I confess, i am still running 4.9.6 in Windows 7. Don't hate me.

Everything basically OK. Maybe a freeze up or router communication glitch every couple of weeks. I reboot, and back to normal. One of my fans texts me, I remote in and reboot, so downtime limited and infrequent.

Last night, however, it started freezing every half hour on me. I restart, it's OK, then it freezes again.

The Event Log freezes, too, so no diagnosis is visible.

Spacial tech support for this vintage model ended in the previous millennium. Whoever knew the software is by a pool in Florida.

Anyway, anyone out there know any fixes I can try?

Installing SAM 2021.6 did not solve the problem. I followed Tech Support instructions below, which did not work. I start my stream and it still freezes after between one and ten tracks. This is my laptop running Windows 7.

I also tried installing SAM 2021.6 on a desktop running Windows 10. When the laptop was frozen, I followed the instructions below, and for the desktop install, both decks are frozen, and do not play even a single track. Encoder communicates fine with streamhost, Clockwheel loading tracks properly.

Sent: Friday, March 18, 2022 at 5:22 AM
From: "Spacial Technical & Sales Support" <support@spacial.zendesk.com>

Mar 18, 2022, 4:22 CDT
 
If your players freeze or won't play a track when you load it onto the deck, your sound device may be improperly configured.
 
To fix this, click on "Config" in the toolbar and select "Audio Mixer Pipeline." Then follow these steps:
 
Click the "Air Out" button, and an "Audio Settings" window will pop up.
Under "Air output settings," select the proper "Output driver" from the drop-down menu.
This is usually "DirectSound" output.
Even if this option is already selected as a default setting, select it manually from the drop-down menu.
Also under "Air output settings," select the proper "Output device" from the drop-down menu.
Even if this option is already selected as a default setting, select it manually from the drop-down menu.
Click the "Apply now" button followed by "OK."
 
Please let me know if this resolves your problem?
Mar 17, 2022, 9:17 CDT

I have installed your Free Trial of SAM Version 2021.6. The key is my OLD license key. I need help with 2021.6.

Hello,

you can try to run SAMBC as admin and also try to silent output to see if the problem is related with soundcard/driver issues. Try to repair the database or also move to mariadB.

Best,
Ivan

_________________
Ivan Radolović - Spacial Volunteer Support (SVS)

It's freezing again. It stops at the Automated Recovery, which is set for five seconds, and freezes. I can't even cancel that and start a deck manually. Running as administrator changes nothing. I'm unable to get into configuration at all.

Go back to SAM version 4.9.6 in Win7 PC if it has worked quite well so far. (Don't use new Version as there may be new bugs). In the following, some forum users will hate me ... but they are methods to narrow down errors. Do the following: 1) Enable Windows Task Manager permanently to monitor processor usage and Services to find any trouble makers. 2) Disable all antivirus tools. 3) Also disable Windows Defender - Important! 4) Disable all Win7 update processes (ask Google how). 5) Check Windows System Settings - in Task Scheduler module - if any tasks are scheduled, if so disable them. Finally, watch Windows Task Manager when SAM is running. 6) Disable in SAM "Auto Error Recovery" (I never enabled that checkbox).
Background story: Windows Defender and Windows System periodically make some background services that can and do disturb SAM. SAM itself can sporadically cause a very high processor load due to SAM's sound processing and in cooperation with the database when searching for the next songs to be queued. - resulting in SAM freezing. With the help of Task Manager and Service Monitoring you can see a lot.
Note: For SAM problems with Windows 10 - that's a different story... but just as terrible, just with different causes. I've been using SAM on 6 different PCs with different operating systems and different SAM Versions / Licenses for 12 years and know pain only too well...

I get similar freeze-ups when my internet connexion acts up or my external DD is solicited by another process...
I currently run SAM 2017 Pro on Win 10 and 11

You can help your Sam use less processor resources by converting all your music to the streaming bit rate and normalizing it to about 90% of max volume prior to putting it in your queue