Loopy Pro: Create music, your way.
What is Loopy Pro? — Loopy Pro is a powerful, flexible, and intuitive live looper, sampler, clip launcher and DAW for iPhone and iPad. At its core, it allows you to record and layer sounds in real-time to create complex musical arrangements. But it doesn’t stop there—Loopy Pro offers advanced tools to customize your workflow, build dynamic performance setups, and create a seamless connection between instruments, effects, and external gear.
Use it for live looping, sequencing, arranging, mixing, and much more. Whether you're a live performer, a producer, or just experimenting with sound, Loopy Pro helps you take control of your creative process.
Download on the App StoreLoopy Pro is your all-in-one musical toolkit. Try it for free today.
AudioLayer AUv3 - "deprecated" version, any reason to use?
I think I read about this somewhere a while ago but after a lot of googling cannot find any info at the moment. When I got AudioLayer, there were two AUv3 versions - the "regular", and one labeled "deprecated." I forgot how or why, but in AUM I occasionally experience the channel with AudioLayer cutting out, with the error "bad signal" and to "contact the developer." I'm not sure if I'm using the wrong version of the plugin. Can someone explain the differences between the deprecated and non-deprecated versions of AudioLayer, and any reasons why one might use one version over the other?
FWIW I have an "emergency" music rig on an old iPhone (the original 2016 SE), using iOS 15.6.1, running AL in AUM v1.4.1. I know these are not the latest versions but I'm hesitant to update anything due to the age of the phone. Could any of this be a reason for seeing the "bad signal" alerts? BTW I'm pretty sure I can't go beyond iOS v15 on this phone.
And now my final question (!) - I don't see any way to find out the exact version of AudioLayer that's on my phone! I clicked around everywhere, looked in the settings, etc. On my iPad 9G, when I go to the App Store and look it up, the button says "OPEN" instead of "Update" so I guess I have the latest version. On my iPhone SE 2016 it says "update" so I know it's not the latest - but would the latest version be OK with my older phone and iOS? Thanks and sorry for the length of this post!
Comments
The deprecated version is for projects created with old versions of AudioLayer.
Thanks, that makes sense. That brings up another quandary however - I don't remember which version I was using when I created my projects. Also, when you say "old versions", do you mean the standalone or the AUv3 plugin?
My ultimate goal is to avoid those "bad signals" in AUM. I know it can get tricky with all the different app, AUv3, iOS versions, etc.
Hi. I believe the only difference is the AudioComponentDescription string that the host uses to load the AUv3. iOS devs discovered that MacOS requires that these identifiers be ALL-CAPS, so they've added a second identifier in the required form, so their apps could work on Macs. They could remove the older ID, but then AUM sessions saved with the old ID would fail to load. So, you should always use the non-deprecated ID. The old, deprecated ID is just to keep older sessions working. There is no actual difference in the app "versions"; there is only one app with two IDs.
The bad signals in AUM are caused by bad data in the app. We didn't use to see them because AUM didn't report them.
Edit: If an app doesn't display its version in an "about" screen, or settings, you can find the version by looking in "iPhone Storage", and tapping on the app name.
Thanks, this is really helpful! Nice to hear from someone who knows the nuts & bolts of this stuff. I decided to risk it and updated all the music apps on my old iPhone (after a full local backup). So far everything appears to be working.
I wonder, if AUM didn't use to report bad signals - did the channel just mute as it does now? I sure wish there was a way to recover easily – when this happens in the middle of a show it can be bad! I just discovered I can reload that individual channel from the session file so that's good, I guess - though my phone is not in easy reach during my gigs and the tiny screen of the original SE doesn't make things easier. These "bad signals" seem completely random and don't happen often - so it's impossible for me to determine an exact cause. Maybe if there was a log file somewhere, like MacOS's Console? That might help.
Thanks for that tip on finding the sw version too!
More likely the app itself would invalidate or it would screw up other things in the host audio. At least I think I remember this being why @j_liljedahl has resisted making it an option to disable it. Maybe I'll try to find the discussion, though it's like searching for a needle in a haystack.
[edit] I give up. I can't find the posts.
Thanks for looking for those posts. I'll just live on the edge. I had to use the phone for one show on a recent tour when my laptop setup refused to load a Kontakt instance. 99% of the time it stays in my laptop bag.
I suspect that the bad signals occur when an app suddenly changes what it is doing, and incorrectly references uninitialized data. This is likely due to an error in its code, but we cannot fix that. Are you triggering changes in the plug-in while it's running, maybe unbypassing it, or adjusting its controls via MIDI or directly on its screen? You could try to avoid sudden parameter changes while audio is being processed. Or try to find a different, equivalent app.
My midi controller has stuff mapped to AUM's controls - but as far as I can remember, nothing is going to AudioLayer beyond notes, sustain pedal and pitch/mod wheel – I'm not adjusting parameters inside that plugin. I do have a button mapped to bypass one AudioLayer instance - my method of conserving CPU resources when I don't need it. That channel has occasionally given me a "bad signal" but the recent event was a different channel that's left active all the time.
Your posts have been helpful in telling me what to look out for - thanks! I'm also hopeful that updating all the apps (some were many versions behind!) may have fixed whatever buggies were causing these issues.
Equivalent to AUM or AudioLayer? AFAIK there is nothing out there equivalent to AudioLayer. I know AUM has a few competitors, but I have too much time invested in my setup to switch, and not much motivation as these "bad signal" events are still rare enough for me to live with.
I meant AudioLayer. AUM is not your problem. AudioLayer is apparently generating bad data in its output audio stream. Floating-point data has a strict format, meaning that certain values can be recognized as invalid. Further processing of invalid data just propagates the invalid flags. These likely produce gaps in the audio output.
Got it, thanks. I'll be on the lookout the next time I get a "bad signal" alert and try to pinpoint exactly what I was doing. I've also communicated with AL's developer on this board so maybe he'll catch this thread - though as I mentioned, it could be that I was using an old version on my iPhone and whatever causes this has been fixed.
Is there another iOS sampler app that reads Logic .exs instrument files? I haven't heard of any. AudioLayer has made possible my moving from a laptop to an i-device for all my local gigs.
If you have not communicated with @VirSyn about this particular issue, I suggest doing so rather than hoping he’ll notice the thread.
Right, of course. There's not much I can tell him right now as I haven't paid much attention to what I was doing when these incidents happened. If and when they do I'll try to rectify that and will be in touch with him. I've communicated with Harry on this board before - when I found a bug relating to pitch bending in MPE mode.