Final Cut Pro crashes and orginal files vanish

I have posted this issue on other boards, and I am getting desperate for a solution.

For the past week, Final Cut Pro has been continuously crashing while I'm working on this large indie feature project. Every time it crashes, the original files on my external hard drives just vanish into thin air. I promise I am not deleting them myself. This has happened on eight files now, at least, and some of them were not backed up anywhere else. I have already re-installed Final Cut, but the problem continues. I really need to recover these files. I don't know if they're being deleted or renamed or what. Does anyone have any idea how I can get these back? Already tried Disk Warrior and Data Recovery 3, with no luck. And this has happened on multiple drives, so I don't believe it's a hard drive issue. The last time it happened, I was exporting a sequence to Sountrack Pro and I received a "General Error" and the files vanished. Shortly after that FCP crashed.


I am using Final Cut Pro 7 on an iMac i5. The external hard drives are all OWC Mercury Elite Pros.

Thank you in advance for any insights!

FCP 7 itself has no ability at all to delete files. There is something else wrong with your Mac, which is causing the crash. Files simply don't vanish like that. I've been an IT engineer foe over20 years and can assure you it simply doesn't happen unless you have a virus or a drive that is about to die.

Explain your system specs, hard drive configuration, and what location is set as FCP's SCRATCH DRIVE. Also, are you logging in as the Admin user, or a regular user when you boot and use your Mac?

If you in fact do have what appears as vanishing files, take it in to an Apple store or other Apple Certified Service Center, as you have something very wrong with the system as a whole.

I was afraid it might be a hardware issue. *sigh*

OK, system specs: I am working on 3.6 GHz Intel Core i5. I am using Final Cut 7. Unfortunately, due to limited space, I had to capture the video over several different external hard drives (I know, dumb way of doing things). They are all OWC Mercury Elite Pros. So far, original media files have gone missing from three different drives. I am logged in as the Admin user.

Right now I am running Data Rescue 3 on one of the three drives to see if I can recover any of the files. I do rename them in Final Cut Pro for logging, but I keep the original names the same (Untitled, etc.) I had put my tape decks in storage, since I have since switched to DSLR, and I'm hoping these files can be recovered without having to recapture from those tapes.

Again, any help is greatly appreciated. Is this a hardware issue, do I need to make an appointment at one of the local Apple stores, how can I recover the missing footage, etc.? Thank you so, so much!

Which drive is your Scratch Drive? What Mac model? How much RAM?

I have several I am using as scratch drives. I know now that was a dumb way of organizing things, but I was working on two projects at once and drives kept filling up, etc.

Anyway, I'm on a 3.6 GHz Intel Core i5 with 8 GB memory. My drives are OWC Mercury Elite Pros.

Any help is greatly appreciated! Thank you!!!

Model, an iMac, 17" MBP, 15" MBP?

BenB wrote: Model, an iMac, 17" MBP, 15" MBP?

It's an iMac.

Ben can probably speak better to this, or at least confirm it, but I seem to recall that if you are importing files and are NOT copying to final cut events folder, and NOT optimizing, then you are editing from the original file. If that is deleted in the event browser, it is actually deleted from the drive. This could explain vanishing files.

If, however, FCPX always creates copies of the originals for editing, then this wouldn't be the case.

dgwvideo wrote: Ben can probably speak better to this, or at least confirm it, but I seem to recall that if you are importing files and are NOT copying to final cut events folder, and NOT optimizing, then you are editing from the original file. If that is deleted in the event browser, it is actually deleted from the drive. This could explain vanishing files.

If, however, FCPX always creates copies of the originals for editing, then this wouldn't be the case.

I'm working in Final Cut Pro 7, not X.

OK, back home, in the studio, no more traveling for a little while. Let me answer this with a clear head now.

As for X, it can potentially end up with 3 copies, depending on how you configure the Import: Original (either in it's original location, or in the Event folder), ProRes, Proxy.

7, it has no intrinsic ability to make files disappear, something else is going on with your system. What ever is making your files go missing, is also crashing out FCP 7.

Here's what I'd do, check the available space on those drives. First, does it seem to be holding those files and they're just invisible? Second, do all of those drives have at least 10-15% of their capacity free?

I'd immediately run Disk Utility to "Repair" all drives. Then run Disk Warrior to rebuild the directories of all drives. If either of these two fail, you have a bad drive. If they are both successful, you may find your files again.

BenB wrote: OK, back home, in the studio, no more traveling for a little while. Let me answer this with a clear head now.

As for X, it can potentially end up with 3 copies, depending on how you configure the Import: Original (either in it's original location, or in the Event folder), ProRes, Proxy.

7, it has no intrinsic ability to make files disappear, something else is going on with your system. What ever is making your files go missing, is also crashing out FCP 7.

Here's what I'd do, check the available space on those drives. First, does it seem to be holding those files and they're just invisible? Second, do all of those drives have at least 10-15% of their capacity free?

I'd immediately run Disk Utility to "Repair" all drives. Then run Disk Warrior to rebuild the directories of all drives. If either of these two fail, you have a bad drive. If they are both successful, you may find your files again.

OK...to answer your questions, it's hard to tell space-wise since these weren't super large files. Maybe 200 mb each or so, and the drives are all two terabytes.

Actually, they don't have 10-15 percent space free -- this has happened on three drives and they're close to full.

I've run disk utility and disk warrior and they seem to be ok. And with it affecting three different drives, I'm figuring it's not a drive issue but a FCP or computer issue. But unfortunately, I was unable to recover the missing files

"Actually, they don't have 10-15 percent space free -- this has happened on three drives and they're close to full."

That is your problem.

P.S. I think I said this in the first post, but it may be worth mentioning again: It always seemed to happen when I was exporting to soundtrack pro. I would get a general error and files from whatever sequence is working in at that time would offline and disappear from the external drive.

Ok...had never heard that before. Good to know! Thanks!

So are my missing files lost forever or can I still retrieve them from the drives?

No clue if the files are really gone, or just invisible. But when you exceed the 10-15% free space limit on a drive, you're asking for trouble, symptoms that don't make sense, like the one you have here. Your drives are too full, nothing else can be done, no other troubleshooting will help, until you free up enough room for these drives to do their job properly.

nbye wrote:
I'm working in Final Cut Pro 7, not X.

Sorry about that. Don't know how I missed it.