Audio files missing/not recognized?

[lynxxx]

I'd appreciate it if someone (Digi?) could elaborate on this with some clarity. I have an occasional problem with loading some sessions, all of which are on a separate drive(s) as per: Digi.
Yesterday I installed an IBM Deskstar hard drive in my G4 QS 1ghz DP and transferred sessions from my ext.FW drive to it. During launch on a few sessions the find dialog comes up and wants to know where a certain file name is. I tried the various options but the fix is to just select the audio folder of the session you are trying to open, then click Open, which results in another request for another file, etc. until you have them all(usually around 5 or 6 and then it merrily continues the launch, opens the session and plays fine. Evidently only necessary once if you save the session.When I look in the Audio window the file names are there in bold.
So I'm wondering why it's doing this and more importantly is it affecting anything else negatively? I know I've dealt with this before and read about it, but it eludes me at the moment. It would seem that this has to do with the sessions being moved from one drive to another.
I just read in the Answerbase that this has to do with having a unique file ID but a more specific explanation/example would be helpful. I can't afford to plant any land mines in the work I'm doing right now.

[dkrz]

It is always preferable to move/copy sessions from within PT as opposed to using the finder.

If audio files from one session is referencing multiple drives, then moving just the session folder from one drive to another will not move all your audio files.

Best thing to do is a "Save session copy in" command (navigating to whatever drive you want to move the session to) and check off the "Copy All Audio" files box.

"Save session copy in" makes duplicate files of all regions in your session and generates a new self contained folder with ALL the necessary audio files within it.

Before you do this though, you might want to "Remove" unused files from your session using the Audio Bin menu. This way you won't have to worry about duplicating any unnecessary material.

dk

[dkrz]

Oh, one more thing. It's helpful using the "Show full path names" at the bottom of the audio bin drop down menu. This way you can see exactly where all the files reside on what drives in case you need to see where everything lives...

dk

[TAPKAE]

I have a question about that... What happens when I delete a bunch of tracks from the session itself, so they aren't in the audio bin on the right, but are still in the audio files folder... and I want them gone for good? I find that using the Finder to delete the unneeded files confuses PT and upon start up it asks me to find the files or skip the search... That they are missing and are expected to be found makes sense, but I don't know how to make them disappear to PT's liking... Do I need to import them all back into the bin so I can authoritatively delete them in a way that is agreeable with PT?

[lynxxx]

dkrz
Thanks for your reply. I'm not sure if you're referring to the Apple finder or the PT find dialogue window which is what is coming up on my screen. So if I follow you correctly then I should have opened each session on the FW drive and then selected Save Session Copy in... and moved it to the new internal drive that way and there would be no location problems?
That makes sense, however here's another thing. The same 5 of the 25 sessions on the FW drive, all of which opened and played fine before yesterday when I copied them to the new drive, now have the same problem on launch. This is with or without the new drive partitions on the desktop.
Most puzzling of all is that by doing what I describe in my first post I can restore the files on the new drive, which now appear in the Audio bin with no other path than that drive. So I am still rather confused as to what exactly causes the files to be misplaced and then apparently restored. It seems as though somehow some files got hidden and are found by this process. I can't understand why it affects the FW drive though. All these sessions were created by opening a new session designated to the FW drive.
So in summation, whatever causes the problem caused it on both drives and of 25 sessions copied by dragging from FW to new internal drive only 5 have this problem, which apparently, is corrected by designating the correct session folder named in the PT find dialogue window and then clicking Open until the wayward files are all properly relocated.I would like to be clear on this.
Your thoughts, Digi's and anyone who knows would be appreciated.
Thanks

[dkrz]

Well… I think that sometimes PT just gets confused. I did have some similar problems myself in the past.

Here is a step by step on what "I did" when moving/archiving/copying sessions and deleting pesky files that I know I don't need but PT keeps looking for.

This may be overkill, but once PT file management starts to get out of control it tends to snowball into a huge headache. For me, it was the only thing that really "solved" the infamous -file location "dick dance".

You may need an afternoon or a few hours to do this if you have many sessions on various hard drives that you want to get under control. But once it is done, it's done.

Others may give other simpler solutions but remember, when your dealing with multiple sessions spread across multiple hard drives. Files will get "cross referenced" over multiple sessions if your not careful with importing files or disc allocation procedures. This is the source of the problem.

After this, if you keep to some simple rules and carefully pay attention to what your doing when importing and starting new sessions., things will be good…

1. Mount ALL hard Drives.

2. Open the problem session. When the dialog opens for file search rigamaroll, the first thing I do is; uncheck the box where is says "Require matching file ID's when locating other audio files for this session". Also, under where it says "Search in…", click on the radio button that says "All Volumes".
Click "Search".

If the file exists, PT will find it. It will appear in the "Candidates" window near the bottom of the dialog window. Double click on the found file that will appear in THAT window, NOT in the main file display window at the top (don't ask me why, it's just seems to work best this way). Repeat this process as necessary until session opens.

3. While holding down the Option key, open the disk allocation menu and you will see that a "Select Folder" option appears. Select the appropriate session folder. (NOT the audio folder within the session folder, but the actual Session Folder). Click OK.

4. Consolidate All Audio Regions in the timeline.

5. From the Audio Bin Menu, choose "Select all unused regions". At this point, click "Remove" NOT DELETE.

6. NOW, do your "Save Session Copy In..."

7. Close the session and open the copy session to verify that everything is OK. You'll be prompted to check the new disc allocation. Check it and hit OK.

8. Quit PT and go to the original session folder and [this is important]: as long as your sure that no other sessions your working on are referencing any of those files in that sessions Audio Folder, move the whole session folder to the trash but DON"T empty yet.

9. Open any other sessions that are in question and repeat this procedure. This important because, very often, files get "cross referenced" by PT, especially if you've got some standard loops or samples that you tend to re-use and import into your sessions.

10. When you are satisfied that everything is OK. Restart your computer, Open all sessions again, double check allocations. Then empty the trash.

Things to remember in the future:

First thing to do after opening a new session is to assign Disc Allocation with the Option Click method. This is a very important thing to remember. (I wish PT would give an automatic prompt to do this upon New Session creation); …would save us all a lot of headaches.


Whenever importing files into a session; Pay attention as to weather you are "adding" or "copying".

"ADD" leaves the file in place (wherever it is on the hard drive) and will NOT bring the file into that sessions Audio Folder. PT will only REFERENCE it. (this is how the whole cross referencing nightmare begins…)

"COPY" will make a copy and put the file into wherever your disc allocation for that session is set to. In other words; into the current sessions Audio Folder. This method is best.

I always use "COPY" now when importing because I have over 100 sessions which I do not want crossed referenced in ANY way. It's just too much work when archiving…

Good luck,

dk

[thornlab]

I have a question about that... What happens when I delete a bunch of tracks from the session itself, so they aren't in the audio bin on the right, but are still in the audio files folder... and I want them gone for good? I find that using the Finder to delete the unneeded files confuses PT and upon start up it asks me to find the files or skip the search... That they are missing and are expected to be found makes sense, but I don't know how to make them disappear to PT's liking... Do I need to import them all back into the bin so I can authoritatively delete them in a way that is agreeable with PT?

If the you're in the session originally and you see them in the audio list window,on the right from the mix window,select unneeded files,click on the "audio" button, select clear audio.from there it will prompt you to decide wheater you want them out of the session or both the session and audio drive.

[TAPKAE]

I hear ya with that. But... how can I get rid of those extra files so that they are gone gone gone and don't come back to haunt me upon all subsequent start ups? These are tracks that were removed from the session, but still reside on the drive, and are searched for upon startup. If I have deleted them directly from the folder, I am cursed forever, but removing them from the session alone leaves them behind in the folder... the only way I know of to get PT to delete things for good and without the startup hunt, is to bring all the files in the folder into the audio bin and then hand pick the unneeded files and delete them in PT. The import process seems to take some time, Doesn't it just need to index the files in the folder within PT to properly clean house, instead of reimporting things? I hope I am explaining this right.

[dkrz]

TAPKAE,

Did you read my post above? It may clarify things a bit for you...

dk

[lynxxx]

TAPKAE
If you are done tracking your session and only want your "keeper" tracks this is the simplest, most effective way:

Consolidate and re-name track regions (using a space or numbers in front to delineate final track names and bring to top of file). Save and close session. Open audio folder and drag all files other than the newly named active session files into the trash. Open session again and when window appears asking "where is Audio file 1-00"(example) choose "Skip all". Session opens and all other files are now gone.
(Note: Occasionally there are some unused regions remaining in the Audio file window in Edit Window. Choosing Select Unused =Regions and then Clear Selected from Audio window bar and then deleting individually per prompts will remove these.)