Updated, now project files gone

[Mr. Torture]

I have not turned on my computer in a few weeks, I fired it up and started Cakewalk. It asked me to do an update which I did. Now my project folder is empty? I can find other project files on the same drive and other drives, but the specific folder is completely empty. I know it's the correct Cakewalk folder and it did not change the location in settings when it updated?

[Mr. Torture]

I would like to add that the “Cakewalk Project” folder has a creation date of yesterday, the same day I did this update. I have had this computer and folder for over 12 years. No other folder on the drive was affected.

[GIM Productions]

I haven't updated but I read that there were some problems, have you checked that the path to your audio folder in the preferences is correct?
Maybe the update selected the default one.
Good luck

[Mr. Torture]

1 hour ago, GIM Productions said:

I haven't updated but I read that there were some problems, have you checked that the path to your audio folder in the preferences is correct?
Maybe the update selected the default one.
Good luck

Yeah all paths are correct. All files / audio are gone.

[Promidi]

Do you have a backup?

Have you done a Windows search of all your drives for *.CWP files?

I have done many Cakewalk updates and have never lost project files.  Even if I did , I would be restoring from the project files from the previous night’s backup.

[Mr. Torture]

Yeah, I searched and all content in that folder is gone. Very disappointing.  I had a backup, but that external drive died so I am SOL.

just hard to believe that if the hard drive is bad or going it would only target that one folder.

[User 905133]

4 hours ago, Mr. Torture said:

Yeah, I searched and all content in that folder is gone.

I assume by this you mean you used a utility to search your system for all *.cwp files?

Edited December 7 by User 905133
fixed a typo

[Sock Monkey]

On 12/6/2024 at 5:13 AM, Mr. Torture said:

I would like to add that the “Cakewalk Project” folder has a creation date of yesterday, the same day I did this update. I have had this computer and folder for over 12 years. No other folder on the drive was affected.

12 years!! And you are wondering why data is disappearing?? 
Brand new SSD drives cost about $50 for a 1 TB drive. That’s pretty cheap oil change. 
 

The Samsung Magician is a free app that can analyze and migrate your C drive to a new drive. If your drives are Samsung. Otherwise there’s other apps available. 

Edited December 8 by Sock Monkey

[Amberwolf]

If you google around, there are a few "free" recovery utilities, though some of them charge to actually recover the data they find.  

This is the first hit on that search

https://www.lifewire.com/free-data-recovery-software-tools-2622893

I highly recommend doing the download on a different computer, and running it from a USB stick or cd/dvd.  

Anything you download or install onto the computer you're trying to recover has a chance of overwriting the data you're trying to save.  Just using the computer causes drive writes and file creations/etc., each of which has a chance of overwriting that lost data.

 

 

[Nigel Mackay]

As a matter of interest, what was your project folder?