RNBO Target Export Error - Could not activate runner's audio, please check your audio configuration settings

Mark Swiderski's icon

I am trying to export one of the RNBO guitar pedal patches to my Raspberry Pi 4. I can see the target listed, I can ssh in, and everything on the RPI seems to be fine from what I can tell. But when I try to export, I get the following error:

Starting Code Generation
Generating Objects
Compiling Patcher
Printing CPP Code
Sending config
Sending code
Sending patcher
Compiling
Could not activate runner's audio, please check your audio configuration settings

Does anybody know what the problem is?

Mark Swiderski's icon

If I use the "Dummy" interface it seems to export fine. But when I try to use my USB interface (Presonus Studio 1810) or any other interface I get the error.

Alex Norman's icon

HMM.. have you tried changing the other settings, sample rate, period frames, num periods?

If none of that works, are you able to ssh to your pi and run

journalctl -u rnbooscquery -f

and then try an export and post the output here?

Mark Swiderski's icon

I tried all of those items and it did not work. I ended up switching instead to an even older USB audio interface I had (a Roland V-Studio 100) and it worked right away. I'm not sure why my Presonus Studio 1810 did not work, but now that I have a working I/O solution I am all set. Thanks!

Evol's icon

Hello! Hope someone might be able to help. I am having the same issue although I get the same error regardless of which device I select in Audio:Interface (including hw:Dummy.).

I've tried searching for some of the errors but getting stuck. Appreciate any tips.

pi@rpi0:~ $ journalctl -u rnbooscquery -f
Jan 17 09:33:22 rpi0 rnbooscquery[540]: JACK server starting in realtime mode with priority 10
Jan 17 09:33:22 rpi0 rnbooscquery[540]: self-connect-mode is "Don't restrict self connect requests"
Jan 17 09:33:22 rpi0 rnbooscquery[540]: creating alsa driver ... hw:vc4hdmi|hw:vc4hdmi|256|2|48000|0|0|nomon|swmeter|-|32bit
Jan 17 09:33:22 rpi0 rnbooscquery[540]: ALSA: Cannot open PCM device alsa_pcm for playback. Falling back to capture-only mode
Jan 17 09:33:22 rpi0 rnbooscquery[540]: Cannot initialize driver
Jan 17 09:33:22 rpi0 rnbooscquery[540]: JackServer::Open failed with -1
Jan 17 09:33:23 rpi0 rnbooscquery[540]: failed to open jack server
Jan 17 09:33:23 rpi0 rnbooscquery[540]: failed to create jack server
Jan 17 09:33:23 rpi0 rnbooscquery[540]: audio is not active, cannot create instance(s)
Jan 17 09:33:23 rpi0 rnbooscquery[540]: {"error":{"code":5,"message":"cannot activate audio"},"id":"336c3fb5-b6ef-4f8e-a97b-088486f36391","jsonrpc":"2.0"}

Alex Norman's icon

hmm, it looks here like you're trying to connect to hdmi which i've never had success with.

can you show the output trying to connect to dummy? have you added anything in the "extra args" ?

If you're using max to change the settings, you have to do an export to get the settings to load. If you want to just try different settings without that, the web interface is a little bit more user friendly.

Evol's icon

Thanks Alex. I ended up buying a cheap usb audio interface. I tried it last night and it worked first time! So all ok now

Alex Norman's icon

happy to hear that!