Error recovering after crash - .autosave not recognized

Audacity Help Forum Windows
1

TLDR: My computer crashed while editing. When I try to recover the project, I get the following error:

Audacity did not recognize the type of the file ‘C:\Users\danie\AppData\Roaming\audacity\AutoSave\Episode 24 - Dan - 2019-06-30 13-03-16 N-68.autosave’. Try installing FFmpeg. For uncompressed files, also try File > Import > Raw Data.

Full story: I recorded a track and then saved the project. I moved the .aup file and _data folder together to a new directory, then opened it and started editing. After a few minutes, my computer crashed.

When I rebooted and reopened the project, I saw the project recovery dialog. The project I was working on is listed as recoverable. When I click “Recover Projects”, I get the error message posted above. When I click OK, the project is empty with no tracks. I’ve tried several times and it’s always the same error message and the same sequence of events.

I tried following the advice in this thread. This recovery script produced an output file that contained legible voices, but out of sequence and horribly scrambled. I can import the individual 6-second clips from the _data folder and they sound fine. I’m really hoping there is a better way than trying to reassemble all ~800 clips manually, especially since the .aup file is intact. But the filenames in _data don’t seem to correspond to those listed in the .aup file, which worries me.

Details:
Audacity 2.3.1
Windows 10 x64 Build 17763
FFmpeg is installed.

I’ve uploaded the .aup file, the .autosave file, the log from the attempted recovery, and a text file showing a tree view of the _data folder. Please let me know if there’s any other info I can provide. Thanks very much for any help or suggestions; I really hope there’s some way to recover this project!
Episode 24 - Dan - 2019-06-30 13-03-16 N-68.autosave (67.9 KB)
Episode 24 - Dan.aup (113 KB)
Episode 24 project tree view.txt (46.6 KB)
Episode 24 log.txt (2.81 KB)

2

After a few minutes, my computer crashed.

Did you close Audacity and then move the project? Was Audacity running all during these moves?

Did the computer go down, or Audacity freeze/crash?

Win10 is pretty robust. You have to do something pretty seriously evil to make it fall over. If Windows did go down, you really need to resolve that first. I don’t think rescuing your chapter is the most serious problem.

As far as I know, if your AUP doesn’t match the work in the _DATA folder, then you have no AUP file and probably no show.

Yes, the AU files are little 6-second segments except a handful of graphic files, but if this is an edited project, the order is going to be insane. The files also flip left and right and without the AUP file, there’s no way to predict which is which.

Koz

3

Did you close Audacity and then move the project? Was Audacity running all during these moves?

Audacity was closed when I moved the project.

Did the computer go down, or Audacity freeze/crash?

The computer itself froze and crashed. This has happened before and I don’t think it’s related to audacity. It’s a relatively new computer and I think there might be a problem with the graphics card.

If Windows did go down, you really need to resolve that first. I don’t think rescuing your chapter is the most serious problem.

I see your point, but I disagree in this case because it means that I and two other people have to rerecord a podcast on a short deadline. If I had a choice, I’d recover the episode ASAP and fix my computer afterwards.

As far as I know, if your AUP doesn’t match the work in the _DATA folder, then you have no AUP file and probably no show.

Yes, the AU files are little 6-second segments except a handful of graphic files, but if this is an edited project, the order is going to be insane. The files also flip left and right and without the AUP file, there’s no way to predict which is which.

Understood. That’s what I was afraid of.

Let me ask one final question though – do you think a partial recovery might be possible? The project was a 70-minute single-track mono recording, and I had only edited the first 10 minutes or so. I was only using the Silence and Fade Out effects on parts of the track, not actually cutting and pasting anything or changing the continuity. Do you think there’s any chance to somehow recover the unedited last 60 minutes of the recording? If so, we would at least only have to rerecord the first 10 minutes.

Thanks very much for your help!