AudioDeviceSelectorComponent, DeviceType Issue

General JUCE discussion
1

Hi
May I suggest a change in the AudioDeviceSelectorComponent?
When switching Device type, (ASIO/Direct Sound/etc) could the comp please NOT load the first driver in the list?
Just set it to “no device selected” or something.
I get plenty of crash reports from users wanting to use their asio device, but then get a crash when selecting ASIO. It then turns out the app is crashing because the first driver is loaded.
The first driver might be a disconnected device that crash, or one of the incompatible devices.
The way it is implemented now the user never gets a chance to select the actual working driver he/she wants.
Makes sense?

2

Hi
Any update on this, or suggestions for a mod?

3

It’s in our backlog, but everyone’s pretty busy on JUCE 5 stuff. I’m afraid I can’t give you a sensible ETA.

4

Any news on this, or suggestion on how to not make it open a “random” driver when selecting ASIO ? These crashes are so pain to help the end user track down

5

it is my humble opinion that it is better to return no device than try to find ASIO4ALL, or open a random driver.

I created this workaround:
Added “return -1;” in juce_win32_ASIO.cpp (1442)

int getDefaultDeviceIndex (bool) const override
{
 return -1; //dont return any default device, just "no device selected"   
 jassert (hasScanned); // need to call scanForDevices() before doing this
	
    for (int i = deviceNames.size(); --i >= 0;)
        if (deviceNames[i].containsIgnoreCase ("asio4all"))
            return i; // asio4all is a safe choice for a default..

   #if JUCE_DEBUG
    if (deviceNames.size() > 1 && deviceNames[0].containsIgnoreCase ("digidesign"))
        return 1; // (the digi m-box driver crashes the app when you run
                  // it in the debugger, which can be a bit annoying)
   #endif

    return 0;
}

Also added a check here:

void AudioDeviceManager::insertDefaultDeviceNames (AudioDeviceSetup& setup) const

As this, as far as I can tell, assumes a valid device index.
So I just surrounded it in:

  if (type->getDefaultDeviceIndex(false) >= 0)
  {
6

Running into this again 7 years after the original post. This seems a bit silly to me because on the one hand, we have code in AudioDeviceManager::insertDefaultDeviceNames() which is called by AudioDeviceManager::setCurrentAudioDeviceType() that does this:

// We set default device names, so in case no in-out pair passes the validation, we still
// produce the same result as before
if (setup.outputDeviceName.isEmpty() && ! outputsToTest.isEmpty())
    setup.outputDeviceName = outputsToTest[0];

if (setup.inputDeviceName.isEmpty() && ! inputsToTest.isEmpty())
    setup.inputDeviceName = inputsToTest[0];

And yet we have a jassert in juce_win32_ASIO.cpp in createDevice() that does this:

// ASIO can't open two different devices for input and output - they must be the same one.
jassert (inputDeviceName == outputDeviceName || outputDeviceName.isEmpty() || inputDeviceName.isEmpty());

When using ASIO device types, this assert demands the input and output device names be the same, and yet insertDefaultDeviceNames() applies a default inputDeviceName which may be different than the output name, with no ability to intervene when making calls to AudioDeviceManager::setCurrentAudioDeviceType().

Since it appears that with ASIO the input and output device names must match, why not enforce that in AudioDeviceManager::insertDefaultDeviceNames() when the device type is ASIO?

For me, changing the end of AudioDeviceManager::insertDefaultDeviceNames() from:

// We check all possible in-out pairs until the first validation pass. If no pair passes we
// leave the setup unchanged.
for (const auto& out : outputsToTest)
{
    for (const auto& in : inputsToTest)
    {
        if (validate(out, in))
        {
             setup.outputDeviceName = out;
             setup.inputDeviceName = in;

             return;
        }
    }
}

To this…

// Windows ASIO requires input and output device names to match
if (type->getTypeName() == "ASIO")
{
    setup.inputDeviceName = setup.outputDeviceName;
}
else
{
    // We check all possible in-out pairs until the first validation pass. If no pair passes we
    // leave the setup unchanged.
    for (const auto& out : outputsToTest)
    {
        for (const auto& in : inputsToTest)
        {
            if (validate(out, in))
            {
                setup.outputDeviceName = out;
                setup.inputDeviceName = in;

                return;
            }
          }
    }
}

…fixes the issue and avoids the jassert.

1 Like