Does anyone have suggestions for a less expensive external drive for storing music tracks. I like to keep all drafts just in case I want to review something older or steel a track from and earlier draft.
I'd like at least 3TB. I won't need any of the files to run BIAB or retrieve RTs/RDs/etc. Speed is less important, I have 2 TBs on my CPU and still have 1 TB available. But memory fills up fast.
Thanks.
Andy
BIAB 2017 Ultra Windows 8 and 10 Scarlet 18i8 Reaper and Mixpad
Andy, if this is for archival storage I would not go for the less expensive. Generally less expensive means shorter shelf life. At least that has been my experience.
Me, it's not about how many times you fail, it's about how many times you get back up. Cop, that's not how field sobriety tests work.
64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
My solution was to get sufficient local storage for current projects and then sign up for unlimited cloud storage.
I then move things I don't need 'right now' to that storage where it is backed up and managed for what I consider a reasonable fee, considering everything else I get with the service. For instance I can freely share the space during projects. As an example, the image below shows some guitar tracks I received from JazzManDan (now calls himself MusicStudent here) back in 2010 .. and I know they are still available. The JonWax folder contains extremely rare tracks by MC Breed right before his death in '08 (the tracks are actually still being fought over legally .. so sad because nobody will ever hear them and nobody makes any money)
Anyway, it's all there and I don't have to worry about it. I can also access it from anywhere at any time.
Make your sound your own! .. I do not work here, but the benefits are still awesome
I jumped on a 1&1 offer that was $5/month for unlimited storage years ago. Looks like it is around $8/month now .. which is still very cheap for unlimited storage (for years). https://www.1and1.com/web-hosting
They also include website hosting and other features, and the hosting has been nice, but after many years I have realized the storage (and backups) alone were well worth the price. I would guess other suppliers have similar offers. I just ended up at 1&1 years ago and have had no reason to change.
Make your sound your own! .. I do not work here, but the benefits are still awesome
Thanks, guys. I should really go thru the files and cull out any repletion or useless song versions, but I've done that before and then wished I still had something that was on one. So, I'd like to just store everything, maybe for a year or two just in case.
I have other music files and some videos, etc. My CPU has the 1TB left, which is good for daily tracking, but my other external is 2 TBs and it's getting close to full, plus it's older technology and slow as heck, which is fine for true storing, but if I'm expanding might as well take the plunge. Looks like Seagate has models in the $150 range for 5TB, and unless they've degraded, their equipment is well reviewed.
Just thought I'd get ideas from the knowledge base. Thanks for all the input!
Andy
BIAB 2017 Ultra Windows 8 and 10 Scarlet 18i8 Reaper and Mixpad
I am a little bit suspicious of using very large hard drives for backup/archiving. You can end up with all your eggs in one basket gone! I use a dual drive NAS in Raid 1 mirror mode for my archiving. If one drive goes down you can replace it and all your data is still intact.
Also since it is a network device you can access it's content from anywhere on your local network (or even further afield)if you wish.
Big John, I share your concern. But partitioning a large drive won't help if the drive fails; all partitions will be unavailable without costly recovery services. Maybe instead, buy a bunch of little drives, and store them in different places, especially off-site?
BIAB 2024 Win Audiophile. Software: Studio One 6.5 Pro, Swam horns, Acoustica-7, Notion 6; Win 11 Home. Hardware: Intel i9, 32 Gb; Roland Integra-7, Presonus Studio 192, Presonus Faderport 8, Royer 121, Adam Sub8 & Neumann 120 monitors
My approach, right or wrong, is to keep two backups of all my files. One is on another computer, off-site. The other is a portable hard drive in my car. Various critical files like my compositions and recordings are stored on additional flash or portable SSD drives, and DropBox.
My first experience with the cloud was a bust. After paying them for several years, the service failed. Apparently everyone whose account was created in a certain month lost their account on one bad server. It seems they didn't keep a backup.
BIAB 2024 Win Audiophile. Software: Studio One 6.5 Pro, Swam horns, Acoustica-7, Notion 6; Win 11 Home. Hardware: Intel i9, 32 Gb; Roland Integra-7, Presonus Studio 192, Presonus Faderport 8, Royer 121, Adam Sub8 & Neumann 120 monitors
I am a little bit suspicious of using very large hard drives for backup/archiving. You can end up with all your eggs in one basket gone!
partition the drive that way you will be safe..!
Partition the drive will only give you more 'virtual' drives. That alone is certainly not enough to protect you or guarantee you from drive failure. All your eggs are still in the same physical basket.
I believe that everyone will get a turn at a drive failure, sooner or later. You must have a guaranteed recovery path.
BIAB & RB2024 Win.(Audiophile), Sonar Platinum, Cakewalk by Bandlab, Izotope Prod.Bundle, Roland RD-1000, Synthogy Ivory, Kontakt, Focusrite 18i20, KetronSD2, NS40M Monitors, Pioneer Active Monitors, AKG K271 Studio H'phones
USB external drives and Windows 10: Got me a backup RAID 3TB drive, 2 partitions, and all of a sudden windows 10 decided it would just see it as an unallocated 3TB thang. Never had such problems with windows 7 ..... But found AOMEI partition assistant (partition recovery) to be the hero of my day. But i just got me a 3TB drive to backup my backup drive LoL. -F
I recently had a drive failure on what I call my Apps-Data drive (all the sound libraries, VST/VSTi files, etc). I back it up every week (although it doesn't change much, so my backup system doesn't take very long to go through about 900GB of stuff). Installed a replacement drive, copied the files overnight, and was back up and running the next morning.
And Trevor is right. Partitioning a single physical drive doesn't protect you, because you still can lose the whole drive (taking all the partitions with it. Partitioning may help if something caused some data corruption within the partition itself, but not from physical hardware failure.
Best bet if you use a big drive (and I've got 1TB, 1.5TB, and 2TB external drives) is to buy enough additional storage to back everything up, and then do so on a regular basis. If the data on the drives change infrequently, it doesn't take long at all to back everything up.
John
Laptop-HP Omen I7 Win11Pro 32GB 2x2TB, 1x4TB SSD Desktop-ASUS-I7 Win10Pro 32GB 2x1.5TB, 2x2TB, 1x4TB SATA
Maybe instead, buy a bunch of little drives, and store them in different places, especially off-site?
That'd be me then. I have 2tb in my PC Tower that runs BB and tons of other stuff. But i have anold 250gb in there too that stores my finished projects and an external seagate drive that gets a back up - well you never know when - -
BiaB2022PLUS,927. every extras pack I can find ;-),Sonar7XL,Win 10
That's a lot of good stuff for consideration. It'd be amazing to cross them like hybrids. The RAID system (how cool is that?!), separate, external HHDs ( have that now, one for biz, person, and for music), Cloud...prayer.
I really need to go thru it all and do a spring cleaning.
Anyway, I bit the bullet and ordered a new CPU yesterday. 512 SSD, 7TB, i7, 32BG RAM. I wonder if I can rig it so the 5TB HDD in my existing CPU could still be available for storage........why not I guess. It's networked.
You techie people have it made.
Andy
BIAB 2017 Ultra Windows 8 and 10 Scarlet 18i8 Reaper and Mixpad
RAID allows the system to rebuild the failed drive .. unless you're doing it wrong.
We use RAID specifically for that purpose in production servers; if a drive fails, we can yank it out, insert another and it rebuilds.
Unless you are talking about the RAID controller itself. They are more reliable than the drives, so that's pretty rare for one to go bad .. though I have seen it happen. But even then the drives were OK, just needed a new RAID controller.
Not understanding why you wouldn't like RAID (?)
Make your sound your own! .. I do not work here, but the benefits are still awesome
FWIW, if you are seriously concerned about backups, services like 'rackspace' have been very reliable for data storage in my experience. I personally use redundancy here combined with 1&1 storage off-site (I got a very good price from them many years ago and simply have had no need to change for personal use). But my professional experience with rackspace (and a couple other providers) has been positive.
Make your sound your own! .. I do not work here, but the benefits are still awesome
Also the hard drives in the RAID array are formatted as EXT4 which with a third party app can be read by Windows. So when I upgraded to larger drives in the NAS I was able to take one of the old hard drives and copy it's contents back into the larger capacity NAS from my PC.
Add updated printing options, enhanced tracks settings, smoother use of MGU and SGU (BB files) within PowerTracks, and more with the latest PowerTracks Pro Audio 2024 update!
Download and install this to your RealBand 2024 for updated print options, streamlined loading and saving of .SGU & MGU (BB) files, and to add a number of program adjustments that address user-reported bugs and concerns.
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For the larger Band-in-a-Box® packages (UltraPAK, UltraPAK+, Audiophile Edition), the hard drive backup copy is available for only $25. This will include a preinstalled and ready to use program, along with your installation files.
Backup copies are offered during the checkout process on our website.
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Handy flash drive tip: Always try plugging in a USB device the wrong way first? If your flash drive (or other USB plug) doesn't have a symbol to indicate which way is up, look for the side with a seam on the metal connector (it only has a line across one side) - that's the side that either faces down or to the left, depending on your port placement.
Update your Band-in-a-Box® 2024 for Windows® Today!
Update your Band-in-a-Box® 2024 for Windows for free with build 1111!
With this update, there's more control when saving images from the Print Preview window, we've added defaults to the MultiPicker for sorting and font size, updated printing options, updated RealTracks and other content, and addressed user-reported issues with the StylePicker, MIDI Soloists, key signature changes, and more!
A few excerpts:
"The Tracks view is possibly the single most powerful addition in 2024 and opens up a new way to edit and generate accompaniments. Combined with the new MultiPicker Library Window, it makes BIAB nearly perfect as an 'intelligent' composer/arranger program."
"MIDI SuperTracks partial generation showing six variations – each time the section is generated it can be instantly auditioned, re-generated or backed out to a previous generation – and you can do this with any track type. This is MAJOR! This takes musical experimentation and honing an arrangement to a new level, and faster than ever."
"Band in a Box continues to be an expansive musical tool-set for both novice and experienced musicians to experiment, compose, arrange and mix songs, as well as an extensive educational resource. It is huge, with hundreds of functions, more than any one person is likely to ever use. Yet, so is any DAW that I have used. BIAB can do some things that no DAW does, and this year BIAB has more DAW-like functions than ever."
Convenient Ways to Listen to Band-in-a-Box® Songs Created by Program Users!
The User Showcase Forum is an excellent place to share your Band-in-a-Box® songs and listen to songs other program users are creating!
There are other places you can listen to these songs too! Visit our User Showcase page to sort by genre, artist (forum name), song title, and date - each listing will direct you to the forum post for that song.
If you'd rather listen to these songs in one place, head to our Band-in-a-Box® Radio, where you'll have the option to select the genre playlist for your listening pleasure. This page has SoundCloud built in, so it won't redirect you. We've also added the link to the Artists SoundCloud page here, and a link to their forum post.
We hope you find some inspiration from this amazing collection of User Showcase Songs!
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