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  1. #1

    Default Opening and editing SAW Plus 3.x EDL and SES files

    I have a few projects from I think around 1996/1997 when I was in college and used, I believe, SAW Plus 3.1 on Win95. What's the best way for me to recover and edit those now, and what SAW license level would allow me similar or greater functionality (track count, etc.) to SAW Plus 3? I tried downloading the demo of the latest SAW Studio (5.8a) but neither the open or import function would allow me to open these files - SAW Studio reported "Incorrect File Format! Possibly a Newer EDL Version" when attempting to open or import.

  2. #2

    Default Re: Opening and editing SAW Plus 3.x EDL and SES files

    Quote Originally Posted by Nathan Hall View Post
    I have a few projects from I think around 1996/1997 when I was in college and used, I believe, SAW Plus 3.1 on Win95. What's the best way for me to recover and edit those now, and what SAW license level would allow me similar or greater functionality (track count, etc.) to SAW Plus 3? I tried downloading the demo of the latest SAW Studio (5.8a) but neither the open or import function would allow me to open these files - SAW Studio reported "Incorrect File Format! Possibly a Newer EDL Version" when attempting to open or import.
    Well, there's always SAW Plus 3.1. What's stopping you from using that?

    You could also try stripping the EDL (in SAW Plus) of plugins/FX and anything non-essential. That might make it more palatable to SAWStudio's import function. See the SAWStudio Help file under the Import section for recommendations for prepping older EDLs for import.

    Another possibility: was SAW Plus 3.1 a 16-bit program? I don't remember for sure, but I'm pretty sure SAW Plus 32 was an upgrade from the prior SAW Plus, so that has me thinking SAWStudio isn't capable if importing your EDL. SAWStudio only imports SAW Plus 32 and newer generations, I think.

    If you want to move into the 21st century with your DAW, your best bet might be to consolidate tracks (create a buildmix of each track) in SAW Plus and then import those directly to a newer program like SAWStudio.
    Last edited by Dave Labrecque; 06-23-2020 at 01:32 PM.
    Dave "it aint the heat, it's the humidity" Labrecque
    Becket, Massachusetts

  3. #3
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    Default Re: Opening and editing SAW Plus 3.x EDL and SES files

    Quote Originally Posted by Dave Labrecque View Post
    Another possibility: was SAW Plus 3.1 a 16-bit program? I don't remember for sure, but I'm pretty sure SAW Plus 32 was an upgrade from the prior SAW Plus, so that has me thinking SAWStudio isn't capable if importing your EDL. SAWStudio only imports SAW Plus 32 and newer generations, I think.
    .

    EDLs stands for "Edit Decision List" and don't have bit depth, they are just a list of instructions and in most cases just a basic text file.

    i.e.,

    1. load track one with "XXX.wav" file
    2. set volume to 5.8
    3. load "XYZ" plugin on channel 1 aux 2
    4. set output master level to 8

    etc., etc.,
    ---------------------------------------
    Philip G.

  4. #4

    Default Re: Opening and editing SAW Plus 3.x EDL and SES files

    [QUOTE=cgrafx;219026]EDLs stands for "Edit Decision List" and don't have bit depth, they are just a list of instructions and in most cases just a basic text file.


    The edls are not exactly text files. There is a bunch of structures for various data. You can see bit of text and some of it can be decerned with a hex editor. It fits with Bob's philosophy of compact. The audio data was always stored in separate files. Anyway getting back to opening it, each version could import a version or two back into its current format. I think it was not until sawpro that you could export all of the tracks as audio files of the entire duration - which would be time aligned of course you can import into anything.

    Rail Rogot had also written a tool called edl-investigator that probably did what the name implies. Sorry Rail for misspellings.

    Anyway, you would need at least one of the early precursors of studio to open or import it. And of course once you get it open you could work on it there.

    There is a caveat, the earliest versions could use an audio file format .snd? that was dropped in subsequent versions of saw - if your audio was recorded in that format, you needed sawplus or less. Don't quote me on the version or the extension - just remember being burned by this myself.

    Try opening the edl in notepad (or a hex editor). Among the gibberish, there may be a version and audio file references in plain text. It may tell you what you need to know.

    John

  5. #5

    Default Re: Opening and editing SAW Plus 3.x EDL and SES files

    One more thing when opening an edl with an editor be sure not to accidentally save even if you haven't changed anything. The edl is kind of a snapshot of essential data in ram. Text editors are not saw, so non printable characters may appear as whitespace so while not visibly changing anything, a save could render it useless.

    Also I didn't notice the ses. Was that the audio (and maybe the one I was referring to)?

  6. #6

    Default Re: Opening and editing SAW Plus 3.x EDL and SES files

    Quote Originally Posted by cgrafx View Post
    EDLs stands for "Edit Decision List" and don't have bit depth, they are just a list of instructions and in most cases just a basic text file.

    i.e.,

    1. load track one with "XXX.wav" file
    2. set volume to 5.8
    3. load "XYZ" plugin on channel 1 aux 2
    4. set output master level to 8

    etc., etc.,
    Yeah, I don't know anything about the insides of EDLs. Still, the prior-SAW-version aspect (pre-SAW Plus 32) makes it not readable by SAWStudio. That's the important part. I guess the bit-depth is irrelevant. Thanks for that clarification.
    Last edited by Dave Labrecque; 06-23-2020 at 07:29 PM.
    Dave "it aint the heat, it's the humidity" Labrecque
    Becket, Massachusetts

  7. #7

    Default Re: Opening and editing SAW Plus 3.x EDL and SES files

    Quote Originally Posted by jmh View Post
    I think it was not until sawpro that you could export all of the tracks as audio files of the entire duration - which would be time aligned of course you can import into anything.
    The way to do it with Saw Plus 32 was to solo each track and do the buildmixes one at a time. Alternatively, if you had enough audio devices, I think you could assign each track to a different output device and do the builds simultaneously (not soloing any of them, of course).
    Last edited by Dave Labrecque; 06-23-2020 at 07:26 PM.
    Dave "it aint the heat, it's the humidity" Labrecque
    Becket, Massachusetts

  8. #8
    Join Date
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    SF Bay Area
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    Default Re: Opening and editing SAW Plus 3.x EDL and SES files

    Quote Originally Posted by Dave Labrecque View Post
    Yeah, I don't know anything about the insides of EDLs. Still, the prior-SAW-version aspect (pre-SAW Plus 32) makes it not readable by SAWStudio. That's the important part. I guess the bit-depth is irrelevant. Thanks for that clarification.
    Yes, I meant to go back and add that this doesn't mean that the EDL is usable/readable in SAW Studio, just that their wasn't any correlation to being generated in a 16-bit, or 32-bit or 64-bit program.

    EDL's are also used by many different kinds of programs (audio editing, video editing, etc), obviously each with their own unique set of instruction lists.
    ---------------------------------------
    Philip G.

  9. #9

    Default Re: Opening and editing SAW Plus 3.x EDL and SES files

    I don't have access to SAW Plus 3.1, or a Win95 system to run it, and I don't have a license for the old software - these are CDRs with backups of the projects from college, and were recorded from their studio. My personal "DAW" at the time was a bit lower tech - a Tascam PortaStudio. I'm also guesstimating that they were created with SAW Plus 3.1 - one of the CDRs says "SP3.1" on it, and the .WAV files and .EDL files of the projects have date stamps of between 8/22/96 and 4/25/97, however only one CDR says "SP3.1", so the others could have been created with different SAW versions.

    I did try opening up the EDL with a hex editor - it didn't tell me too much other than the songs have up to 20 tracks in them and it listed out the .WAV file names used within the project, but not any guidance on placement of the wav files or timestamps, or other details (track vol, pan, etc.).

    A few of the CDRs have projects with .SES files and no .EDL files, so I was assuming that was a file format from an earlier or later version of SAW. Those projects with .SES files also have .WAV files in them for the media. Basically the folders look like this:

    1) .SES file folders:

    a) Contain .WAV files with corresponding .PK files (i.e. GUITAR2.WAV also has a GUITAR2.PK file)
    b) contain .SES files with the project/song name but no .EDL file (i.e. the song name written on the CDR is the same as the name of the .SES file)

    2) .EDL file folders:

    a) Contain .WAV files with corresponding .WPD files (i.e. GUITAR2.WAV also has a GUITAR2.WPD file)
    b) contain .EDL files with the project/song name (i.e. the song name written on the CDR is the same as the name of the .EDL file)

    I appreciate the help with the forensics on this one, I haven't been able to find any clarifying details from many google search attempts but am hoping others were a little more familiar with the SAW landscape 23-24 years ago.

  10. #10

    Default Re: Opening and editing SAW Plus 3.x EDL and SES files

    I would contact rmllabs and ask about the possibility of a good deal on antique software with the purchase of some version of studio.

    If it is obtainable, you would have to be able to replicate the exact path for the audio that the edl refers to. I'm not sure if I had any ses projects, I didn't get on saw till the last days the first or second iteration. Still you may be in trouble as far as plug ins is concerned. I don't know how forgiving those old sessions were to missing parts. Did those versions even have plugins?

    I went through a pile of old harddrives from retired machines not to long ago looking for a few things. They all worked fine when last in service but my success rate was not too impressive. Some old projects and ancient versions of saw went in the trash - possibly intact on the non-spinning platters. It reminds me of years ago as an AS400 operator having to port our 50year employee data archive 8" floppies from a system34 as our new machine would no longer support that format. We were only 10 years into eternity and half of the data had literally fallen off of the platters...

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