Pro tools leaves very large wave files (>2gb)?

[James Young]

Hi,

I recently purchased an MBox and am using Pro Tools 6.4 on a Dell Inspiron 600m laptop with a 1.8 Ghz Pentium M, 1GB of RAM and an 80GB HD. O/S is WinXP Pro SP 2.

Pro Tools is doing something odd with waves files that are no longer in use in any of my sessions i.e. i haven't deleted them from the disk, but they no longer appear in the edit window anywhere.

Anyway, somehow these files are somehow becoming taking up around 2GB in diskspace! And some of them are saying "in use by application" when I try and delete them.

Any suggestions as to why this is happening and how to prevent it would be greatly appreciated.

Kind regards,

James

[tele_player]

Several details are involved here. First, one of the items you set in ProTools preferences is 'record allocation'. If this is left at the default of 'use all available space', ProTools will create a 2G file for each record-enabled track, each time you start recording. When recording stops normally, ProTools resizes this file to the correct length for the amount you recorded. If ProTools terminates unexpectedly, prior to adjusting the file size, you'll be left with the big file.

Most savvy users set record allocation to a smaller time limit, like 10 minutes. This reduces the time between when you start the transport and when it actually starts rolling; it's especially noticeable when you're recording several tracks at once.

Regardless of this setting, ProTools doesn't leave the big files around except when it crashes.

[marcusb]

Sounds like you've orphaned some audio files from your sessions (ie. deleted unsused regions and removed them from the session but NOT from the disc). These audio files are now no longer tied to any session and are just wasting disc space.

The "file in use by application" error is caused by the digibase system. Even though the files aren't linked to a session, they are still monitored by digi audio file database so appear to windows are 'in use' to delete them you need to reboot and delete them before starting PT. I've also noticed that even when you close PT the files seem to remain locked. It's quite a PITA if you need to do some cleaning up.

Cheers,
Marcus

[MaLa]

Most savvy users set record allocation to a smaller time limit, like 10 minutes. This reduces the time between when you start the transport and when it actually starts rolling; it's especially noticeable when you're recording several tracks at once.

Where can I change this setting, please?

[James Young]

Hi, that's brilliant, thanks for your help.

(FYI - this setting can be changed whilst in a session from Setups - Preferences - Operations).

James