Audiobus: Use your music apps together.
What is Audiobus? — Audiobus is an award-winning music app for iPhone and iPad which lets you use your other music apps together. Chain effects on your favourite synth, run the output of apps or Audio Units into an app like GarageBand or Loopy, or select a different audio interface output for each app. Route MIDI between apps — drive a synth from a MIDI sequencer, or add an arpeggiator to your MIDI keyboard — or sync with your external MIDI gear. And control your entire setup from a MIDI controller.
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GarageBand can’t receive USB audio input after connecting to AudioBus
I have a reproducible bug on an iPad Pro using AudioBus and GarageBand together. Anyone else getting the same problem?
The setup
- USB audio mixer into iPad.
- Load USB input into the input slot of AB 3.
- Load GarageBand into the output.
I can record external audio into GarageBand as normal.
The problem
The problem comes when I subsequently try to record the USB audio direct onto GarageBand, after disconnecting AB. The interface shows up (all 12 inputs), but none of them passes any audio. GarageBand’s level meters show nothing. It’s like no audio is coming from the interface.
This happens only after I use AB and GB together in this way. The problem persists until I use Reset GarageBand in the Settings app. Then I can record directly into GB again. Everything is fine until I hook it back up to AB.
This is only a problem with input. Output isn’t affected.
It’s a 2018 iPad Pro 13-inch, and I’m using the latest beta of AB 3.
However, this bug also works the exact same way on an older iPad Pro, and with the last few versions of AB3. It persists through reboots.
Comments
Some things to try, if you haven’t already:
The problem is almost certainly that there’s a background process hanging on to the interface. All those measures are ways of clearing that up which don’t involve something as drastic as resetting GarageBand. Clearing Ghost apps is one of the best things you can get in a habit of doing when working with audio apps.
It could also be an issue with the interface. If none of the above helps then you might get further insight from others if you provide the make and model.
I’ve tried all of those. It also happens with different interfaces, on several different iPads, and persists across reboots.
The sure-fire way to fix it is to use the “reset GarageBand” toggle in the Settings app. But that only works until I put GB into an AudioBus audio output slot again.
@mistercharlie - Did you try it with a new project in GB? My idea is that perhaps the GB project somehow gets corrupted when using Audiobus in your setup. So after you disconnect Audiobus, when you try to record directly into GB in a fresh new project, there might be audio. Just a thought.
Idea 2: did you check the advanced settings in GB? (you can find them in any project). I don’t know how to set them up properly for your setup, but it might be a thing to consider.
@Marcel thanks for the ideas. I’ve tried all of those. I’m thinking that I might have to uninstall both and start from scratch. It’s odd that it happens on two different iPads though, and with different usb interfaces
Have you contacted @Michael ?
Yes! Apologies for the respond delay @mistercharlie; it's been a comedy. Checking this out for myself soon. If there's a problem we'll need to contact the garageband team.
No worries! I figured you’d be busy.
I did. I sent an email, but I didn’t mention it here as I didn’t want to make it seem like I was trying to pressure him via the forum. I just thought I’d repurpose my bug report as a post to get some help from you fine folks.
Just getting into this today, @mistercharlie, and it's quite remarkable. On my first try, I saw the issue extend beyond GarageBand (after I had ended the Audiobus session which had the first channel of my interface going into GB), and affecting some other apps too - I tried Loopy and Amplitube, and both saw the interface, but got silent output. It didn't affect Samplebot, AUM or AudioShare, all of which I believe operate at the hardware sample rate (Loopy, at least I know for sure, operates at 44.1kHz all the time). So this might be an iOS bug related to sample rate conversion.
On the second try though (after a reboot, which restored GB's functionality), I could reproduce again - GB was unable to receive from the interface - but Loopy was fine afterwards. Most strange. On the third try, a reboot didn't fix it - I too had to reset GB from the system settings app.
I'll write a bug report for the audio team at Apple and leave it in their hands.
Great. Glad it’s not just me!
It’s a real pain, but at least the fix is easy.
Thanks for looking into it. Fingers crossed that Apple comes up with a fix.
@mistercharlie, I think you may have overlooked Michael’s question about re-booting above...
I actually removed that question, after I figured out the answer for myself
No issues on iPhone 7 Plus, but this is with internal mic. I’ve to test with my iRig interface too.
Only seems to happen with multichannel interfaces. Even the lightning headset works fine.
Ok, my iRig has a mono input, I can’t push tests further!!
I didn’t see it before it was removed. But if it’s about rebooting, that has never fixed it for me. Only resetting GB in settings does the trick.