DP-32SD File Error when loading song

[Robin Andrew ESCOLME]

Hi – I’m new this forum and just want to say that of the few posts I’ve read, I’ve learnt a ton of useful stuff – many thanks to the contributors! As the intro guide for Newbies suggested, I’ve read the ‘stickies’ relating to my problem and looked in the indices and haven’t found anything that refers to this issue, so here goes. (Apologies if I've been useless and missed the thread with the required solution!)

I’ve been using my DP-32SD for about 5 years – trouble free. I’ve used the same SD card in all that time – and I’ve never backed it up (I know, I know – huge mistake). About 6 months ago the card filled up, and to free up space I just deleted various songs that I didn’t want or need to keep, and then carried on as before. Now I know I should have been backing up the card, importing/exporting tracks to keep each track to a single ZZ file, deleting unused files, etc, etc. Anyhow, now I’ve hit this issue – there are two songs on the card that I was unable to load – I got ‘File Error’ and the song does not load. Having scoured this, and other forums, for any clues, I tried the ‘Delete Unused’ on all my songs, including the two that cannot load, and freed up GBs of space. Now, both songs load – but according to the DP-32 (in Multitrack Mode), the songs is blank – no recorded tracks at all. Looking in the MUSIC folder (either move the SD card to a PC or connect the DP-32 to a PC via USB) shows that all the previously recorded track data is still there – and all ZZ files still play on the PC and contain (as far as I’ve listened) all the tracks and edits I’ve made.

I tried to export tracks, but of course, it said there is no recorded track, so my next step was to copy all the ZZ files onto a PC, create a new song on the DP-32, and then copy all the ZZ files to that new song – of course that didn’t work either (Didn’t really expect it to as I assume that all the ZZ files have to be ‘registered’ in one or both of the .sys files).

So now my guess is that the content of one of the .sys files has become corrupted – and fixing those might be a tad difficult – unless there is someone on here who taken up the challenge laid down by the Venerable Mr. Tipping in this thread……

“…..a utility on a computer could be used to process the edltable.sys file and rebuild the ZZ files... any programmers out there up for the challenge?”

One thing I haven’t tried yet is to recreate the structure of the songs – ie, to record the basic tracks to get the ZZ files created – and then replace those ZZ files with the ZZ files of the ‘lost’ songs. Keeping ALL the ZZ files, including all the ‘edits’, might be too complicated, even if it’s possible, but at least if I have the main track without edits, I only have to do the edits again, and not re-record all the tracks.


So my question is…Has anyone else faced this issue, and if so, how did you recover the songs? Is my idea to recreate the structure of the song then shoe-horn in the old ZZ file a non-starter?


(PS – started exporting/import track data and backing up all the other songs, and I’ve ordered a new SD card!).

 

[Phil Tipping]

Welcome to the forum Robin.

my next step was to copy all the ZZ files onto a PC, create a new song on the DP-24, and then copy all the ZZ files to that new song – of course that didn’t work either (Didn’t really expect it to as I assume that all the ZZ files have to be ‘registered’ in one or both of the .sys files).

I've not come across that magic utility so the only way I know of getting ZZ files back into a song is to copy them to AudioDepot and then use the import function. If you've already proved they are ok on a PC, they should import ok. I would first reformat the card before doing this (after backing up everything you can of course).
You may find the tracks don't line up, and some may be redundant (old takes) but you can use Track Edit to shunt things around... or even do all this prep on a DAW before importing them.
The new song won't contain other settings such as panning, eq, fx etc. so you're right, it won't be the original 'structure' as such, but at least you'll have the crucial recordings.

 

[Robin Andrew ESCOLME]

Hi Phil,

Thank you so much for responding so quickly – I really appreciate it. Your procedure worked – I’ve rebuilt one of the songs with the main (original recordings) for each track. They are also all lined up – which makes sense since these are the original first recordings of each track. Also, the panning, eq, fx, etc are all still present - I guess this shows that the corruption in the .sys files was not terminal, and only related to ZZ tracks visibility? The edits of course I will have to do again, but this will not take so long – so you have really helped me today – thank you!


Of course, if I’d half a brain I should have worked this out for myself – I had it in my head that there was a difference between the ZZ files and a track – but they’re just .WAV files – the DP-32 doesn’t see a difference – which is why this process worked. So here, the full steps I took to get around my problem…..

Problem: Song won’t load – ‘File Error’. But all ZZ files still available.

Solution:

1 – Execute Delete Unused (this allows the song to load, even though it looks like it is empty)
2 – Transfer all the ZZ files from the DP-32 to a PC
3 – Find the ZZ files of the original recordings (they will be the largest files)
4 – Rename those files with short but meaningful names (voc-1, gtr2, drums, etc)
5 – Transfer those files to the Audio Depot
6 – Import those files to the song – you can select the original track also
7 – Hit play – and the song is back!

OK, you lose all the edits with this process, and that could be the thing that makes you decide to re-record – but in my case, this is a huge time-saver – especially with the second song (it’s around 9 mins).

It would still be great to get an understanding of how the .sys files are structured, and how they might be repaired in such a situation - maybe that's a retirement project!

Thanks again!

 

[-mjk-]

This did come up some time ago:

https://www.tascamforums.com/posts/30886

Glad you were able to recover. The trick is to not freak out and do drastic things (like formatting the SD card).

But let this be a hard, but well earned lesson: Back up everything.

 

[Robin Andrew ESCOLME]

Hi mjk. Thanks for finding that post, although it's not quite my scenario in that I couldn't see any tracks for exporting, even though all the ZZ files were there.
Totally agree about not panicking, and of course, about backing up.... something I've been very lucky with over the years....but now I need to be very conscientious and back up songs as I finish them.

Cheers
R.