Skip to content

Troubleshooting

Common problems and their fixes. If none of these solve your issue, email support@plasticfactory.com with your OS version, DAW, and a short description of what you're seeing.

I get no sound

Run through this checklist in order:

  1. Play is enabled. Each layer has its own Play toggle in the header. Make sure Play is lit on Layer 1 (and Layer 2 if you're using it).
  2. The output device is correct. In the standalone app, open Settings → Audio I/O and confirm you're routed to your audio interface, not a disconnected output.
  3. Density and wet/dry are non-zero. If Density is all the way down, no grains spawn. If Dry/Wet is fully dry, you only hear the input (or silence, if there's no input). Start both knobs around the 12 o'clock position.
  4. MIDI is arriving (Instrument mode only). The default Grainulator build is a MIDI-controlled instrument. Without incoming notes it stays silent. Arm the track, play a note, and watch the keyboard indicator. If you want audio without MIDI, use the Grainulator FX build instead.

The app crashes on launch

The most common cause on macOS is a stale quarantine flag on the bundle. Clear it from Terminal:

bash xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/Grainulator.app

If that doesn't help, check that your macOS version is supported. Grainulator requires macOS 11 Big Sur or later. On Windows, Grainulator needs the Visual C++ 2022 runtime; the installer bundles it, but a failed install can leave it out. Re-running the installer usually fixes it.

If the crash is reproducible, grab the crash log (macOS: Console.app → Crash Reports; Windows: Event Viewer → Windows Logs → Application) and send it to support.

My audio file won't load

Grainulator accepts WAV, AIFF, FLAC, MP3, and Ogg Vorbis files. Anything else — including M4A/AAC, WMA, and protected iTunes files — has to be converted first.

Sample rate is handled automatically: files are resampled to the current session rate on a background thread, so a 96 kHz WAV in a 44.1 kHz session still plays at the right pitch. That conversion happens once at load time.

Very long files (over about five minutes) take a moment to decode and resample. The waveform display stays blank while the load is in flight, then pops in when it's ready. If a file never finishes loading, it's probably corrupt — try opening it in another audio app to confirm.

CPU usage is too high

Granular synthesis is expensive by nature, and dense patches on both layers can push a laptop hard. Try these in order:

  1. Drop grain density. Density is the biggest CPU lever. Halving density roughly halves the grain count and therefore the CPU cost.
  2. Bypass unused FX. The compressor, reverb, and especially reverb freeze each add overhead. If a slot isn't doing anything musical, disable it.
  3. Turn off the resonator if it's enabled but not audibly contributing.
  4. Disable the second layer. If you're only using Layer 1, switch Layer 2's Play toggle off so it stops spawning grains.
  5. Raise the buffer size in your host or the standalone Audio I/O settings. Larger buffers give the engine more headroom per block.

The plug-in is missing or times out in my DAW

First, force a rescan. Logic Pro caches AU validation results aggressively — delete ~/Library/Caches/AudioUnitCache/ and relaunch Logic to force a clean revalidation. In Ableton Live, go to Options → Preferences → Plug-ins and click Rescan. Most other hosts have a Rescan button in their plugin manager.

On macOS, check that Gatekeeper hasn't quarantined the bundle itself. The same xattr command from above also works on plugin bundles:

bash xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/Components/Grainulator.component xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST3/Grainulator.vst3

If a DAW reports the plugin "timed out during validation", it usually means the host killed the scan before Grainulator finished initializing its sample cache. Rescan once more — the second attempt almost always succeeds because the cache is already warm.