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[finzic]

Hi all,
I have been using many different versions of JRiver across Windows 10 and Mac. Now I am using v23 for Mac with Mac OS High Sierra 10.13.6 because it can rip CDs. In the meantime,I upgraded my MacBook Pro with a second HD and extracted the optical drive to a USB enclosure. It works perfectly smooth with iTunes, but I want to use superior JRiver.
Any time I insert a CD with JRiver open, suddenly iTunes starts up and starts reading the CD. That's fine, I can hide it... but when I start to rip CD with JRiver, 9 times out of 10 the software crashes either with a SIGSEGV or in complete silence.
I noticed that when the CD drive stops spinning for a split second and then restarts, the crash or the silent death happen.
How could I fix this problem? I want to use JRiver but unfortunately it is quite unstable...
Thank you so much
Luca.

[JimH]

Any time I insert a CD with JRiver open, suddenly iTunes starts up and starts reading the CD.

That may be causing the problem.  See if you can find a CD setting in iTunes that you can uncheck. Could be at the OS level.

[finzic]

I tried this workaround and found an option in system preference under "CD & DVD" but unfortunately it does not help...
It seems that, whenever the drive stops and starts spinning again, JRiver dies in silence.
Is there anything else I could try ?
Thank you

[finzic]

Here is a crash report - happening now, while ripping.
Please find it in the attachment.

[RoderickGI]

Well, on a Windows PC it would be the File Association pointing to iTunes, and the setting that what to do when an optical disc is inserted.

I think iTunes is probably still trying to take control of the optical drive while MC is using it.

To test, with MC closed, insert a CD. If iTunes starts, that is the issue. Find the setting that stops that happening.

[finzic]

Well, on a Windows PC it would be the File Association pointing to iTunes, and the setting that what to do when an optical disc is inserted.

I think iTunes is probably still trying to take control of the optical drive while MC is using it.

To test, with MC closed, insert a CD. If iTunes starts, that is the issue. Find the setting that stops that happening.

I tried this one, and it actually solved the problem of having iTunes start. iTunes does not start anymore, but unfortunately the crashes are still there.
Could it be the fact that the library is on the second HDD and sometimes it is stopped when not used for some time?

[RoderickGI]

Could it be the fact that the library is on the second HDD and sometimes it is stopped when not used for some time?

That's unlikely. If MC needs the drive, OSX will spin it up.

I'm not sure about using a USB Optical Drive with MC to rip files on a Mac. I know on Windows this can be a problem, as MC tries to take full control of the Optical Drive, and the USB connection doesn't allow it. So that could be the problem.

Does MC actually crash, as in close unexpectedly, or does it just become unresponsive, which is a Hang?
If just a Hang, can you leave it for some time to see if it recovers and starts working again?

[finzic]

That's unlikely. If MC needs the drive, OSX will spin it up.

I'm not sure about using a USB Optical Drive with MC to rip files on a Mac. I know on Windows this can be a problem, as MC tries to take full control of the Optical Drive, and the USB connection doesn't allow it. So that could be the problem.

Does MC actually crash, as in close unexpectedly, or does it just become unresponsive, which is a Hang?
If just a Hang, can you leave it for some time to see if it recovers and starts working again?

MC crashes brutally. Sometimes it crashes with a crash report as the one I posted before here; other times it crashes silently with no message.
Thank you for the reply, in the meantime

[RoderickGI]

If you are using default drivers for the Optical Drive, you might be able to find specific drivers from the manufacturer that behave better. Or vice versa.

Generally, this issue is a combination of the way MC tries to take control of the drive (low-level control, which provides better CD rips), the hardware in the computer and its drivers (USB port), the operating system, the hardware in the Optical Drive, and the driver used for the Optical Drive.

It can be pretty hard to work out which bit is the problem, and even then, it may not be possible to fix.

I did look at your crash report the other day. I had forgotten that. I can't work out what the cause is from that anyway, but the;

Exception Type:        EXC_BAD_ACCESS (SIGSEGV)
Exception Codes:       KERN_INVALID_ADDRESS at 0x00007fa2b5141a2c
Exception Note:        EXC_CORPSE_NOTIFY

doesn't look good. Probably points to the USB driver in combination with the way MC accesses the drive.

I assume that when the Optical Drive was mounted internally it was on a SATA connection? If you were on Windows, I recommend exposing a SATA (i.e. eSATA) connection and putting the drive in a SATA capable external enclosure. But I guess that isn't going to happen on a Mac?

[finzic]

If you are using default drivers for the Optical Drive, you might be able to find specific drivers from the manufacturer that behave better. Or vice versa.

Generally, this issue is a combination of the way MC tries to take control of the drive (low-level control, which provides better CD rips), the hardware in the computer and its drivers (USB port), the operating system, the hardware in the Optical Drive, and the driver used for the Optical Drive.

It can be pretty hard to work out which bit is the problem, and even then, it may not be possible to fix.

I did look at your crash report the other day. I had forgotten that. I can't work out what the cause is from that anyway, but the;doesn't look good. Probably points to the USB driver in combination with the way MC accesses the drive.

I assume that when the Optical Drive was mounted internally it was on a SATA connection? If you were on Windows, I recommend exposing a SATA (i.e. eSATA) connection and putting the drive in a SATA capable external enclosure. But I guess that isn't going to happen on a Mac?

Yes you're right. This is the original optical unit of the Mac that I took out to replace with a hybrid 1TB SSHD. I put the optical unit in a USB enclosure. Unfortunately my late 2011 Macbook Pro does not feature an eSATA connector...
By trial and error I noticed that sometimes a full rip gets to completion, with a lot of patience and a mixture of low rip speed and prayers

[RoderickGI]

Ah, maybe the low rip speed means that whatever buffers being used (hardware, software, OS) aren't being overrun. Buffer overrun would be consistent with those crash report error messages.

I find the ubiquitous "Thoughts & Prayers" don't actually do much. But if it helps you... 

[finzic]

Hi,
there's some news on this issue.
I tried to rip CDs to FLAC single file plus cue file. The situation got a lot better - less crashes, almost no crashes while ripping. Instead, I have crashes while encoding to MP3 files. Could it be because the library is on the second SSHD hybrid spinning hard drive, which happens to be almost all the time stopped, and starts spinning upon request?
Anyway, this workflow is more likely to complete successfully, with the added benefit of producing the FLAC + cue files which I love for archiving purposes.