Project File Size Bloat=Autosave?

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Tobor
Posts: 803
Joined: Mon Jan 31, 2005 10:01 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Location: Colorado

Project File Size Bloat=Autosave?

Post by Tobor »

Hi,

I just completed a project in 9.5.1/High Sierra. For the most part everything went great. I'm starting to embrace pre-gen, although one thing that bugs me is going back to tracking with a hungry VI...get a crackle and spikes when I need to record a new part after there are tracks in play.

But this topic is file bloat. The project I worked on was a jingle, and I had maybe a half gig of audio files that I continued to edit and tweak. Upon completion of the project I dragged it to another disk for backup, and discovered that the project file size had expanded to 35 gigs!!! The problem seems to be in the Autosave folder. Although my preferences said keep only 10 autosave backups, there was seemingly ten for each incremental project save in the file. What was also interesting was that these autosave backup files seemed to be anywhere from a half gig to a gig each!! I didn't think that autosaves included what must be a sound file backup? And the main Audio Files folder has remained at the original half gig size. Very strange.

Also surprising when closing or saving a project file, I sometimes get a prompt saying "this file has been changed by another application. Do you want to overwrite the sound files or save a copy?" Not wanting to potentially lose or compromise valuable sound files, I clicked 'save a copy'. But now I see that all it did was duplicate all the audio files in my Audio Files folder, no huge deal there, except that from that point all the Autosaves were doubled in size as well.

Can't help but think something is very wrong here vis a vis DP9.5.1 and High Sierra. Should probably bring this up in the other HS thread, but don't know what exactly is out of kilter. I know, however, that I've never had this problem before now and that Autosave files should probably not be of such a giant size. ????
iMac 2.7 i5, DP 9.5.1, 10.13.3, Apollo Twin, 828, MTPAV, Toontrack, Spectrasonics, BFD3, Drumcore, Reason 10, Live 10, Logic X, Spitfire, Zebra, Miroslav, Waves, Kronos X, MOXF 6, Axiom 49.
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philbrown
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Location: Almost Mexico

Re: Project File Size Bloat=Autosave?

Post by philbrown »

That's very strange. Normally the autosave is always smaller than the original file. I have looked into this at length and the autosave can be as small as a tenth of the original, but never larger in my experience. Also the 10 autosaves for every incremental backup is not normal either.

I'm glad I'm still on Low Sierra.
2020 iMac 27" 3.6GHz 10 core i9 • Mac OS 12.2.1 • DP 11.04 • UAD-8 Octo card • Midas M32R

Plugs: UAD•Slate•Scuffham•Flux IRCAM•NI Komplete•Klanghelm•Waves•Spectrasonics•Arturia•Soundtoys•Nomad Factory•PSP•Stillwell•Cytomic•Korg•Five12•GForce
User avatar
Tobor
Posts: 803
Joined: Mon Jan 31, 2005 10:01 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Location: Colorado

Re: Project File Size Bloat=Autosave?

Post by Tobor »

philbrown wrote:That's very strange. Normally the autosave is always smaller than the original file. I have looked into this at length and the autosave can be as small as a tenth of the original, but never larger in my experience. Also the 10 autosaves for every incremental backup is not normal either.

I'm glad I'm still on Low Sierra.
Yes, yes, and yes. So odd that hitting 'Get Info' on each individual Autosave file reveals up to 750mb (i.e. the size of the original audio file folder) as opposed to just a few mb like normal.

I haven't had a chance to dial up other projects in the last couple days but will check out other files today. Hopefully this is just a strange anomaly and a rogue project, otherwise it's a GIANT red flag.

So frustrating as after building up my HS SSD disk I finally felt like I had things running smoothly. I have certainly been tempted to go back to Sierra (the new SSD had been installed into my iMac with HS and then I migrated my smaller MBP disk onto it), but figured by the time I did all that rigamarole things would be updated. I guess 'eventually' can be a long time.

I'll do some more research today and put off the rant for now.
iMac 2.7 i5, DP 9.5.1, 10.13.3, Apollo Twin, 828, MTPAV, Toontrack, Spectrasonics, BFD3, Drumcore, Reason 10, Live 10, Logic X, Spitfire, Zebra, Miroslav, Waves, Kronos X, MOXF 6, Axiom 49.
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philbrown
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Re: Project File Size Bloat=Autosave?

Post by philbrown »

Your sig says you're on 9.02. Why not try 9.51? Maybe MOTU fixed this already.
2020 iMac 27" 3.6GHz 10 core i9 • Mac OS 12.2.1 • DP 11.04 • UAD-8 Octo card • Midas M32R

Plugs: UAD•Slate•Scuffham•Flux IRCAM•NI Komplete•Klanghelm•Waves•Spectrasonics•Arturia•Soundtoys•Nomad Factory•PSP•Stillwell•Cytomic•Korg•Five12•GForce
User avatar
Tobor
Posts: 803
Joined: Mon Jan 31, 2005 10:01 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Location: Colorado

Re: Project File Size Bloat=Autosave?

Post by Tobor »

philbrown wrote:Your sig says you're on 9.02. Why not try 9.51? Maybe MOTU fixed this already.
I've largely switched to 9.5.1 and I do think it works great for the most part. Pre-gen is great for playback, but I occasionally get glitches when recording new parts with moderate to high footprint VIs that I don't get in 9.02. I'm tempted to track in 9.02 and mix in 9.5.1, but readjusting the TO layout when going back and forth is a bit of a pain. Love the Effects Meter in 9.5.1 so trying to stay there and make it work.

I'm sure a lot of it is the SSD, but High Sierra and DP 9.5.1 on my SSD partition runs so smooth and loads so fast that it's hard to go back to my HDD and Sierra, feels like molasses. So far it's been OK with the workarounds (UAD etc.) but this Autosave thing could send me back. Could always disable Autosave I guess, just to add to the workarounds.
iMac 2.7 i5, DP 9.5.1, 10.13.3, Apollo Twin, 828, MTPAV, Toontrack, Spectrasonics, BFD3, Drumcore, Reason 10, Live 10, Logic X, Spitfire, Zebra, Miroslav, Waves, Kronos X, MOXF 6, Axiom 49.
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Tobor
Posts: 803
Joined: Mon Jan 31, 2005 10:01 pm
Primary DAW OS: MacOS
Location: Colorado

Re: Project File Size Bloat=Autosave?

Post by Tobor »

Well good news, looks like that's the only project affected/infected by the Autosave conundrum. Just booted another project with a fair amount of Audiofile data and the Autosave just saved a typical small file. Whew.

I do get some odd prompts occasionally when saving here in HS asking if I want to Save a Copy or replace the data and I'm not sure how to respond. I'll have to keep an eye on it.

Whatever I did, I hope I don't do it again!
iMac 2.7 i5, DP 9.5.1, 10.13.3, Apollo Twin, 828, MTPAV, Toontrack, Spectrasonics, BFD3, Drumcore, Reason 10, Live 10, Logic X, Spitfire, Zebra, Miroslav, Waves, Kronos X, MOXF 6, Axiom 49.
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