[Android] pcm_readi failed with 'cannot read/write stream data: I/O error'

[maomaoispan]

Hello, thank you very much for this project, it is very good.

I am using this project to make a sound recognition system, which runs normally under the iOS system.
But under the Android system, it works normally at the beginning. After about dozens of seconds, no data is received. ChunkId can be obtained normally, but chunk is empty. The official example project runs in the same situation.

Android Studio log：

2025-02-28 10:00:38.642   369-11674 android.ha...mpl.ranchu android.hardware.audio.service       W  pcmRead:221 pcm_readi failed with 'cannot read/write stream data: I/O error' (-1)
2025-02-28 10:00:38.642   369-11674 android.ha...mpl.ranchu android.hardware.audio.service       E  pcmRead:222 failure: -1
2025-02-28 10:00:38.656   369-11671 android.ha...mpl.ranchu android.hardware.audio.service       D  TinyalsaSource::read:143 pcm_readi was late delivering frames, inserting 15963 us of silence
2025-02-28 10:00:38.672   369-11671 android.ha...mpl.ranchu android.hardware.audio.service       D  TinyalsaSource::read:143 pcm_readi was late delivering frames, inserting 15963 us of silence
2025-02-28 10:00:38.688   369-11671 android.ha...mpl.ranchu android.hardware.audio.service       D  TinyalsaSource::read:143 pcm_readi was late delivering frames, inserting 15963 us of silence
2025-02-28 10:00:38.704   369-11671 android.ha...mpl.ranchu android.hardware.audio.service       D  TinyalsaSource::read:143 pcm_readi was late delivering frames, inserting 15963 us of silence
2025-02-28 10:00:38.720   369-11671 android.ha...mpl.ranchu android.hardware.audio.service       D  TinyalsaSource::read:143 pcm_readi was late delivering frames, inserting 15963 us of silence
2025-02-28 10:00:38.736   369-11671 android.ha...mpl.ranchu android.hardware.audio.service       D  TinyalsaSource::read:143 pcm_readi was late delivering frames, inserting 15963 us of silence
2025-02-28 10:00:38.746   369-11674 android.ha...mpl.ranchu android.hardware.audio.service       W  pcmRead:221 pcm_readi failed with 'cannot read/write stream data: I/O error' (-1)
2025-02-28 10:00:38.746   369-11674 android.ha...mpl.ranchu android.hardware.audio.service       E  pcmRead:222 failure: -1

I don't know if I have set it wrong or if there is a memory leak. Thank you.

[birdofpreyru]

Hey @maomaoispan , thanks for reporting it! Right as I was writing that I have double-checked the Example App and don't see the problem, it indeed failed for me once the way you describe it. Though, then I restarted it, and now it runs just fine for a while. I'll try to figure out what is going on, although at the moment I have no clear idea...

[birdofpreyru]

Agh... actually, the only way I am able to reproduce it (in Android Emulator, at least) is by removing Example App from the foreground (either by circle or square button), and then bringing it back to the foreground... sometimes it just keeps working, sometimes it can't hear anything anymore with that W android.hardware.audio@7.1-impl.ranchu: pcmRead:221 pcm_readi failed with 'cannot read/write stream data: I/O error' (-1) message.

[birdofpreyru]

For record — I've tried to investigate it, by adding checks for return value of .read() operation in the Android code (see the relevant code block referenced below), and also attaching all possible event listeners AudioRecord exposes. Nada. At the moment the input randomly disappears after I move Example App between foreground and background (and that PCMI error appears in the logcat logs) I get no errors in the Android code (the return value of .read() still equals 8192, like if the entire chunk has been read successfully), and no listeners trigger. Thus, I have no idea what to do about it, and I can't find anything useful re. this error in Google.

From what I saw, a viable workaround seems to be just stopping and restarting the recording when the app moves between foreground and background.

react-native-audio/android/src/main/java/com/drpogodin/reactnativeaudio/InputAudioStream.kt

Lines 64 to 80 in 1f29aad

	record = AudioRecord(audioSource, sampleRate, channelConfig, audioFormat,
	bufferSize)
	if (record.state != AudioRecord.STATE_INITIALIZED) {
	throw Exception("Failed to start audio recording")
	}
	record.startRecording()
	// Main lifetime.
	var chunkId = 0
	while (!isInterrupted) {
	record.read(chunk, 0, chunkSize)
	if (!muted) listener.onChunk(chunkId, chunk)
	++chunkId
	}
	// De-initialization.
	record.stop()

[maomaoispan]

Hey @maomaoispan , thanks for reporting it! Right as I was writing that I have double-checked the Example App and don't see the problem, it indeed failed for me once the way you describe it. Though, then I restarted it, and now it runs just fine for a while. I'll try to figure out what is going on, although at the moment I have no clear idea...

Hey! Thanks for your reply. The same code recently ran normally on a physical machine, but the above problem still exists in the simulator. It's so strange.