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Author Topic: headerless SDII recovery?  (Read 12857 times)

pete andrews

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headerless SDII recovery?
« on: January 24, 2011, 09:35:28 AM »

ran into a bugger on friday....
went to open an old session from around 6 years ago (in Digital Performer) and the session wouldn't open. on further inspection, i find that there are maybe a couple hundred sound files (SDII) that are corrupt. Sound Hack reports that they are headerless. no problem... i change the header info back to what it should be, save, but there is no audio in the file. nothing... so i have a few questions:

1) if i've chosen the wrong params for the new header info and saved it (for example, wrong bit depth)... would sound hack choke on the new file?

2) should sound hack (or something else perhaps)? be able to play the file even without the header present? or at least show data? i.e. what's the best way to verify that there is valid data beyond the header?

3) does anyone know a tool that could do batch processing of a group of files that need the header repaired? (i fear i may have to write one). does sound hack (or again.. some other tool) have a CLI?

4) am i screwed?

i was asked for a tracks only version of one of the songs in this old session, and i've already re-recorded the tune while i'm trying to figure out this problem... i'd like very much not to have to re-do an entire album!

thanks  all....

pete

John Bailey

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #1 on: January 24, 2011, 09:42:33 AM »

Hi Pete,

If you go to   http://www.railjonrogut.com/

Rail Jon Rogut has a utility on there called SdTwoWav that batch converts SD2 files to WAV files.  Give that a shot, and report back, OK?

Good Luck!!
Cheers,
JB
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John Bailey
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pete andrews

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #2 on: January 24, 2011, 10:48:40 AM »

john -
thanks for the tip.
i tried rail's app there.. tried saving one of the corrupt files off as both 16 and 24 bit wav... but the results are still looking (and sounding ) totally empty when opened again back on the mac with Wave Editor.

-pete

pete andrews

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #3 on: January 24, 2011, 11:04:20 AM »

...also - not sure how much this tool will help as i still have to convert them all back to SDII for DP since it is looking for the original files to be of that type.

hmm.....

pete

Bob Olhsson

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #4 on: January 25, 2011, 12:46:45 AM »

Back when I was on the real Mac system we did use sound hack to fix stuff like that.

Daniel Farris

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #5 on: January 25, 2011, 01:19:52 AM »

Bob Olhsson wrote on Mon, 24 January 2011 21:46

Back when I was on the real Mac system we did use sound hack to fix stuff like that.


Yep. Soundhack is probably the only hope for this, and there is a version (v 0.896) for Intel and PPC Macs.

DF
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John Bailey

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #6 on: January 25, 2011, 12:37:17 PM »

I think Pete mentioned that Soundhack was able to fix the headers, but the files turned up with empty audio...

Pete, if you fix the headers up, have you tried 'Peak' to recover the audio?  If you can recover them into AIFF (Big Endian), it's pretty easy at that point to turn them back into SD2 files with a resource fork...

Aaarrrgghhh..., the legacy of SD2 just won't die...  I just have this feeling that there's a massive trove of hard drives out there that contain the masters for some well-known and loved albums that will be in a similar state.  Somebody ought to devote a business to this that we can all turn to, for solid advice and working software solutions.  I would love to see the work of Tom Erbe (SoundHack) and guys like Rail Jon Rogut (who has helped countless people including myself recover corrupted audio files) become an established, rock-solid place to go, when disaster strikes...

Anyhow, hope you see some success with this!
Cheers,
JB

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John Bailey
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Bob Olhsson

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #7 on: January 25, 2011, 01:26:23 PM »

I've been telling people to avoid SD2 like the plague for over a decade.

It has been a time bomb since Apple started threatening to pull the plug on supporting resource forks in system 8.

Rail Jon Rogut

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #8 on: January 25, 2011, 05:46:26 PM »

Open one of the files in OxED (Hex Editor) and do you see anything other than zeroes?

Rail
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TotalSonic

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #9 on: January 25, 2011, 08:28:56 PM »

Bob Olhsson wrote on Tue, 25 January 2011 13:26

I've been telling people to avoid SD2 like the plague for over a decade.

It has been a time bomb since Apple started threatening to pull the plug on supporting resource forks in system 8.


Completely agree - and it's even more of a p.i.t.a. when you receive them and have to open them on Windows PC.

Luckily Rail's app can open and convert most sd2 files I receive here without a problem - but the one place I've had insurmountable problems so far is with the non-standard 88.2kHz and 96kHz sd2 files that the latest editions of Digital Performer can make.  I really can't understand why MOTU chose to create a non-standard file format for these when aiff or wav should have a been a no-brainer instead.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

John Bailey

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #10 on: January 25, 2011, 09:59:36 PM »

Bob Olhsson wrote on Tue, 25 January 2011 13:26

I've been telling people to avoid SD2 like the plague for over a decade.

It has been a time bomb since Apple started threatening to pull the plug on supporting resource forks in system 8.


No kidding, eh?  Just think of all those feature films in the vaults with Hard Drives or Magneto Optical disks meant for Akai DD8 dubbers in ProTools 5 / SoundDesigner2 format.  

Just that alone, makes me shudder...  At least a decade of film, TV, and music archives that are potentially un-recoverable.  Maybe it's just as well...

I see a business opportunity there, though... Go to all the record labels and film companies, and give them a quote on recovering, consolidating and transferring their audio masters into BWF files.

My Hard Drive closet alone, would be easily 7 or 8 months work for a diligent young lad, but at least there's minimal (if any) SD2 files to deal with.

But who's going to pay for it?  So for now, it will fester...

Recipe for disaster?  Client buys pre-formatted drive at Best Buy and transfers all their files over, to make space on their system.  Client discovers after-the-fact that preformatted drive they bought is FAT32...



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John Bailey
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pete andrews

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #11 on: January 26, 2011, 09:30:15 AM »

hex editor...

excellent idea... not sure why i didn't think of that.
trying it now...


thanks everyone for the ideas...


pete

pete andrews

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #12 on: January 26, 2011, 09:52:20 AM »

not good.....

index.php/fa/16219/0/

-pete

mastermind

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #13 on: January 26, 2011, 01:35:52 PM »

pete andrews wrote on Wed, 26 January 2011 08:52

not good.....

index.php/fa/16219/0/

-pete


That looks pretty quiet.....   Sad

I was going to post up (a bit un-related) about opening SDII files in Wavelab (on a PC)... I've been able to do that for years, but if you get anything wrong (sample, bit depth, bit order) you'll get either full-scale noise or nothing or junk...

But it looks like there is a deeper problem here... as in, nothing to recover....

I am amazed that still, there are certain clients that send me SDII files to master from.  I'm all about being nostalgic and all, but this is one form of "vintage digital" I wish people would let go of.

t
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trevor sadler
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mazoaudio

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Re: headerless SDII recovery?
« Reply #14 on: January 26, 2011, 02:31:45 PM »

[quote title=mastermind wrote on Wed, 26 January 2011 12:35]
pete andrews wrote on Wed, 26 January 2011 08:52

not good.....


I am amazed that still, there are certain clients that send me SDII files to master from.  I'm all about being nostalgic and all, but this is one form of "vintage digital" I wish people would let go of.




Pete,

I feel your pain about this issue.  What is the problem exactly with SDII files in general?
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Lance Ketterer

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