What in the world is a DLL file?

[Terry Wetzel]

Hey guys. There's trouble in river city! While in a rush trashing preferences I did it again! Clicked and deleted the wrong file! I then emptied the trash! Plugins all gone! So, I said to my self, self, just delete and reinstall Pro Tools with the installation cd. It has the plugins on it right? The disk is Pro Tools 9.0 and I was on 9.0.6. No problem sez I . I'll just install 9.0 and then download the 9.0.6 update from the Avid site. Now the problem. After deleting and reinstalling 9.0, I get a little popup that says, "missing DLL file". I've done this 3 times now with the same results each time! And to add insult to injury I can't update to 9.0.6 if 9.0 refuses to install!! What's a guy to do? If anyone has a clue here I'd appreciate your help and guidance. Pre thank you!
P.S. The disk may be damaged but I don't know how it could be as it has been in the wallet since I first installed PT's 9. I pride myself on proper care of cd's.

[Joe.LoDuca]

Terry, this is a bad problem. I know myself, I am pretty good at saving an image of my whole PC somewhere when its working well.. Just keep that image somewhere for occasions such as this. If it were me, I would be unraveling that backup right about now.. IF you don't have that, I believe DLL is Data Link Library.. Kind of like mini module programs on all the things your PC does.. I can absolutely tell you that every plugin (3rd party or not) will have DLL's on your box. And I also know that there are directories where all of your stuff will be centrally located.. and it sounds like you killed that. If you don't have a backup image, my next thought is that you're going to have to re-install all your plugins as well. Sounds like you did protools already. I hope that whatever plugins you have can just install the module program and not the data per say. In other words, IvoryII is one of my many plugins, the program module takes about 2 minutes to install. The actual 16 DVD's of Piano samples takes a full day to just install that.

But I think thats going to be the answer for you short of an image restore, you're probably going to have to reinstall all your plugs..
Good luck!

[nikhilmulay]

It's dynamic link library actually..
Does the error say which dll is missing? Depending on the file, you could try extracting the dll from install files or downloading from the net, although that comes with a bit of a risk.

[Benoni]

Originally Posted by Terry Wetzel

Hey guys. There's trouble in river city! While in a rush trashing preferences I did it again! Clicked and deleted the wrong file! I then emptied the trash! Plugins all gone! So, I said to my self, self, just delete and reinstall Pro Tools with the installation cd. It has the plugins on it right? The disk is Pro Tools 9.0 and I was on 9.0.6. No problem sez I . I'll just install 9.0 and then download the 9.0.6 update from the Avid site. Now the problem. After deleting and reinstalling 9.0, I get a little popup that says, "missing DLL file". I've done this 3 times now with the same results each time! And to add insult to injury I can't update to 9.0.6 if 9.0 refuses to install!! What's a guy to do? If anyone has a clue here I'd appreciate your help and guidance. Pre thank you!
P.S. The disk may be damaged but I don't know how it could be as it has been in the wallet since I first installed PT's 9. I pride myself on proper care of cd's.

Do you know exactly what .dll it is?

Have you tried a system restore point?

If it's a Windows file you can try sfc /scannow from an administrator command promt.

If it's a plugin, can you re-install the plugin? It would help to know the exact error.

[cwsand]

Originally Posted by Terry Wetzel

What's a guy to do?

Have a backup plan!!

Seriously, do it.

[Terry Wetzel]

Thanks cwsand. I managed to recover by using the ap true image. I can't recall the proper name of the program. since I had never used it prior to this problem it recovered back to the day when I first bought the pc. I managed to recover my audio files. With the help of Sweetwater tech support I successfully updated to Pt's 9.0.6 so I'm back in business. I have also scheduled automatic periodic updates. We learn by our mistakes as stupid as they may be!

[Terry Wetzel]

Thanks for offering help Benoni. since my skills are minimal I decided not to persue the dll problem. I had an alternate plan that worked out. (See my answer to cwsand). Thanks for your help.

[mjslakeridge]

Hey Terry,
Since you have Acronis True Image software, I would do an image backup of your C:\ drive right now, after you have successfully got back to 9.0.6. That way, if you have a problem with PT in the future, you can quickly get back to where you are right now. Any time you add something to your setup (new plugins, etc.) make a new image. When you are saving the backup image files, use a descriptive name, including the date made. I usually make a new backup image every 3 months or so, and store it on an external drive, deleting the oldest image if I am running low on space. I personally do not use the automatic periodic updates, because I don't fully trust the incremental method (lack of understanding of it fully). Since my Pt computer is not connected to the internet, nothing really changes on it over time, unless I add something manually.

[Benoni]

Originally Posted by Terry Wetzel

Thanks for offering help Benoni. since my skills are minimal I decided not to persue the dll problem. I had an alternate plan that worked out. (See my answer to cwsand). Thanks for your help.

That's cool. But in the future try to get a screen cap, take a picture with a cell phone, or write down the exact error message. These things can be very specific and will help in tracking down the exact issue.

Glad you are up and running.

[Terry Wetzel]

mslackeridge. Thanks for the advice. Question. is it ok to store the image backup files on C/Ds until I get another drive? Right now I only have one remote drive and that's where I keep my session files.