Messages posted by EricJ

Ok yeah I see that now, thanks might be useful. Thanks again anyone who tried to be helpful

Quote

Hi,

The Pack Project Materials is a specific function to gather all the assets used in a project and copy them to a user specified folder. The .pds file is also modified to remove the absolute file locations and the overall aim is to produce a "portable" project that can be archived, copied or transferred without any concern about the original locations and resources.

File>Pack Project Materials

It is an extremely useful function particularly when operating from multiple drives and file locations and, in effect, gives a complete project in one place.

Cheers
PowerDirector Moderator

Hi and thanks, I think by "packed" you mean export as a file. I always do that since these are mostly for youtube, but I like to retain the ability to redo or edit the project so I can output (or render or produce if you prefer) an edited file.

I did open one of the pds files in a text editor and I saw could do that by editing but it would be less work to open the projects on the new computer and when files come up "missing" just change the location and re-save the pds. I always keep all the media files and the project file as well as the output file in their own directory (folder... sorry I am old-school )

I appreciate the help, I guess I alredy knew the options available and there is no way to make the program not look for the files on a particular drive as my web editing program does so I will deal with it.

If I am able to post a URL here, here is a recent upload if anyone is interested,

https://youtu.be/8-6UO15ph6A

Thanks everyone!

Quote Hi,

As you probably know the standard .pds file holds the absolute file references in the format Drive:Folder Path: File name : SRC="D:\Sandra Maggie visit\SANY0019.MP4

When a project is packed the absolute format is changed to a "relative" format : SRC="SANY0019.MP4"

Also the .pds file can be edited in a plain text editor, where find and replace can be used to change, say, a drive letter.

So in theory you have 4 paths :

Emulate the old drive and folder structure on the new system - with care everything should transfer across.

Pack each project and copy to it's new location - will duplicate files if you are using a library of files for several projects, as each packed project will have it's own set of files.

Transfer projects across and when opened each project should give you the choice to manually point to the "new" location for each video/image clip - mostly works but you need to know where to look!

Edit the .pds files - useful in an emergency but has unlimited potential for mess ups!

Pragmatically, the third option is probably best - as you intimated.

Cheers
PowerDirector Moderator

Thanks for the suggestion and yes I could do that but I never wanted the 3 hard drive setup really and would prefer one. I use a web-page editor that allows you to specify absolute or relative links to everything making it much easier to deal with things like this. I guess if nothig else I can do it one project at a time, I think I only have about 50 or so PD projects, was using MAGIX for years before I needed to edit 4K.

Honestly I don't often go back to re-edit things I've already uploaded so will probably just add this to the horrors of moving to a new computer with many terrabytes of stuff. I hate the thought, but get bored in Winter so it will keep me busy and won't remove anything much from current system until I am ready.

Thanks though

Quote I must confess I've rather failed to keep abreast of modern developments in disk and OS technology but I wonder if you could just create partitions on the new drive to emulate the individual drives in your current setup. On my Windows 7 the disk management utility allows disk letters to be reassigned so if you can do that you should be able to recreate your existing paths.

Have hundreds of projects, almost 200 on YT alone. Current computer has 5TB internal hard drive space but it's broken up into 3 drives (currently media is on internal drive E, program is on internal drive F) so now looking at a new computer with a 4-6 TB single drive. I can easily copy the folders and keep in the same named folder locations on the new system but I am concerned I might have an issue unless there is some way to specify relative or absolute paths for the media because the drive designation will be different.

I always keep all the files in a project in one folder, from experience this makes a lot of things easier but not sure if I will have an issue with the drive designations on the new system.

I am hoping there is a way to do this other than open each project and when file location errors come up to designate the new location.

??

Thanks,
Eric