Fixing an Audio Issue

I'm told I got the first Rode RodeCaster Pro sold in Canada about 7 years ago. I don't know if that's true, but my dealer told me it was true, and I like to think it's true.

It's a great board, and I use it several times a day. Sometimes I'm recording voices via my four mics, sometimes I'm playing audio from the board itself, and often I'm bringing in audio via the USB channel. That USB cable is connected to my laptop, and I might play audio from my soundboard, YouTube, or even a conversation on Zoom.

I used that USB channel yesterday afternoon when Cole Raiskums joined Troy Burtch remotely for his segmenet on Between Two Fermenters. It worked as it has for 7 years.... perfect.

This morning, I was preparing for an episode of my podcast, Toronto Mike'd. My guest, Luke Sellars, was going to be in sudio on my microphone, but Gare Joyce was going to join us remotely from his home in Kingston. Suddenly, the audio fed to the board via USB, and that means Gare, was not recording. It was also not live streaming at live.torontomike.com. It could be heard in the headphones, but a blank space in OBS, Audacity, Garage Band, etc.

I troubleshot the shit out of this annoying issue. I swapped out every single link in the chain. I updated all software and firmware, tried a different USB adapter, tried a new cable, switched the laptop, and restarted and lit many a penny candle. It had to be the RodeCaster Pro itself, the only part I couldn't swap out because I didn't have another at my disposal.

I was set to buy a new one tomorrow, when my audio guru had a suggestion: do a factory reset. So I did that, a factory reset of the RodeCaster Pro, and voila! It worked again!