My 500 GB C Drive is almost full. (I'm getting dropouts when I try to edit music in Sonar X2 Essential, which may or may not be related to the full C drive.)
I must move as many of my Sonar files to my 2 TB external drive as possible. It is not as simple as moving the Projects folder or Content folder to the external drive and changing the file position under Preferences. I've tried and that led to problems.

Please send me links or suggestions how to do this, if possible. I have searched but not found a clear procedure.

I am on the verge of getting a new computer with an audio card (mine is Sigma Tel on the motherboard) and a C drive of 1 TB. Maybe that would help.

Is the safest (but very time consuming) way to do this simply save each of my many projects as a CWB and put each bundle on the external drive?

I have Windows 7. My biggest Sonar folder is C:\Cakewalk Projects (242 GB).


Thank you, larry goodell in NM

You should be able to use a different drive without issues. It IS as simple as moving the folders. You should not have to save as CWB. The only reason I can see for an issue is that the external drive and/or drive bus is not fast enough to handle the data transfer. I would get an internal drive and transfer the project file to that new internal drive instead of the external one.

If you have a laptop for SONAR, then you need to cleanup the hard drive, or get a bigger one. If you do not have USB 3.0 or E-SATA, you may run into issues. You could always just import a project at a time to work on after you backup all your project files.

Fragmentation could also be an issue. Since you really diod not specify your computer specs, this is all speculation.

thank you! I have a hand-built computer, Windows 7 Home Premium, Intel Core 2 CPU, 2 GB installed memory, 32 bit. When I've tried to move directories to the external drive I have to go through locate missing files procedures and corrupt files being found. 

thanks again,
larryg

Ive done this often enough that its really simple. I copy root folders over to a new HD and access files from that new folder. My programs (such as Sonar) stay on the system drive, My data is on many drives. For Sonar I have a Sonar files folder on one drive and I also have a similar folder on another drive. All I have to do is remember whats where. 

larryg : "thank you! I have a hand-built computer, Windows 7 Home Premium, Intel Core 2 CPU, 2 GB installed memory, 32 bit. When I've tried to move directories to the external drive I have to go through locate missing files procedures and corrupt files being found."

Your computer is a bit on the weak side, especially for X2a.

Make sure you're not trying to move any programs.

As has been mentioned, you only want to move your Sonar projects and they should move without issues, unless you have problems
with the actual drives at either end.

@larryg - 
you're absolutely right about the problem not being easy to resolve.  in addition to the directory paths in the preferences of sonar that you need to change (there are 15 that you need to worry about from project files to fx chain presets) there are also registry entries that deal with paths in the media browser and things like prochannel implementation.  when you move directories and open sonar, all the file paths are reset and it's a real big pain in the a$$ trying to set everything up again.  first time i made that mistake it took about 3 hours to put all the pieces back together.  

that being said, what i do now is known as symbolic linking and i'll give you a place to start.  
say your external drive has the letter f:
open windows explorer and select "cakewalk content" and "cakewalk projects folders" and MOVE THEM to drive f.
then, open a command prompt and type "cd c:\" to get to the root of your boot drive (assuming that's where the folders in question were.
then, make symbolic links to the new file locations by typing the following:
mklink /d "cakewalk content" "f:\cakewalk content" ===hit enter===
mklink /d "cakewalk projects" "f:\cakewalk projects" ===hit enter===

this essentially tricks windows into seeing the files in the original location even though they have been moved.  

just never start sonar without your external drive plugged in though.  could be nasty.

hth

I would get another internal hard drive.. assuming it's a desktop / has room inside the case.

it's not unheard of for folk to run 2-3+ drives... I'm currently having "fun" freeing up space on my laptop.. which isn't so friendly with big sample libs.

Project files are easy - just open each one up in sonar and use the save as command.  Then open them from the D: drive or whatever letter is your 2nd drive.  No need to fuss w/ preferences.

@

@larryg - 
i would recommend you run the clean audio folder tool as well, because with a projects file of 242gb you probably have some unused audio files hanging around somewhere.

For each Project, do a Save As.. and save to your new drive, selecting the box "Copy all audio with project". You can also change the Project Path and Audio Path for the Save as well. 

Rename the old directory or directories so that Sonar can't find them, and then attempt to open the Projects from the external drive. If this work, you should be in business.

I have found this to be the best method, as merely copying over audio files to an external drive has failed for me in a couple of cases, where somehow a "bounce to clip" track was not copied, apparently (must have been bounced to a different folder than where I would have expected). 

I no longer trust that Sonar will take care of my audio. Double-check. It's worth it!