The 'Do not recover' option

[Meanderthal]

Hi all.

I'm doing some multitrack music recording using 1.3.13 Beta on an Acer Aspire 5920 laptop with Windows Vista and a Lacie d2 Quadra external hard drive.

I made a recording on the 7th of Jan. which I saved to my external hard drive. The following day, after making some minor changes to my previous day's recording, I accidentally knocked my external hard drive over and it hit the ground with a thud before I'd managed to save the changes. The hard drive now makes a clicking sound and doesn't register on my laptop, so I'll have to get it fixed. While I'm waiting, I'd like to get on with editing other Audacity projects that I saved to my laptop's hard drive. However, whenever I try to open any of them, the automatic crash recovery box pops up, prompting me to recover the changed project on my external hard drive. Obviously, as the external hard drive isn't working I can't recover the project, and I can't continue with any editing until I either recover the project or I click the ''Do not recover'' button. I'm assuming that if I click the ''Do not recover'' button I'll lose only the minor changes that I made on the 8th of Jan. and not the entire project that I recorded on the 7th (I notice that the recoverable project name includes the date 2012-01-08). Losing these minor changes isn't too much of an inconvenience but losing the entire project would coincide with me losing the will to live.

Although I assume that this is the case, I haven't yet dared to click the ''Do not recover'' button. Can anybody assure me that my assumption is correct and that I will lose only the minor changes that I made on the 8th of Jan?

Thanks in advance for any help anyone can give me

And a Happy New Year to you all.

[steve]

I accidentally knocked my external hard drive over and it hit the ground with a thud before I'd managed to save the changes. The hard drive now makes a clicking sound and doesn't register on my laptop, so I'll have to get it fixed.

That could be very bad. It may require replacing the hard drive, which would mean that all data on that drive will be lost.

Regarding the recovery option, try recovering the project - if you get anything recovered, save it with a new file name to your laptop.

[waxcylinder]

That could be very bad. It may require replacing the hard drive, which would mean that all data on that drive will be lost.

That's why cautious folk have two separate identical backup devices - and the ultra cautious have off-site backups too - and the ultra-ultra cautious put the off-site backup in a firesafe.

I personally was glad That I had two copies a couple of years ago when one of my 1TB disks crashed. I popped down to the shops and back home staright away with a new one and then backed up the one good one I had left.

I know tht this doesn;'t help for now, bit I would strongly urge you to consider 2 parallel backups in future - disks are relatively cheap these days.

WC

[Meanderthal]

Steve,

I tried recovering the project, but a box pops up that reads: ''error opening project. Couldn't find the project data folder'', and when I click OK I get another box that reads: ''error opening project. could not load file''. As my laptop can no longer register the hard drive there's no way of recovering the project as things stand.

Can anyone answer my main question of whether clicking the ''Do not recover'' button will lose only the minor changes I made on the 8th, that is assuming that the hard drive is repairable and everything is still on it, which I fully realise might not be the case. But for the sake of argument, assume that it is repairable. What will happen if I press the ''Do not recover'' button?

Cheers.

[steve]

that is assuming that the hard drive is repairable and everything is still on it,

That's the million dollar question.
If the hard drive is repairable without data loss then the project should open in the same state as when it was last saved. There will probably be warning messages saying that "inconsistencies" were found, and/or "orphan block files" but it should still open. There's no guarantees about this as dropping an active hard drive is a very dramatic way of crashing out of a program. Also I would not be too optimistic about being able to repair the hard drive without losing all of the data.

I'd press the ''Do not recover'' button and accept that changes since the last Save are lost.

Probably your best chance of recovering data from the external drive would be to run the hard disk manufacturers diagnostic program.
I've had success in the past reviving apparently dead Seagate drives with their tools http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/suppor ... s/seatools and Western Digital drives with their Lifeguard Diagnostic http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?lang=en
Note these are low level tools and should only be used on drives that they are designed to run on.
Take care if you use tools of this type - if you select the wrong drive you could accidentally erase everything on your computer - if in doubt, seek help or just bin the faulty drive.

[Edgar]

Can anyone answer my main question of whether clicking the ''Do not recover'' button will lose only the minor changes I made on the 8th

The answer to this is "probably" all of the entire project will be lost. If you have any old versions stored on another drive (or on CD/DVD) those will still open (unless dependent on files on the dead drive).

Until you press the "Do Not Recover" button there is a slight chance of recovering the data--I would suggest you not press it!

One question no one seems to be asking is where you have your Audacity "Temp" folder (if it IS NOT on the dead drive there may--no promises, be something there of your project).

Another is where your Autosave folder is (if it IS NOT on the dead drive there may--no promises, be something there of your project).

[steve]

One question no one seems to be asking is where you have your Audacity "Temp" folder (if it IS NOT on the dead drive there may--no promises, be something there of your project).

Once a project has been saved the Audacity "Temp" folder is no longer used. Temporary files are written to the project _data folder, which we are told was on the dropped drive. Sorry to be pessimistic but I don't see much chance of recovering anything useful from the local drive without the external drive as the external drive had all of the data.

Another is where your Autosave folder is (if it IS NOT on the dead drive there may--no promises, be something there of your project).

Yes that may be useful if the external drive can be repaired without losing data. I think the autosave file continues to be saved in the temporary folder even after the project has been saved. The default location on Vista is something like: C:Users<your user name>AppDataLocalTempaudacity_temp
To be on the safe side it may be worth copying the entire temp folder before using the "Do not recover" option.

[Edgar]

where you have your Audacity "Temp" folder

Once a project has been saved the Audacity "Temp" folder is no longer used. Temporary files are written to the project _data folder, which we are told was on the dropped drive.

If the dead drive did not contain "Temp" and Audacity was forced to quit (as seems likely because the Recovery dialog shows) there may be a fully functional project in "Temp". Certainly worth exploring if the data is precious.

where your Autosave folder is

I think the autosave file continues to be saved in the temporary folder even after the project has been saved. The default location on Vista is something like: C:Users<your user name>AppDataLocalTempaudacity_temp
To be on the safe side it may be worth copying the entire temp folder before using the "Do not recover" option.

The Autosave folder is in the same folder as the preference config file--most likely on the C: drive--not the dead drive, there may be a fully functional project in "Autosave". The name and/or extension might need changing; certainly worth exploring if the data is precious.

[Gale Andrews]

Can anyone answer my main question of whether clicking the ''Do not recover'' button will lose only the minor changes I made on the 8th

The answer to this is "probably" all of the entire project will be lost. If you have any old versions stored on another drive (or on CD/DVD) those will still open (unless dependent on files on the dead drive).

Until you press the "Do Not Recover" button there is a slight chance of recovering the data--I would suggest you not press it!

One question no one seems to be asking is where you have your Audacity "Temp" folder (if it IS NOT on the dead drive there may--no promises, be something there of your project).

Another is where your Autosave folder is (if it IS NOT on the dead drive there may--no promises, be something there of your project).

You are safe in principle to press "Do not recover". Pressing that button deletes the autosave file that has the temporary changes. It does not delete the saved .aup file or any files in the _data folder for that project - by definition in your case it could not do so because the drive is broken.

If the drive was working, you could (and should) copy the original .aup and _data folder into a new folder before pressing "Do not recover". But if anything got deleted in the original, it would be a bug. I have never heard of a such a bug.

The location of the temp folder is irrelevant once you have saved the project - all the data including the recent unsaved changes are in the _data folder for the project. If and when you reopen the original project, the files for the unsaved (and now unrecoverable) minor changes will be warned as "orphan block files". Those files "should" be safe to delete, but because Audacity does still have possible bugs with reopening projects, the advice is do not delete the orphan files.

Had you never saved a project before you knocked the drive over, then having pressed "Do not recover", the temp files are still there (but with no way to recover them because you deleted the autosave file) until you exit or File > Close. Again in that case, you could/should copy the autosave file and the folder for the temporary project (inside the the temp folder) into a new folder.

The autosave file is in the "AutoSave" folder in Audacity's folder for application data:

Windows 98/ME: WindowsApplication DataAudacity
Windows 2000/XP: Documents and Settings<user name>Application DataAudacity
Windows Vista/7: Users<user name>AppDataRoamingAudacity
OS X: ~/Library/Application Support/audacity/
Linux: ~/.audacity-data/

You would look in the Directories Preferences of Audacity to see where your Audacity temp folder was.



Gale

[Gale Andrews]

If the dead drive did not contain "Temp" and Audacity was forced to quit (as seems likely because the Recovery dialog shows) there may be a fully functional project in "Temp".

I'm afraid not (assuming Audacity did what it intended). When the project is saved all the .au files go into the _data folder for the project. The temp folder is never used again for that project.

there may be a fully functional project in "Autosave". The name and/or extension might need changing; certainly worth exploring if the data is precious.

There should be a fully functional project including the minor changes IF you refrain from pressing "Do not recover". If you press that, you lose the minor changes but not the original project, assuming it can be recovered from the drive.

You may still be able to get the data off a non-functional USB drive by breaking open the case, removing all the USB electronics and connecting the drive to the motherboard of your computer.


Gale