Help / Troubleshooting

No sound - or DTS / AC-3 / TrueHD plays silent

If a few tracks are silent but the rest of your library plays fine, those tracks are almost certainly DTS, AC-3, or TrueHD - surround formats that Vesari Stylus decodes with a helper that's included with the app. Normally they just play; if they don't, that helper isn't being found. If everything is silent, it's usually the output device, the volume, or a stuck output mode. Here's how to tell which one you've got, and fix it.

Only DTS / AC-3 / TrueHD tracks are silent

Vesari Stylus plays most formats on its own, and for DTS, AC-3 (Dolby Digital), and TrueHD - including DTS audio stored inside a .wav file - it uses a decoder that ships inside the app. You don't install anything: it's set up for you automatically, so these tracks should play out of the box.

If they're silent while everything else plays fine, the app's copy of that decoder isn't being found - most often because antivirus or security software quarantined it, or the install didn't finish cleanly.

The fix:

Check your antivirus / quarantine. If your security software flagged or removed a file from the Vesari Stylus program folder, restore it and add Vesari Stylus as an exception.
Reinstall Vesari Stylus. This restores the bundled decoder; in most cases that's all it takes.
Restart the app and play the track again.

A quick way to confirm this is your case: if every silent track is DTS, AC-3, or TrueHD and the rest of your library is fine, the surround decoder is the culprit - not a broken file.

Everything is silent

If nothing plays, work through these in order - the first is by far the most common.

Check the output device. In DSP Rack, confirm the device you're actually listening on is the one selected - your headphones, DAC, or speakers. If Windows quietly switched the default (plugging in an HDMI monitor is a classic cause), the app may be sending sound somewhere you can't hear it.
Check the volume in three places: the app's own volume, the Windows system volume, and the level on the device itself - some DACs and amps have their own knob or mixer.
Watch the Output meters. Play a track and look at the level meters in DSP Rack. If they're moving, the app is making sound and the break is downstream - a wrong device or a muted output. If they're flat, the app isn't outputting; go back to steps 1 and 2.
If you use Exclusive output, switch back to Shared. Exclusive mode takes sole control of the device, so if another app is already holding it - or the device won't accept that track's format - playback can fail to start and you get silence. Switch to Shared (WASAPI) and try again. If the sound returns, that was it.

Still silent?

If the same track plays fine through your device in another app but Vesari Stylus stays silent after all of the above - and it isn't a surround-decoder case - that may be a genuine bug worth reporting. Use the in-app report and mention your output device and whether the Output meters were moving. That one detail tells us exactly where the sound is stopping.

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