Actually if you have Ultimate S2 or 3 you can save an archive file with trim that will save all of the vedeo events that are used in your project while losing all of the stuff you cut out. Great time saver and it keeps it in editible format.

L.T.

"I'm not sure where you got the idea that generated media is stored in the registry."

Because I recovered it and restored them to the registry after my last system crash - "virtual" where do you think it's stored - in thin air? Granted - these may just be the pointers to the media but crash your registry and see how many of your custom media tags are lost.

So where are they (all files that Vegas uses) stored?
And how do I ensure they are backed up?
And how do I safely move them from one platform to another?

I may be new to Vegas but I'm not new to file system or hardware issues…..

I'm assuming this is the plugin you spoke of

http://www.vasst.com/search.aspx?entity=16&category=Plugins

I'll give it a try but I'd still like to know where Vegas hides all of it's files.

When I search the registry for presets I've named I find them there. How to back them up is another matter, but the Sony preset manager looks like it just saves packages, which doesn't sound too helpful if you didn't make packages in the first place.

I don't think that backing up the registry or even just exporting a part of it is a very good answer, but it's a way to do it.

It might be helpful to know just what objects you want backed up. People could either give specific answers or at least do your research for you.

Rob Mack

The problem with backing up the registry and restoring it after a creas is that often, the registry is the reason for the crash and even more often, you did the last backup after adding a preset - not just before the system went down.

I'm not happy at all on the tools Sony gives for exporting and saving presets (generated media) - heck, I want to be able to save a project and have the presets there when I open the project on a different machine. I also don't want to have to restore items to my PC using regedit

It looks like the presets are stored under: C:\Program Files\Sony\Vegas 6.0\Presets\ but must have entries in the registry under: HKEY_USERS\S-1-5-21-1229272821-1078081533-725345543-500\Software\DXTransform\Presets\{0FE8789D-0C47-442A-AFB0-0DAF97669317}
It's a real pain to copy all these individually every time you make an update - in fact, it's a royal pain in my side.

Give me the ability, in the original software not a plug-in, to backup my data - when I save a project, I want it saved - in one location, one file if possible, that I can archive with the original video clips in case I have to re-edit the project at a later time. To me, this is a fundamental requirement of any program.

Sony screwed up in my eyes on this one - if I lose one more project due to the difficulty of backing things up, I'll be looking for a different answer to my editing needs.

Wow, has this thread gotten off to a bad start.

First, nothing needed to backup and restore a project is stored in the registry. Forget about the registry. Stay away from the registry. OK?

Second, the only truly non-replaceable file is the VEG file. If you have VEG backups enabled (which creates BAK files), then you might want to store that as well.

Third, if you capture from DV tape with Vegas, and if you label your tapes and also label your capture files to match those tapes, and if you keep your original tapes, then you can always recapture at a later time, and reconstruct your project from those captured tapes and your VEG file. If you do this, then you don't need to keep your AVI files when you archive (you will still need to keep photos, sound files, and other media files).

Finally, if you want to save all your media files, along with the VEG file, onto some sort of external disk media, then you certainly don't need Ultimate S (although that is a great add-on to have for many other reasons). Instead, the backup (and optional media trim) facility that was mentioned earlier in this thread is actually built right into Vegas itself. All you do is to select "Save As" from the file menu, and then before you click on OK, make sure you click on the "Copy and Trim Media with Project" box. Remember, however, that the destination drive must have enough space to store ALL of the media used in your project. If you are going to do this, I HIGHLY recommend that you click on the "Project Media" tab and then click on the little lightning bolt icon which removes from the project (but not from the disk drive) all media that has not been used. Often you bring media onto the timeline and then later decide not to use it. If you don't want to waste archive space, then perform this step before doing the "Save As."

Also, one minor note is that the "trim" feature only works on DV AVI files, not m2t, MPEG or any other AVI other than DV.