 4. = 126", "dynamics = f"
- set format - style - dynamics: above
- enter notes: N 4E (shift one octave down by Ctrl-Arrow-Down) 8E 4.A 4E 8E 4.G 4E 8E
(program hangs and does not recover within 5 minutes)
I closed MuseScore using the task manager. On first retry I let MuseScore restore the session, but as I had not saved yet, only the title was available, no further setting and no note. When entering the first notes, MuseScore again hangs after the first couple of notes. (Again after the first notes in the second measure)
After this second hang I restarted from scratch (as described above), but MuseScore hangs again at the same place.
This is MuseScore 3.6.2 running on Win 10 Pro, MuseScore language set to German.
Anything else I can test / anything else you need as further info?
Comments
Unfortunately I cannot reproduce following those steps. I tried following them precisely, but then I also tried with a modification, as I am guessing you customized your shortcuts so 4 is quarter note and 8 is eighth - otherwise those rhythms make no sense :-). So I tried it replacing 4 with 5 and 8 with 4. Still no problem. So probably either there is something unrelated going on where some other process just happens to be stealing the CPU at that moment, or you are using a non-default soundfont that somehow is getting in the way, or something else unique about your configuration. That might be something you need to figure out, but as a start, could you at least save the score just before the hang and attach that? Also let us know if you can recall any other possibly relevant customizations you might have made.
I guess you might also try variations in that routine to see if you can identify one of those steps as the trigger. Like, does it work better with a different template (possible, since that affects playback parameters), or different notes entered?
In reply to Unfortunately I cannot… by Marc Sabatella
Thanks for trying to reproduce it. Oh, I should have mentioned my shortcut customizations - "4" is indeed a quarter note, "8" a 1/8th.
While entering the score, MuseScore and Firefox had been more or less the only active programs. CPU usage is less than 5%, with 0% from MuseScore itself, but a "not responding" note in the task manager for it.
I just made MuseScore hang again, by following the steps described above. This time I saved the score directly after having finished the first measure (see attached score), then entered the first note of the second measure (ok), and on entering the second note it hung again.
Normally MuseScore is quite stable here. Last crashes I remember were at the beginning of the 3.x series. I haven't worked much with the 3.6 versions yet - only have edited an existing score with it yet (without any problems, using 3.6.0, IIRC). This is the first time I started a new score with 3.6.x (3.6.2 in this case).
Using the saved score I was able to enter a second measure. Then I wanted to add repeat bars, but even opening the bars palette did not work any more - MuseScore hung again.
In reply to Thanks for trying to… by msmb
Can you give precise steps starting from this score? I tried a bunch of things, no hang for me. Not that I can inmagine a bug where merely entering a note into a mostly empty score would ever hang - if such a bug existed everyone would be hit by it. So it seems more likely some unique aspect of your system, but what that might be is a mystery.
In reply to Can you give precise steps… by Marc Sabatella
Originally (without saving in between) it crashed on entering two more notes.
To answer your question starting from the save file, I opened the file I had attached to my previous post (in my installed "downgraded" 3.5.2 version). Here I was able to enter a full measure and two more notes, then MuseScore hangs again.
So: Click on the second measure and press: N 4E 8E 4A 8G 4.+ 40 8E 4E 8E => hang
Following the same steps using the portable version of MuseScore 3.6.2 I had installed yesterday, entering this (and more) was no problem.
One notable difference I just found: The portable version does play the notes while entering whereas the other version does not. So I looked for the input/output settings. Here I found different settings:
- Portable version: API=MME, Device=Lautsprecher (...)
- Installed version: API=Windows WDM-KS, Device=Speaker (...)
Then I switched the setting for the installed version to the same as the portable version. Now entering more than the above mentioned notes DOES WORK (have not tried a longer phrase, just two more measures), but the tone is distorted, whereas in the portable version with the (seemingly) same audio settings is crystal clear. As both installations are done yesterday after having uninstalled the existing MuseScore I don't think that I have changed any synthy setting or else, at least not consciously.
So it may be some sort of buffer overrun on audio output. If so, it should be caught, IMHO, and presented with some meaningful error message. (If possible)
In reply to Originally (without saving… by msmb
Still I can't get anything to go wrong. it does seem apparent here is conflict with some other program or device on your system - something else might be stealing the audio driver and locking it out, perhaps (some programs do that).
As for which device driver works best within MuseScore on any particular system, that's obvious system dependent, each system has different drivers. Normally whatever is offered by default should work fine, but if not, feel free to try others.
I suspect the portable version is 32 bit and is thus limited to 32-bit drivers, which would explain why it seems a different default.
In reply to Unfortunately I cannot… by Marc Sabatella
Soundfont is MuseScore_General.sf3
In reply to Unfortunately I cannot… by Marc Sabatella
Did yet another test, but starting with the blank template "select instruments", choosing "Sopran", "Alt", "Tenor", "Bass" (you get the German names for it when you select the instruments manually), and following the steps described above - no hang this time, even after having entered several more measures this time.
So for now it looks I'm able to continue my work, but I would still like to know what's going on... :-)
In reply to Unfortunately I cannot… by Marc Sabatella
Regarding possible customizations: I don't remember any relevant customizations except the shortcuts for note lengths. I have set them to 1=full note, 2=1/2, 4=1/4, 8=1/8, 6=1/16, 3=1/32
I'm using MuseScore since the 1.3 times, so I may have forgotten some customization. Is there a way to identify them easily?
This is truely strange: Today I uninstalled MuseScore 3.6.2 and reinstalled 3.5.2, imported the freshly created shortcuts.xml. Then I opened the above mentioned score. After pressing "ignore" (newer format) everything looked fine so far. Then I copied the first two measures from Soprano to Alto and started modifying some notes. Guess what happened? Somewhere in the second measure program started to hang again. Sigh.
Since I had not used MuseScore regularly for a few months due to Corona, it's hard to say whether there was some system change during that time which may cause this. "sfc /scannow" found a few minor things, but that did not have any effect wrt the original problem.
Next thing I tried is the portable version of MuseScore 3.6.2 - This seems to work for now... Fingers crossed!