I Need advice on Auto Save settings

Cubase
1

The “Auto Save” in Cubase evades me at times after migrating from Logic last year. When Logic crashed, by default, it seemed to save the project in the exact state it was in just before the crash. Then when I located that most resent version in Logic’s Project File Backups folder, a simple double click on it relaunched Logic and restored the project the way it was just before the crash. I could also launch earlier versions of the project as well. It just all seemed to work for me right from the start.

Cubase has the timer that does a backup every 15 minutes by default and yes, I know that when Cubase crashes and I relaunch it, it will often say that a newer version is available although, I’m not sure how that works, is that if it’s older then 15 min. of the crash? or newer?. It then allows me to save it under the new 01.cpr version number after it’s project name. That works pretty well for me.

Under Cubase’s “Auto Save Interval Time”, in Preferences/General, it defaults to 15 min. I just set it to 0.5 min. Is that going to be too extreme? I also just set Cubase”s “Maximum Backup Files” from 10 to 1 because after all, if I try to relaunch Cubase by clicking any of those default 00.bak to 10.bak files, all I get is a message saying; “There is no application set to open the document” and if I try and choose Cubase to open it, it does not allow it, so my old Logic approach seems to be unavailable now.

Also, the Cubase Operational Manual says that if the “Maximum Backup Files” is set to 10, it overwrites 01,and 02 and so on after it exceeds 10. But as I see it, if it crashes on say, 03, it’s going to offer me a whole new .02cpr anyways, so again, why have it set to 10?

So my questions are;

[1] Is it unwise to set the timer from 15 min. to 0.5 minutes?

[2] Is my new “Maximum Backup Files” setting of only 1 a bit too extreme?, if so, why? or should I just leave it on 10? I just don’t understand what I should ever do with all the .bak files, if anything. Is there any reason to have 10 of them hanging out in all my project folders if i can’t access them individually? I figure why not set it to 1 and have Cubase overwrite it during every crash? I just thought I would try and keep those folders uncluttered.

[4] Is it unwise to ever delete any of those .bak files? or does that throw the whole auto save completely off?

Please go easy on me. I’m not Mr. Super Savvy and I’m new to Cubase. How do you guys and gals set these two preferences? and why?

2

New question;

Apparently I AM! supposed to be able to bring my sessions back into a previous state from a .bak file. I’ve never been able to do this on a 2008 MacBook Pro. anyone have a quick answer as to how to do, or fix this?

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[1] Is it unwise to set the timer from 15 min. to 0.5 minutes?

Not sure if unwise but seems unnecessary…and possibly could impact general performance/stability if you’re constantly saving.

[2] Is my new “Maximum Backup Files” setting of only 1 a bit too extreme?



Is there any reason to have 10 of them hanging out in all my project folders if i can’t access them

If that one file is corrupted you will have lost your whole project…in this case you can start working backwards through them until you find one that works. You can open them from Cubase file menu or you can rename them to cpr. It’s not something you’re likely to need to do often but you might be very happy the one time you can.

[4] How do you guys and gals set these two preferences? and why?

What happened to [3]??
I leave as default…but I always do a manual save after recording a take or doing any tricky editing etc.

4

I’ve have it set for 20 versions saved automatically, 1 every 5 minutes.

Actually, all the files .bak are shuffled up a number each time it saves a new version, so v20 is the oldest and the plain .bak (no. 01 is un-numbered!) file is always the latest.

I think what happens if you open any CPR which has a later .bak file of the same name then Cubase will offer to open that one instead for you on the basis that you either forgot to save last time or it crashed.

[I wish they automatically went into a sub-folder because I like a nice tidy project dir!]

I also use the Incremental Backup shortcut key (Ctrl-Alt-S) to quickly save a new version before doing important things (like vari-audioing or tempo mapping, things which have a tendency to crash…). This creates a new version of the file with a number at the end, and also starts you off on a new set of auto-saved backup versions too.

Mike.

5

Cool! ….so it is! alot like Logic in that, I can relaunch older versions as well as new ones. The only difference is, I gotta launch those .bac files in Cubase from the file menu as opposed to double clicking them in the Project File Backups folder in Logic. Works every time now!

This is all great information. And I did notice that the .bak files with the bigger numbers are the older versions. It does seem to “shuffled up a number each time it saves a new version” as Mike mentioned.

I Liked one version enough to hit save and sure enough, it created a new .cpr to go with it. I guess that will now start a whole new auto save procedure if I were to continue working with it as inevitable crashes occur, as all DAWs do. Very cool.

Just for fun, I renamed a .bak to .cpr and hit enter, Cubase asked if I’m sure, I confirmed and it changed to a .cpr right before my eyes. How cool is that?

Yeah, I didn’t realize that at the time Grim. Set at 1, with one corrupt file and I’m screwed. I set the version number back to 10 again sense my .bak problem is now solved.

The default settings make more sense to me now with the time at 15 min. Just needed to wrap my head around it all. Although I may reduce that down the road and Grim makes a good point regarding stability and performance so I’ll wait until I get a faster machine. I have enough cpu problems as it is.

For now, I’m thinking I’ll set the time really short at the beginning of projects when my cpu usage is low. I could lose a lot of midi input in 15 min. and that would disrupt the creative process as well.

Cubase’s auto save seems to work pretty well now that I know what files to delete and what to keep and how to use it he he he.

I’d like to accept this award and thank the academy in behalf of my producers; Grim and Mike, without who’s help, this would have never been possible!

Thank you, Thank you, Thank you very much.

Dave