Audio Source Showing "inactive" in OBS Audio MIxer, but it's on and working

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YouBackTube Jeff

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I have just purchase the Vocaster two audio USB interface and using with OBS Studio. Got it setup yesterday, all worked great. Today I open it, and my vocaster is no longer showing in the audio mixer. I tried " unhide" and that did nothing. I check the audio mixer advanced settings and it shows Vocaster as "inactive" in the list. but there is no way I can see to make it ACTIVE !?? HOW do I turn the audio source ( vocaster ) back to "active" ? it was working fine yesterday and showed as "vocaster" in the audio mixer. Now it's gone. I can see vocaster in the list of sources, and I can turn one of my global audio inputs to the vocaster and it works. So it shows in the list, and it works as a global audio source, and it was working 100% fine yesterday and showed up in the audio mixer on it's own , NOT as a global audio input.
I didn't change anything and I've spent hours now trying to figure out how to turn my vocaster from "inactive" to "active" I can not find ANYTHING on this but other people asking the same question with a bunch of nonesense answers that don't make sense. it was TOTALLY working fine yesterday and nothing has changed. Vocaster is connected and working. OBS shows it in the "sources" but NOT in the Audio Mixer ?? WHY ??? it says Inactive. WHY ?? how do I MAKE it active again??? Please help I'm pulling my hair out over this.
 
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YouBackTube Jeff

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Here is a screenshot
 

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Y

YouBackTube Jeff

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after switching back and forth from "studio mode" and "standard mode" it suddenly showed up and worked again and shows "active" but I didn't change anything or even turn the vocaster off/on . So I STILL don't know how it was "inactive" or how to turn audio devices back to "active" . I would like to know. Is this a bug ? is there a way to switch devices to "active" if they show inactive ? what is the deal here? thanks !
 
KUCTech

KUCTech

Member
Same problem with a Volt 2 Audio Interface. Had been working consistently since install in March, 2022, then started to display these symptoms about 2 weeks ago.
 
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YouBackTube Jeff

New Member
Well, mine is working again at the moment.... and I can't reproduce the problem on purpose. it just happens some times. I open OBS, and vocaster ( and other devices) still show under "source" but do NOT show under " audio mixer" . Yet OBS is indeed recognizing the connected device. I can shut it off or unplug it, and it no longer shows in the list of devices when I try to add a new audio source. When I turn it back on or plug it back in to the laptop, OBS sees it again no problem. It even lets me use it as a Global audio source and it works there. But.... It does NOT show up on it's own with name "vocaster" in the audio mixer like it should.
When I click on audio mixer advanced settings it doesn't show. I uncheck the "show only active sources" and then vocaster shows in the list but shows as "inactive" like my screenshot above. I have no clue where the switch is to make it active. Or if there is one.
That's the answer we're all looking for. " WHERE is the switch to make a device active ? "

Because according to the device it's connected. According to the list of available devices to use as a global source in OBS it's connected and working..... But OBS does NOT show it in the audio mixer as a separate device.

I switched back and forth from standard to studio mode...... nothing happened. Did it again. Nothing. Tried that a third time..... Bam !
Vocaster AND another device showed up in the audio mixer, and when I check "advanced settings' in audio mixer Vocaster shows up there without unchecking the "show only" box and it says " Active ". in Red lettering.

There is a way to fix this for cameras that have lost connection, when you open the settings for that device in OBS you can "deactivate" and then "active" the device. it fixes my web cam if it freezes or looses connection but is still plugged into the computer.
But when you open settings for an "audio" device, there is no such button. just a place to select the source ( which works fine ).

So what is the deal here ? Three questions we all want an answer to.

1. Is there an " activate " and "deactivate" button for AUDIO devices like there is for camera sources?

2. If so..... WHERE is it ?

3. Is this an OBS bug ?

Thanks everyone.
 
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YouBackTube Jeff

New Member
KUCTech said:
Same problem with a Volt 2 Audio Interface. Had been working consistently since install in March, 2022, then started to display these symptoms about 2 weeks ago.
Click to expand...
I was using an older version of OBS for a long time and didn't update it, because I always find "version updates" have bugs. I'm thinking it's a bug in the latest version. I don't remember this happening with the old version of OBS, mind you I did just buy the Vocaster 2 and wasn't using external USB interfaces with OBS before, just desktop audio etc. so.... I have no way to know if it would have happened with the older version. But it seems like a bug to me. Maybe it will get fixed. I'll make a screenshot video if it happens again and show what I did to "fix" it.. Although I have no idea what fixed it because I changed nothing and didn't unplug / plug or turn anything on or off or change a single thing. I just kept switching from studio mode to standard mode, studio mode, standard mode, then when I clicked studio mode again..... Tah daahhh ! Vocaster and another audio source both showed up in the Audio mixer with their correct names and were working.
 
KUCTech

KUCTech

Member
Tomasz Góral said:
ofcourse all you gots log file?
Check device manager.
Click to expand...

Hi Tomasz: Yes, I gots a log file - see:
As far as the Device Manager is concerned, it originally showed that the driver was out of date (even though the device had been working for over a year). However, I installed a new driver and firmware from the manufacturer. This cleared the driver error, but the problem has occurred again since these updates were applied.

My theory du jour is something in a Windows update might be causing the problem, so I was planning to check into when the last Windows update was applied and what it contained.

Cheers. . .
 
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YouBackTube Jeff

New Member
I Figured it out !!!
You have to hit the "Cut" button under transition to make the audio / video devices show up in the mixer !!
It makes sense, the source is not "added" to the mix yet, because you have to use the transition cut or fade in button to make it part of the "scene".
I was pulling my hair out for hours and hours on this.... turns out I just needed to click "cut" and bam.... everything I added as source shows up. and if you turn it off under source and THEN hit cut or fade, it removes it from the mixer again. Turning it on under source alone does NOT add it to the audio mixer. You MUST click fade or cut under transitions to make it show up and provide audio to the stream or video being recorded.
 
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