Can't access audio files from old session

[WildHoney]

Just received a ProTools session from 2003 that they want to pull some stems from. Several problems: The session file had no extension on it and came up as a UNIX file (remedied this by changing extension to .pts -- .ptf did not work). All the audio files in have no extensions on them and come up as either UNIX files or Plain Text files. The session opens with all the regions in the right spot it seems, but no audio in the regions (no waveform, grayed out italics in the region bin).
Anybody have a clue as to how I can get PT to recognize these audio files again?

[DigiTechSupt]

Sounds like the session and audio files were transferred over a network or brought in from a FAT volume.

You should try adding the proper extension to the audio files, which hopefully will fix the problem. If not, let us know and we'll look at other options.

[WildHoney]

Originally Posted by DigiTechSupt

Sounds like the session and audio files were transferred over a network or brought in from a FAT volume.

You should try adding the proper extension to the audio files, which hopefully will fix the problem. If not, let us know and we'll look at other options.

Thanks for the quick reply. I've tried changing the extensions to .wav, .aif and .sd2, but none of them will allow the files to play in any app I've tried (PT, QuickTime, iTunes)

[Drew Mazurek]

Sounds like the resource forks of the SDII files have been stripped by a FAT drive.

Email Rail, I think he knows how to fix it, I can't remember.

http://www.railjonrogut.com/

[DigiTechSupt]

Originally Posted by WildHoney

Thanks for the quick reply. I've tried changing the extensions to .wav, .aif and .sd2, but none of them will allow the files to play in any app I've tried (PT, QuickTime, iTunes)

Any idea where these sessions and audio files originated? Do you know the bit depth, sample rate and file type for them?

You could try using something like SoundHack to open the files, enter the sample rate and bit depth then resave as the correct file type (aif, wav, etc).

[Rail Jon Rogut]

Find a Windows HD system which will create a new session and import the sd2 files and convert them to WAV files when you
attempt to open the session... or you'll need to repair the sd2 files by creating resource forks for them.

You can use my free Windows app (sdTwoWav) to convert them to WAV files and attempt to relink them manually.

Rail

[WildHoney]

OK, we're gonna try the SoundHack route and see what we can salvage. Don't have access to any Windows machines, no less a Windows PT HD system, so I guess this is the best shot we got.

[WildHoney]

Well, got the files to play using SoundHack, but PT doesn't recognize them as the original files for the session, so all the tracks with multiple regions are still pretty useless. i.e. with continuous stripes I was able to manually reload the files and spot them to the correct locations, but PT was not able to relink to the SoundHacked files itself. Does that make any sense? For instance, I have the "Guitar1" and "Guitar2" sound files, but the "Guitar1" track is comprised of a bunch of different regions from the Guitar1 and Guitar2 files.

[Rail Jon Rogut]

Right - you ned to relink the audio files to the session... since their UMID is gone.

Perhaps you can ship the session to someone with a PC and Pro Tools to try to create a new session for you...

Rail

[WildHoney]

Originally Posted by Rail Jon Rogut

Right - you ned to relink the audio files to the session... since their UMID is gone.

Perhaps you can ship the session to someone with a PC and Pro Tools to try to create a new session for you...

Rail

And this can't be done on a Mac for some reason you're saying?