Playback has unpleasant pops and clicks in Musescore 4 on macOS while it is fine in Musescore 3
I am still using Musescore 3 because the playback in Musescore 4 is unpleasant in the following way:
When you stop playback you can hear pops and clicks. The kind you would hear when you cut and edit audio in a DAW without fading. The audio is almost always ending abruptly instead of letting the tail fade like it does in Musescore 3. This was never an issue with Musescore 3. There the playback is completely smooth. That's why I am still sticking with this old version.
I am having these issues on an M1 MacBook Air 2020 as well as on a new M4 Pro Macbook Pro. Both running macOS 15.5 and Musescore 4.5.2.
The problem occurs with the internal speakers as well as with headphones or a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2.
Edit: Changing the buffer size does NOT resolve this problem.
Comments
Look up How to disable Exclusive mode. The procedure might be different for each of your Apple machines. And you may need to do it for each of your audio output devices.
In reply to Look up How to disable… by bobjp
I've looked it up and sadly it seems like there is no such option in macOS.
Is there no solution to this?
In reply to Is there no solution to this? by z46yp2xjfn
Make sure your computer meets the specs listed on the download page.
Make sure that the audio output device you are using is set in Preferences>Audio/midi. Not just "Default".
The playback engine for MU4 is totally different than the one in MU3, and requires more power.
I understand that some Macs have an exclusive mode setting, but is isn't called that. What can happen is that a DAW or something similar can take control of your audio device and not allow something like MU4 to use it properly. What you describe is typical of the bit rate (not just the buffer) being too high and/or exclusive mode needing to be off.
I understand that Macs normally take care of some of these things automatically.