So I Save As and archive old takes like a fiend (and I do a LOT of takes). This is great for protecting myself in case of crashes/corrupt projects or wanting to return to an earlier idea but most of that stuff, after a certain point, becomes useless and just takes up space. Add to that I screwed up the file system on my computer when setting up Sonar so everything gets written to my C drive and my E drive (which is twice as large) just sits there languishing until I do a bulk dump of junk to store.
 
So what I want to do is go through all my various projects, delete any non critical save points and archived tracks with audio that won't get used to free up space (there is a LOT of unneeded audio files on my drives) then move the folders to the appropriate location.
 
First question, and I have asked this before but I want to make ABSOLUTELY SURE this is correct. I have two HDDs on my system. They both run at the same speed (7200rpm) and are aside from size identical in every regard. So am I supposed to have BOTH the audio AND project folders pointing to my E drive and leave the C drive simply to run programs? When I am looking at the Preferences file location page what should go where ideally? I'm talking samples and stuff too.
 
Second part of the first question... what should I be concerned about/pay attention to when hunting down and moving these folders and files? Is there some special trick to or process that I could use to make sure everything points to the right stuff without spending a crapload of time double checking everything?
 
The second question is... during my folder cleanup/deleting what's the best way to get rid of the associated audio files. Like if I go through all the saved projects one at a time deleting all the archived tracks I don't need on the ones I'm keeping and outright deleting the projects I don't want will the actual (now deleted) audio files go to the recycle bin as well or will they still be stored somewhere? Will this require using that Clean Audio Folder function?
 
No rush. Just gonna try to do this this week I think and want to approach it with as much knowledge as possible. I have a few projects that REALLY don't matter that I can experiment with as far as moving/deleting to see what happens before doing the important stuff. I'll be making an image too so if I royally screw up I could start over. Any advice from folks who have done this would be appreciated.
 
Thanks.

So, the starting assumption is that your E drive is empty and all of your projects & folders are on your C drive yes?
Is it also safe to assume you're using "Per Project Folders"? If not, go and switch that on now in Preferences before you start.
 
The process of moving them across isn't difficult, but it can be tedious, depending on how many projects you've got.
You also need to tell Sonar exactly where your projects live - again, go into Preferences > Folder Locations and set the necessary paths up in there.
 
Now comes the fun part:
 

1. Open up a project
2. Do a "Save As" to your E drive
3. Make sure "Copy Audio With Project" is checked before the save.

Repeat & rinse for ALL projects that you want to keep.
 
Once this is done, you can delete all project & associated Audio files from your C drive.
Now's a good time to do a defrag on your system drive (unless it's an SSD).
If you're as paranoid as me, copy your old stuff to an external drive before deleting.
 

Oh... cool. Thanks, Jonesey. Guess I should have known that but the file structure stuff has always kind of messed me up.
 
Now what about my versions? I'll be keeping some of the version saves and alt mixes. Currently those all use the same audio. Wouldn't using PPF create duplicates of the audio files each time? I don't want that. Is there a workaround?
 
Also what am I pointing the Sonar default locations to on the E drive? Create a new folder(s) for projects and audio? Copy the entire containing folders (which I guess would make using PPF kind of unnecessary)?
 
 
Ack... you know what? I'm being a dumbass. I should look through the manual and maybe I'll even get support on the phone when I'm in front of the DAW and ready to do this.
 
I don't know why the file structure stuff screws me up so bad. Just... sooo many folders. Soooo many things that can go wrong. :-/
 
You guys always shake a few rocks loose in my noodle though so any other tips or tales of triumph might get me more prepared. Cheers.

And I will take your advice in regards to backing up the more crucial things. I should be doing that anyway. I really gotta start using my fancy external drive for that more.
 
That brings up another thing I might like to try.
 
I have a WD Passport USB3 1TB drive. I'm wondering if maybe it would be advantageous to try using it for my BFD, Addictive  Drums and other samples.
 

The following is based on MY understanding of it all, and I recommend that you do additional research into the process, and of the consequences and benefits of the different ways to do things.  I CERTAINLY would recommend a full backup of your projects folder and all audio (if not per-project already), PRIOR to moving things to the new drive, particularly if only bringing over referenced audio clips.
 
The Save As dialog box process will copy all referenced audio clips in a project, IF you have the check box called 'Copy All Audio With Project' checked, so if you open a given project on the C: drive, and then use Save As to move it to your E: drive (or whatever it is called), AND you have 'Copy all audio with project' checked, Sonar will only take the clips that are actually used in the project and move them to the new location on E:
 
If the check box is not checked, no audio will be copied for the project, during Save As.  It will leave the audio in the original folder.
 
I myself would never choose to create a saved copy of a project where all needed audio clips were not present in that project's audio sub-folder.  I think it would be too easy to end up with missing audio doing it that way.
 
Anytime I save off a project, I copy both the project file and the audio sub-folder to a new folder I create for holding the saved version.  That way, everything it needs is present.
 
Keep in mind that if you have audio clips in a given audio folder for a project that you want to keep - but where those particular clips are not referenced, then instead of using Save As to move that project to the new hard drive, I would suggest copying the whole project folder, bringing all audio clips along as an included sub-folder in the copy.
 
It really comes down to a project by project basis, in terms of what audio you want to keep, whether or not you set up archive folders to have needed audio present in their own audio folders, and what audio you want Sonar to ignore (where it is not referenced but still present in the project audio folder).
 
You can:
 
1.  Copy a whole project folder to the new drive, to preserve all audio clips, which would include both referenced and non-referenced clips.
 
2.  Save As WITH the 'Copy All Audio With Project' checked, which will copy only audio clips that are actually referenced by the project, cleaning out old/unused clips in the process.  When I do this, which is my traditional method of doing things, during the Save As dialog box processing, I create a new folder in the new location to house the saved version of the project, and also create a sub-folder called Audio within that new project folder.  Please note that I manually change the project file to match the name of the new project folder, such as from the original Bob's Big Song, to the new Bob's Big Song BK, or whatever, so that I ALWAYS have the project folder and the project file within it matching in name.
 
3.  Save As WITHOUT the 'Copy All Audio With Project' checked, which I think would be a bad option, as it would try to reference the audio clips from their original location.
 
4.  Copy/Paste manually, the contents of a project folder (project file and the audio folder), to a new location - first creating a new project folder (with a new name - such as adding BK to the end of the name), and when I do that I also rename the project file in the new folder to match the name of the new folder.
 
There well may be additional options for you to consider, and I hope others weigh in on this thread with advice and concerns.  :)
 
Bob Bone
 

Forgot to mention - on my current production system, I have 2 hard drives, both are 7200 RPM SATA III drives, not SSD.
 
I keep OS and applications on the primary drive, and project/audio/samples are all kept on the 2nd drive.
 
The above works great for me, and while changing over on this machine to SSD's would give me a performance boost, I have no current performance complaints or bottlenecks affecting things in Sonar.
 
I used to have SSD's on this machine, but a 512 GB drive failed after only 6 months, so I reverted to regular drives that seem to be far more reliable at the moment.
 
Some folks have one or more additional drives, and further split audio/projects/samples in differing ways across however many drives they are running with.
 
Bob Bone
 

Thanks for taking the time to type that up but. I will be sure to read it thoroughly to make sure I understand it all and cross reference it with the manual and try a few methods on a few individual projects before going all in. I did try moving a project a few weeks ago just to see what would happen and I did indeed end up not having any audio so I bailed on it until I could learn more. It can't wait any longer though because my C drive is now half full and filling up quickly and I've been having some read/write problems (solved by upping my buffers but still...). I don't want to be happily working away and run out of space then having to drop everything to sort this out.
 
Cheers.

The reason I didn't buy an SSD was part price but mostly because there were lots of reports of failures. Apparently SSDs are much more stable now though. I'm still rather happy with my current drives. I just push them a little too hard sometimes which is why I'd like to ease some of the presssure on my C drive by putting the DATA on the second drive. Eventually I'll get a third for samples and general storage.
 
Thanks again.
 

Cool.  You will see a big performance improvement when you move projects and audio to the new drive - samples too.
 
Why not create a test project - a Guinea pig - where you deliberately delete a few of the audio tracks to create non-referenced audio clips, and then go through different methods of moving it to a new location, so that you can get a good understanding of it all without putting any 'real' projects at risk?
 
Bob Bone

I have some old CHC/CHB stuff the lads asked me to sing on I can use as testers for this. Should be funny revisiting those old projects.