Hold down your Windows key then hit Pause|Break. In the window that pops up, look under Device Specifications|System Type. Follow whatever it says there.

I would check your system architecture, go to Settings -> System -> About and look for System type, if it says 64-bit operating system then I’d get the 64-bit version of audacity (no need to get 32-bit in this case). Depending on how new your laptop is, it’s probably 64-bit.

Check in your Audacity > Plug-Ins folder. It should have a folder called ffmpeg. If it doesn't, create it, then download this zip file and extract it to the ffmpeg folder. Now Audacity should find the avformat-55.dll file. You can check it has by opening Audacity, then going to Edit > Preferences > Libraries and click the Locate button.

What? I've had literally dozens open at once (doing batch editing).

Probably best to explain what you are trying to achieve.

I don't think you can and I don't know why you'd want to.

You might want to include your OS to help people help you.

Having two instances of Audacity running at the same time is verboten. Even having two different versions of Audacity run consecutively can be a disaster: need to keep them separate with "portable settings", (otherwise they overwrite same config file).

I can mod

I can mod

I can mod.

it's been a while but last time i did it, it was something like...

• Audacity will have a plugin folder possible in the appdata
• You need to extract a dll out of the zip file you download and the move the dll file into the audacity plugin folder
• Reload audacity

Check out these instructions. You need to place the plugins in a different folder than other Audacity plugins, as detailed in the link.

The "without musehub" version is available from the Audacity website, but Windows users need to be very careful or they risk getting the musehub installer instead.

A safer alternative official place to get Audacity is from Audacity's GitHub repository.

Audacity is also available from FossHub. While this is no longer an official download location, they were Audacity's official download partner prior to Muse Group's acquisition.

For Windows users, Audacity is also available from the Microsoft Store, but this version may be slightly different, and it might not always be the latest version. Some people have reported that the MS Store version forces updates whether you want them or not, so I'm not recommending this version, just including it here for completeness.

I find it highly disappointing that Muse Group are undermining Audacity's reputation by their lack of transparency when pushing their commercial products to people that just want the free audio editor.

Good point. As an alternative the software downloads at the Videohelp forum are trustworthy

https://www.videohelp.com/software/Audacity

>"32-bit operating system".

32-bit Audacity will run on a 64-bit operating system, (the only way to use 32-bit plugins in Audcaity).

https://wiki.audacityteam.org/wiki/VST_Plug-ins

https://youtu.be/ulF5ZbEZXPM

Could have installed the dll\vst in \program files\steinberg or \program files (x86)\steinberg.

If it's in the x86 folder, you'll need the 32 bit version of Audacity

Rename the "audacity" folder(s) in AppData\Roaming, (say, to "audacity_old1", "audacity_old2"...) . Then restart Audacity. (NB: If you have different versions of Audacity installed that can corrupt "audacity.cfg" as they will share that file, unless you have/create a "Portable Settings" folder for each version).

Reboot and/or reinstall. Nothing else you can do if you can’t open it.

I run v.3.1.0 on my Chromebook using the Linux kernel.

I run it on my surface!

Linux

Here's the relevant section from the Audacity FAQ. (Click over there to read it with the hyperlinks intact.)

> Will there be a version of Audacity for iPod, iPad or other smartphones or tablet computers? > > > Current versions of Audacity work internally with uncompressed audio to permit high quality editing with a wide range of effects. This requires more processing power and disk space than is available on most mobile devices. Also the wxWidgets interface library we use only has limited support for mobile operating systems and small screen resolutions. > > > > Therefore, considerable rewriting of Audacity and its interface will be required before Audacity will work on portable music players like iPod, smartphones like iPhone, tablet computers like iPad or any of the Nexus devices running Android. > > > > However, Audacity in principle does support a tablet PC running Windows (including Microsoft's "Surface with Windows 8 Pro" tablet), . Audacity will not run on the Windows RT operating system which ships on devices running ARM architecture (such as Microsoft's Surface with Windows RT tablet). > > > > There are many alternatives available for lightweight recording or editing on mobile platforms: > > > > * Android: TapeMachine Recorder > > * iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad: > > * VC Audio Pro > > * Hokusai > > * iSaidWhat?! > > * Symbian: Mixx Mobile > > * Windows Mobile: WavePad for CE (free). > > >
> Can I run Audacity on a Chromebook laptop? > > > You cannot run Audacity on a Chromebook because Audacity does not support Chrome OS. > > > > Chrome OS 69 or later support running containerized Linux. At time of writing, Linux support in Chrome OS is experimental - refer to Google support for information about running Linux applications on Chrome OS.