Traktor 3 Reliability Issues on Win 10 (Music turns into loud "buzz" or won't play)

Mr Kris

Hi all,

I've been using my Traktor S4 Mk2 since 2017, largely reliably until recently. Currently running on a Windows 10 Machine- Asus Tuf Gaming Ryzen 7 3750H, 16GB RAM. Music library is on its own Samsung Internal SSD.

For a long time, Traktor had been dead reliable- prior to this PC, I was running it on a $250 Best Buy special laptop. Could barely run anything, Traktor ran slowly- but never failed to play music. That also describes my experience on my current laptop, until later versions of Traktor 2, and now Traktor 3.

There are 2 main bugs that happen, and I've seen once described on these forums many times, and in Reddit threads and other various websites. The other I haven't seen described before.

Bug 1: The "loud buzzing" sound. After some amount of time playing music, the music will stop, and the audio output is an extremely loud "buzzing" sound. It's not exactly a buzz- it almost sounds like it's a fraction of a beat being repeated. The most common response I see to this issue is to run latency mon and check for buffer underruns. I can confirm that once this happens- the buffer is no longer fed and continuously underruns. I've also run latency mon- I did note that Adobe Creative Cloud would cause issues, so I uninstalled that. (This laptop is 99% dedicated to DJ work, had it installed to do one thing one weekend.) I was testing by letting Traktor autoplay overnight, and after uninstalling CC, it would consistently play for 12hrs+ with no crashing. Thought my problem was solved- however last night, as I was DJing a wedding, on the first open dance floor song- music died and the buzz came in. (Traktor had already been running several hours playing background music.) Latency mon indicated no issues.

Bug 2: This one was strange- at another wedding a few weeks ago, if I had Traktor just sitting idle for a while.... say an hour.... and came back to play music- it would not play. To be clear, Traktor was not frozen. I could use the scroll wheel to move the track selection on screen, but hitting play did nothing. The play indicator would be lit on the screen, but the waveform was not moving, no audio out. No effects that would be freezing the track- same effect on both decks. This, though annoying, wasn't as big a deal as with Bug 1, since it produced no audible issues to the audience. Quick restart of Traktor and I was good to go again.

So I suppose my question is: Has ANYBODY experienced the buzzing crash issue, and successfully alleviated? I've seen many threads, but nobody reporting back that they had actually permanently solved the issue. I haven't yet installed the latest Traktor 3- I thought my issue was solved, and so opted to not update to stay stable. But I supposed I'll update now since there's certainly the possibility that it may fix something.

Some responses to common diagnostic questions in other threads: My MP3s aren't corrupt, I've gone down that path checking the particular songs it has crashed on. I've gone so far as to replay the exact sequence of songs leading to the crash, even 2 hours worth, and the crash/buzz is not replicable. Totally random. The crash/buzz also doesn't happen in any particular time frame. I've gone 6 hours during a gig with nothing happening- as mentioned I've let Traktor autoplay for 12 hours+ without it bugging, and other times, as last night, it crash/buzzed at the most inopportune moment.

Any thoughts appreciated!

Mr Kris

Final update: Ran for about 10 hours yesterday, including time when I let Windows 11 delete Windows 10 in the background and some web browsing as a stress test. Also about an hour of time taking control, as opposed to auto play. No hiccups. Today I let it run 10 hours again on autoplay, no issues.

So it seems the Traktor ASIO driver not stable with my setup (Win 10 or 11, Ryzen 3750H, 16GB RAM), but the WASAPI driver is. Since it used to be stable with this setup, I can only guess that there was a Windows update or other driver update at some point in the past year or so that caused the instability. The extra latency of WASAPI vs ASIO not an issue in my use case, and guessing there's a slim chance of a driver update since there hasn't been an update since 2015.

Hopefully someone in the future finds the above useful!

Mr Kris

Well, if anyone is listening- I upgraded to the latest version, and now it's worse :) Traktor now failing to play music consistently after 20-30 minutes of autoplay. Never had it repeatably fail like this. The one bright side seems to be that instead of the loud buzzing once the buffer has underrun, it's just silent now.

When the failure happens, Traktor is still "responsive" in that I can select tracks, load them into the non playing track- but on the track that it thinks is playing the waveform doesn't move. Play indicator can be clicked on and off, but the waveform is still no matter what. On exit, Traktor thinks something is playing and gives me the warning message that a track is playing.

Buffer continuously underruns. I guess at this point, I'll try updating to Windows 11 and see what happens. Can't hurt I guess.

Frustrating.

Mr Kris

For posterity: Hopefully I'm not typing this prematurely, but I may have solved.

Upgraded to Windows 11- but that did not directly fix. Ran Traktor on autoplay again, and instead of crashing consistently after 20-30 minutes, it would go a little longer... perhaps 30 to 40 minutes, before failing to play music. Same symptom- waveform not moving, Traktor thinks it is playing, no sound. (No more loud buzz at least- just silence.) Traktor is responsive, other than actual play functionality.

I noted that I could switch the Audio device to something other than my S4 Mk2, and if I switched back, things worked again. I had never done this before- during a gig, I would quickly Alt+F4 to get out quickly and restart. And messing with it at home, never thought to try.

That got me thinking- why not try the other S4 driver. I was using the ASIO driver, and switched to the WASAPI driver. At first I thought the driver was non-functional... no sound. But that just turns out that for some reason, on that driver, the monitor out was not mapped to the headphone jack. (Main out was configured correct- but I was just using headphones.)

Well- after switching to the WASAPI driver, I've got Traktor autoplaying for 4.5hrs now with no issues. So it seems, at least in my case, the ASIO driver may have been the culprit.

Hopefully this is truly the case- I'll leave it running all night and see what happens.

Mr Kris

Final update: Ran for about 10 hours yesterday, including time when I let Windows 11 delete Windows 10 in the background and some web browsing as a stress test. Also about an hour of time taking control, as opposed to auto play. No hiccups. Today I let it run 10 hours again on autoplay, no issues.

So it seems the Traktor ASIO driver not stable with my setup (Win 10 or 11, Ryzen 3750H, 16GB RAM), but the WASAPI driver is. Since it used to be stable with this setup, I can only guess that there was a Windows update or other driver update at some point in the past year or so that caused the instability. The extra latency of WASAPI vs ASIO not an issue in my use case, and guessing there's a slim chance of a driver update since there hasn't been an update since 2015.

Hopefully someone in the future finds the above useful!

lcakametrobeatz

I've had the same issue going on for almost a year..I've had the Kontrol MK3 for over 3 yrs and bought a new laptop around the same time and I use DVS because I am a turtabalist..so I depend on those ASIO drivers..I've had no issues with Kontrol or my windows 10 laptop for the first few years..did live gigs with no issue and I record weekly mixshows with it..within the last year I have been experiencing the same issue..after about an hr or two..the music start playing choppy and will eventually lock up or sound will go out..it took me awhile to figure out to just turn off the unit or reset the asio drivers and then things go back to normal..it's one thing to do this during the recording of my radio shows but it's another to deal with this for a live event..and it got to the point where I'm too scared to use this system for a live event for fear it will act funky after an hr or two...Today when recording 4 hrs of radio shows I decided to disconnect the network adaptors while recording and I had no issues..when I record next week I will do the same thing and see if I have the same consistency but I agree windows may have thrown in a funky update that has made the asio driver unreliable so hopefully NI will look into this and update the driver

DJ_DichOtomy

Just wanted to add that I have the same exact issue and it started when I got a new computer with an AMD processor. It seems that everyone who has this problem is using an AMD processor. I would really like a fix as I won't play live with Traktor right now, I don't trust it. I'm forced to use a numark controller I have and Serato (which I really don't like) I prefer Traktor.

lcakametrobeatz

Update:

My laptop is an intel I7 cpu for the last several weeks I have been recording my weekly radio shows in 4 hr sets with no issues with my wifi disconnected so that's giving me a little confidence to take it out live again..will still test another few weeks but the last 3 weeks there are no issues as long as internet is disconnected which also means I cannot use any streaming service while spinning live..hopefully NI will look into this..

Mr Kris

A few more details for me: I always have my network turned off, and that seemed to make no difference in my personal setup- you may have better luck of course. I've done several gigs since my last post, and no issues using the WASAPI drivers. Totally understand the need for ASIO in your use case- hopefully someone is listening!

DJ_DichOtomy

Well I've had Traktor running now for 8 hours with no issues. I switched to the WASAPI driver (screenshot1) and that seems to work. I had always avoided using that driver because when you select it, the latency shows as 20 ms (screenshot2) and I know that around 12 to 15 ms it starts to become very noticeable. Then when I was using the WASAPI driver I opened up the Traktor Kontrol S4 MK3 ASIO Control Pane utility and it was showing a much lower latency (screenshot3) than Traktor was reporting in the preferences. I ran the diagnostics and no issues whatsoever, in fact the utility says 10.5 ms latency, which I tend to believe because if there was really 20 ms latency I would definitely notice.

Anyways so if you saw that high latency and stayed away from that driver, might want to check it out.

Kubrak

@DJ_DichOtomy

I am not sure if S4 MK3 driver shows data just for ASIO, or also for WASAPI..... If it is ASIO driver, it would show data just for ASIO and not for WASAPI.

And as you see in Traktor Audio setup dialog, it shows latency induced by Traktor procesing 10 ms and by audio interface 10 ms, making together 20 ms.

20 ms is noticeable if one hears two signals delayed by 20 ms (or so). But it is not case of Traktor, unless you use Live input. It would, IMHO, matter when using mirophone. I do not have experience, but it could matter for scratching and like.

Long Duc Dong

thanks for this thread guys...I just updated to 3.8 and had this freezing and buzzing issue...will try the WASAPI driver..and hopefully won't have this issue as well

MrDelicious2

Starting using the ASIO Driver (All) and the MK3 S4 Driver: Now I'm having this exact buzz issue, the only fix is to switch driver and back. Then it works again for a short time. You can also restart the software/cput and this will work, but is very time consuming. These fixes NOT acceptable with playing a LIVE Gig.

Prior to Kontrol MK3 S4 Controller and Driver that I purchased hoping to FIX THE ISSUE that I was having with sudden music that would lock into "Super Slow Tempo" every few hours of playing with WASAPI Drivers (Which I've used for years with Traktor with NO issues) It wasn't until several releases ago that this issue came up. I've changed everything, cables, boards, amps, cpus & drivers trying to track down the cause and searching for a resolution.

I am glad to read/hear there are other with these 2 Issues, need a fix

*please, please, please*

MrD

dead_rubbish

I, too have experienced this problem; Traktor playing fine and then randomly crashing with the awful buzzing sound, which, as OP says is like a tiny portion of the audio repeating. I've not tried changing driver, but occasionally use DVS so would prefer to stick with ASIO. I also have an older sound card (Traitor Audio 10).

It may be my AMD processor as I'm pretty sure this happened at a wedding recently when I had turned off everything including network card. Although I'm pretty sure it happened with different soundcards/drivers (main and backup - both ASIO)

Have a big gig coming up and really not sure I can rely on Traktor. So sad as I've relied on it for many years. Switched to Serato with Numark controller and it seems really solid. However, there are SO many shortcomings in Serato compared to the complicated highly configurable beast that is Traktor. And Serato want HOW MUCH for the full software license? Plus the hardware lock in….meh

Please, NI, pay attention to this issue and resolve!