Users of Octave on Windows?  Issues w it.   - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / projects

author: viper
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: September 08, 2025, 10:27:28 pm
content: I have another thread poked in here regarding doing some waveform analysis and application of some filtering, correlation, FFT, etc. I was going to horse with Audacity but in my search, it seemed like that may not have the more advanced filter ability I might be looking for? Going just off the web, it sounded like Matlabs was maybe the right program, but Octave was very similar?Anyway, loaded it and have the "entry point not found" error. I did read the info page regarding several common issues using with Windows. I'm just curious what work around you guys have found? I could load and boot from a separate disk drive but rather get the speed from my SSD C drive if I can. It doesn't help at all that I still have Win7 on my laptop, but that is what I would need for the mobility.

author: thm_w
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 08, 2025, 10:33:17 pm
content: https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?66985

author: viper
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2025, 03:44:12 pm
content: Yeah, this is turning out to be a rabbit hole.... Get what you pay for I guess. Indication was throw in the Visual Studio C++ redistributable. Since this is more of a software issue, is there a better group recommended to discuss this?

author: radiolistener
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 10, 2025, 08:06:45 am
content: Octave is pretty much a free alternative to Matlab. In most cases Matlab code runs in Octave without changes, though sometimes there are differences and a few functions are missing - in that case you have to implement them yourself. I use Octave all the time for analysis, filtering, spectrum viewing, etc., and it’s very convenient.Audacity is quite limited in its capabilities. Compared to Octave, it’s not really suitable for advanced filtering or spectral analysis - those tasks are practically impossible to handle effectively in Audacity.I can’t say much about Windows, but on Linux Octave works without issues. I’d recommend not installing it via `apt install` but rather downloading the latest stable source release and building it yourself. That way you get a fresh and stable build without extra bugs.

author: Tation
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: September 10, 2025, 08:41:39 am
content: Long time user of Matlab which, in some way, is the benchmark against others compare. Don't think that Audacity can even compare to it, Matlab seems much more suited to the task. Maybe can use Audacity to just get the audio files for Matlab to process them.Have also used Octave, a very convenient free alternative to Matlab, with almost identical syntax, Matlab scripts many times work in Octave without mods. Used it on Windows (> 7) without any trouble.But used Octave for a very short time, as long as looking for free alternatives to Matlab ended into Python + numpy/scipy. Syntax is obviously different, but still convenient enough, capabilities are almost the same and (in my case) simplifies things as Python is already in my system and use it everyday. But on Win7 you are limited to Python upto 3.8, though.In any case, the OP mentions tools like FFT, correlation, filtering, that need some knowledge about DSP, and having such knowledge seems strange not yet knowing Matlab/Octave/scipy so, maybe, this tools may be out of reach, by now, to the OP. Hoping not being too much harsh here...

author: MariuszD
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: September 10, 2025, 09:04:12 am
content: Quote from: viper on September 08, 2025, 10:27:28 pmOctave 8.4.0 works on Windows 7. The new versions don't work.

author: viper
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: September 10, 2025, 06:11:34 pm
content: Quote from: MariuszD on September 10, 2025, 09:04:12 amThank you very much for that! I will uninstall and grab that version and give it a shot. Would you know if I need that visual studio redistributable?

author: Georgy.Moshkin
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 11, 2025, 10:32:39 am
content: I had some error (can't remember what kind of error) when used Octave through windows remote desktop. Solved by replacing opengl32.dll with one fromhttps://mesa3d.org/Was related to graphs/visualization.