At BB4, we use Tech Tool to check for defragmentation, drive speed and other key indicators of whether a drive is good to go, or if its time to retire it. Taking things a step further, we do regular diagnostics on our hard drives to make sure that they’re up to the task. There are different RAID configurations, but RAID 1 in particular means that files on one drive are mirrored to another drive, which creates multiple redundancies in case one fails.” “We specified high capacity drives for that purpose. “These drives are being used for archiving and long term storage,” Kiara explains. Our session backup drives use a Sonnet Fusion RAID 1 rack system housing four Seagate BarraCuda hard drives, each with a 4 TB capacity. The spec has to be fast enough to be able to transfer files, or be able to write at the correct speed – if it’s too slow then you get buffer size issues with Pro Tools.” They run at 7200 revolutions per minute (RPM), which is recommended for audio and graphics applications. “Those are known in the industry as well suited for Pro Tools applications. “For our sessions, the main hard drives that we work off of are Glyph,” Kiara says. Studios like BB4 have a two-drive mindset: There are the drives we record, mix and master to, and then another kind of drive that we backup to. Client sessions are backed up immediately. Since you can create bootable backups and boot from your backup, this is an essential tool for our peace of mind.Īt BB4, we have Friday scheduled as our dedicated day for whole-system backups. You can use it to backup either a whole drive, or part of the drive to an external hard drive at a scheduled time that can be hourly, daily, weekly, or monthly.ĬCC is also helpful because it has a smart update function, so you only have to update the newly added or modified files. It’s a Mac OS X application ( visit here for Windows alternatives) that creates file backups, complete computer images, and/or clones hard drives. Our workflow starts with Carbon Copy Cloner. You learn to save quickly and often after that.”Īt BB4, we have two subsets of our studio backup system. “Not even from a backup standpoint, you may forget to save a session file as you’re working on it – suddenly the program crashes and what you just did disappeared. “I think it’s something that every newbie starting out has experienced,” she continues. “Whether it’s your entire computer, your session files, or legacy versions of plugins or your DAW, you want to have those backed up. “You want to have a safety net if something catastrophic takes place,” says Kiara Mudd, House Engineer for BB4. Because in the studio, like pretty much everywhere in life, it pays to expect the unexpected. Either way, a streamlined system for backing up session files is the essence of being prepared. Your audio efforts may simply be for pleasure, or they may be a revenue stream. Here’s how BB4 has honed our approach to backup – we hope this gives you some ideas on how to handle your own session maintenance. Whether its your own surefire #1 smash hit that gets lost in a hard drive crash, or even worse your client’s, it’s easy to wonder in retrospect how a simple backup plan could have prevented it. Sadly, many audio engineers are forced to learn the hard way how important this activity is. One of the unsung heroes of studio workflow is backup. But not all that happens in the hallowed halls of a recording, mixing, or mastering facility is a creative act. The studio – it’s a sacred cradle of creativity.
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