PT sessions not saving - only backups

[vintagetubelug]

Hello and thanks for any guidance. I'm running PT 2021.10.0 but this issue was happening recently when I was still on PT 2020.


When I close a session I always save it. However when I go to open it at a later time it's opening the session from the earliest save - an empty session. I have to go to my backup folder and recover the last backup to open the session as it was when I closed it.



I didn't change any settings that I am aware of, it just started doing this and now does this for every session I am working on.

[albee1952]

Tough to offer any advice with absolutely zero information on the setup Look above for a link called Help Us Help You and have a good read.

What drive are your sessions on? How is it formatted? Is it designated as a Record Volume(watch some youtube tutorials for help on this one). How was the session created?(did you create a new blank session, create from a template, open a previous session and then try to save it as a new session)?

[Extreme Mixing]

Originally Posted by vintagetubelug

Hello and thanks for any guidance. I'm running PT 2021.10.0 but this issue was happening recently when I was still on PT 2020.


When I close a session I always save it. However when I go to open it at a later time it's opening the session from the earliest save - an empty session. I have to go to my backup folder and recover the last backup to open the session as it was when I closed it.



I didn't change any settings that I am aware of, it just started doing this and now does this for every session I am working on.

I'd say that the save must be going to some other folder or drive. Does it open correctly from the open recent command? I would open and do a "save as" and investigate where the saves are being written. If there are backups then some things are working correctly. Most likely this is user error.

Steve

[Darryl Ramm]

I'm also going to guess you have an old session file in a session folder and your session backups are going into their sub directory in that folder. At some time you saved another session .ptx file elsewhere outside of the session folder but you are going back each time and reopening an old session that is still in the session folder. And maybe you keep repeating this behavior. You need to find where you are saving the session file to and open that not the old copy in the session folder. If this is all new to you spend time understanding what is in a session folder and the ptx session file. It's normally a good idea to keep one and only one session file in a session folder until you really understand this stuff/need to do something advanced.

For now instead of a Save As. Do a Save Copy In and carefully pick the options you want in the dialog panel that appears, especially check "Audio Files". This makes sure your audio files get put in that session folder.

Still having problem then more info needed as Dave says.... Type of drive and file system you are saving to. e.g APFS, HFS+, FAT32, ??? ... is that on a local SSD or HDD, NAS storage, icloud or other cloud storage ? etc.

If you create a brand new session (not from a template), say add only one audio track and some trivial content does that do the same thing? Ideally create that new session it a folder on your system boot drive, not on your User desktop, or removable, external, network or cloud storage.

Still having problems: what are the owner/group IDs and permissions of the items in the top level of the session folder for the session having problems?. e.g. in Terminal run the commands and paste the output back here.

$ id
$ ls -ld /path/to/session_folder
$ ls -lR /path/to/session_folder

Try trashing prefs (which you should have tried already but do it now) and that clear out recent session history amongst other stuff. Use Pete Gates free PTPrefs utility, http://petegates.com/pg-pt-prefs.html Trashing Prefs is a part of standard troubleshooting you should just be doing without asking, which is all covered here: https://avid.secure.force.com/pkb/ar...oting/en367983

Pro Tools has an important concept of a Workspace, and the Workspace Browser lets you look at all the assets Pro Tools is using/has access to. If that is new to you have a read of the Pro Tools Reference Guide to learn about the Workplace Browser. That's where you can look at if Volumes are set up for Recording or not that Dave mentioned. And ultimately if weird things are happening you want to be looking at files in Workspace and where it thinks they are and also looking in the Finder and making sure stuff matches.

For bonus advanced points: When Pro Tools saves a session/exits are you sure it's actually saving the session and not crashing? Sometimes it may fail/crash when trying to save a session. Look in Pro Tools log files for recent failed saves. The logs are in ~/Library/Logs/Avid/Pro_Tools_<blah>.txt just open them up with a text editor and see if the end of the file looks reasonable... but what does that mean? .... probably only useful if you can compare the log from a session save that works to one that does not. You are looking for stuff near the end of the log around the line that says something like "xxxxx: Closing session: <blah>.ptx" or "DFW: Selected Save path: <blah>.ptx" ... And possibly usefully all those log files will have that "Selected Save path" showing exactly where you have been saving sessions to.

[vintagetubelug]

Originally Posted by albee1952

Tough to offer any advice with absolutely zero information on the setup Look above for a link called Help Us Help You and have a good read.

What drive are your sessions on? How is it formatted? Is it designated as a Record Volume(watch some youtube tutorials for help on this one). How was the session created?(did you create a new blank session, create from a template, open a previous session and then try to save it as a new session)?

Hi and thanks - when I registered here it asked me for a lot of info about my rig and I assumed it would be part of my profile/ signature. My bad.


I'm running PT 2021.10.0 on a 2020 iMac iOS 10.15.7 Catalina. Apollo x16b interface.



I am creating new sessions and saving them from the drive listed below which is my regular workflow.



The sessions are on a Lacie USB-C external drive formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled). This drive has worked flawlessly for PT until this issue cropped up. I don't remember changing any settings or doing anything else unusual. I do work for hire (I'm a drummer) and occasionally open up sessions that originated from others. (how PT changes your preferences to those of the new session annoys me and I don't know how to stop that, but that's another issue - I think.)

[vintagetubelug]

Originally Posted by albee1952

Tough to offer any advice with absolutely zero information on the setup Look above for a link called Help Us Help You and have a good read.

What drive are your sessions on? How is it formatted? Is it designated as a Record Volume(watch some youtube tutorials for help on this one). How was the session created?(did you create a new blank session, create from a template, open a previous session and then try to save it as a new session)?

Hi and thanks - when I registered here it asked me for a lot of info about my rig and I assumed it would be part of my profile/ signature. My bad.

I am creating new sessions and saving to the drive listed below, which is my regular workflow.

I'm running PT 2021.10.0 on a 2020 iMac iOS 10.15.7 Catalina. Apollo x16b interface.

The sessions are on a Lacie USB-C external drive formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled). This drive has worked flawlessly for PT until this issue cropped up. I don't remember changing any settings or doing anything else unusual. I do work for hire (I'm a drummer) and occasionally open up sessions that originated from others. (how PT changes your preferences to those of the new session annoys me and I don't know how to stop that, but that's another issue - I think.)

[vintagetubelug]

I've replied twice to this thread and it says my posts need to be approved by a moderator but they don't ever appear. Does anyone know what's going on with the moderation here?

[vintagetubelug]

I know how to save sessions and can see where I am saving them to. I have been in touch with Avid support and they are stumped so far. We have reformatted my work drive including a brand new drive. We've also tried saving new sessions to the desktop. We have trashed preferences and started from scratch. The issue persists. My backups stay current but my saves date back to the earliest version when the session was created. This forces me to recover sessions from backups to keep my place in my work.

[[email protected]]

every day when i start a session i do a save as with that day's date. The theory being at most I'll lose one day's work. Try that and see if it helps.

[albee1952]

Originally Posted by vintagetubelug

I know how to save sessions and can see where I am saving them to. I have been in touch with Avid support and they are stumped so far. We have reformatted my work drive including a brand new drive. We've also tried saving new sessions to the desktop. We have trashed preferences and started from scratch. The issue persists. My backups stay current but my saves date back to the earliest version when the session was created. This forces me to recover sessions from backups to keep my place in my work.

We still know absolutely nothing about your system