disk allocation

[georgiateleman]

having to use pro tools in multiple locations on multiple computers has always caused me trouble with disk allocation. I record at a studio and many times bring files home to work on. Audio and fade files wind up in strange places. How best can I limit where pro tools leaves things. If a session stays on my external hard drive and never moves there isn't much of a problem. I recently ran into a problem mixing and wound up putting the whole session on my internal drive. Later went back to using the external drive and files wound up back on internal drive.

[Slim Shady]

Check your disk allocation setup, you can select certain drives for projects to run from, and if "round robin" allocation is selected it will split all your files accross any available drives - make sure this is deselected when you begin any projects on your machine or others.

[Phil Jeffers]

What he said + "save session copy in" is a really handy way to bring a project together if everything's spread into different folders/drives. If you need to consolidate, then import session track/data (depending on which ver you're running) into a new session & choose consolidate media. This will lose outputs/bussing/plug-ins though, so may be time consuming.

[xbook]

Dude, I have been having the same trouble with PT putting folders all over the place. Unfortunatley doing something like a "save session copy in..." doesn't really fix this problem. This is a SERIOUS bug with PT since v6.9. And this happens with both my HD and LE systems.

If I create session "A" on in a folder called "Session A", then import all of the tracks from "Session A" into "Session B" and try to get rid of "Session A", when PT needs to rebuild any fade files, those tracks that came from "Session A" will re-create the "Session A" folder and start putting fade files in there. This is a pretty standard thing when you are working on a movie that has been rebalanced and you end up loseing a reel or 2. I have psoken to Digi on a number of occasions about this BUG, and they have a very difficult time understanding what I having a problem with.

So don't expect a fix on this one soon.

-Jason

[Rail Jon Rogut]

There is no bug -- this is user error. Make sure you're allocating your sessions correctly and your drives are set us Record drives in the Workspace Window.

Rail

[xbook]

Rail,

Thanks for pointing out that this could be user error. Unfortunately you are WRONG. This IS a BUG. If it is a user error, then why is that when I allocate all of the tracks in a session to one drive yet, the fade files show up in another place. Any subsuquent audio I record goes to the right spot, but the fade files don't. Why would this be? And I am performing these actions in a similar way that I have been doing it since v3.2 of PT. If I go and perfrom this function on one of my rigs runnning PT 6.7, the error doesn't occur. So how could you say this is user error?

-Jason

PS By you accusing others of user error, where there is an actual PT bug, you do the users who are having the trouble the disservice of negating their issue. This is something that needs to be addresssed by the software guys.

[Rail Jon Rogut]

The fades are created on the drive where tracks' disk allocation is set to... so if you create a new track and set it's allocation to say drive X but all the original tracks are still allocated to drive Y... then if you create a fade on the new tracks, the fade files are created on drive X and any fades created on the other tracks are allocated to drive Y. If you open a session and the original drive is a Transfer drive, then the new files and fades will be created on the drive where the session resides.

If this is a bug, then please document a recipe to recreate it -- I have never seen it occur.

Incorrect disk allocation is almost always due to the user incorrectly moving sessions around using the Finder instead of using Save Session Copy In... (Also remember the difference in the way OS X handles stationary pads -- which can also cause the disk allocation to be incorrect).

Rail

[Phil Jeffers]

Sometimes you only need to copy the session icon also... if no new audio has been recorded. PT's will always recalculate fade files from the session icon. Get solid file management under control: open sessions via Apple O, don't click on the icon from the finder (especially if Pro Tools hasn't launched yet). Check in you regions list where files are stemming from, via show full pathways (or something like that).

[georgiateleman]

I got some great help from y'all. Protocols are working. It does seem strange to me however that when a folder is copied in any manner onto another hard disc that new audio files wouldn't simply be added to the session in that folder. I could be wrong but I don't believe I use another software with that problem. If I try to save in other softwares and it can't find where to put the new file the software prompts me and asks where to put it. Of course the other software is usually just updating a file and not adding multiple files to the folder. Maybe that is the difference. Anyone out there know?