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Recovering old Buzztracker projects

  • Published: 2023-03-27 12:41
  • Updated: 2023-03-27 18:51

This is a resource for running Buzztracker up to version 1.2b (32bit) as stable as possible under Windows XP. With the goal of recreating an installation to recover old projects from the early 2000s.

Buzz 1.2b was natively developed under Windows 2000. It’s most stable under this operating systems. I personally used it very reliably under Windows XP for years.

For the sake of common sense

I'm sharing these things from memory and based upon personal experience. Whilst testing them on my current oldschool DAW. Of course, I can't guarantee they'll also work for you. Proceed with caution and at your own risk.

General safety measures

  • Work from a backup of your old projects
    • To prevent yourself from saving/overwriting the original files
    • The joy of fiddling around in old projects activated my muscle memory more than once and made save something 🤷‍♂
  • Turn down the volume when loading old projects
    • Noise burst can occur upon opening an old project every now and then
  • Because of that: Don’t use headphones!

General stability tips

  • Under Windows XP, run Buzz.exe in Windows 2000 compatibility mode
    • Right-click its .exe/icon > properties > compatibility tab > Windows 2000

Potential sources for COS

COS = crash on program start - Changing the system sampling rate - RnZn… adapters miss a VST plugin