I haven't read through the entire thread to see if anyone's mentioned this, but since I've been struggling with this for a while with my 24 bit recordings I thought I'd say something (shy and retiring as I am
). Also, I should preface this by saying that I tried fixwav.exe, but when I used it (modeling my answers to the prompts based on the first post) my rewritten file played back static. Anyhow, this may prove simpler for some people.
1. Open the file with the corrupted header in Audacity.
2. Trim off the first few samples (probably the first two will do, but I deleted the first seven or so to be safe).
3. Zoom back out to full range and use CTRL+A to select all of the remaining .wav - THIS IS KEY.
4. In the main menu select File > Export Selection... (NOT File > Export...).
5. In the dialogue box choose the format you want to save the file in. If you're saving to 24 bit you'll have to select "Other uncompressed files" from the "Save as type:" dropdown box, click the "Options" button and select the format we want in the box that pops up. For Windows users saving to 24 bit, e.g., you'd want to choose "Header: WAV (Microsoft)" and "Encoding: Signed 24 bit PCM".
6. Click out of the Options box if you're in there, then click Save in the Export File box.
The resulting file will load into CD Wave and split with no problems. It will also compress to FLAC in FLAC Frontend, likewise with no error messages.
The key here is to export the WAV as a selection (even if you're selecting the entire file, minus the deleted samples at the beginning), rather than just to export the WAV without selecting anything. My theory is that when exporting as a selection Audacity writes a brand new, canonical header, while when exporting without selecting Audacity simply uses the old, corrupted header you're trying to correct in the first place. Also, deleting those first samples in the beginning IS necessary - when I tried selecting all and exporting without deleting the first samples, I got error messages both in CD Wave and Flac Frontend. In any case, all I know is it works.