How do you manage your sample collection

[apleton]

Hi everyone

I make music from several years now, mainly electronic music, using Ableton Live. Since that time, I collected a huge amount of audio samples : drums, fx, movies samples, field recordings… I have more than 20 Gb of audio sample on my hard drive.

How do you guys manage your sample library ? Mine is such a mess, it takes ages to find the right sound.

Do you use sample manager applications, or do you sort carefully the files in directories, or you just accept that mess ?

I tried some sample manager app (on mac) but it was not really convincing.

[Michael L]

Did you try AudioFinder? I find its most important to remember what I have! (a combination of topical directories, keywords, and making the right sound from something close)

[Aloysius]

20GB would be like a drop in the ocean of my collection. You wouldn't even notice it going in.

Question: What does 'sort out' mean to you?

If you're just looking for say 'kick drum', can't you just do a search for 'kick''? Do you really need a sample manager to do that?

How you go about things depends on your workflow.

I just put all the stuff I purchase from BigFishAudio in a BFA folder, everything from Zero-G in a Zero-G folder etc (along with purchase information. This is all backed up on a 2nd drive of course.).

[stardustmedia]

I somehow fear that getting a tool like AudioFinder will need a lot of initial work. My sample library is more than 300GB (or even more, don't remembter) big... more than 400k files... Somehow I don't want to tag them all manually, I believe you get the idea

I manage them by folder-coloring them. Plus over time I somehow got the database in my head. I find samples fast enough when they are of a often used type (e.g. kick). The only thing I need more time, when I look for types that I don't use often.

My question would be then, how does an app like AudioFinder handle this? I guess not at all, until I tagged all 400k files manually

[SampleScience]

I manage my sample packs by developers, I've always found it easier to work that way.

[PTV]

I manage my sample packs by developers

+1

[Jace-BeOS]

I keep things organized by descriptive file names, in folders and subfolders that have meaningful category names. I use no tool other than the file system itself. I also don't keep lots of stuff and I've stopped collecting stuff. It just builds up to where I'd have a ton of stuff I'll likely never use. I don't download freebies or buy magazines with sample discs anymore.

Most of my "new" samples are sounds I've created myself in one tool or the other. Even then I don't save things unless they're really interesting or took a lot of effort to create. These are the samples I tend to use most later on, though I sometimes use other sourced content in samplers (instrument notes, drum hits, almost never loops).

[JonSolo]

By type and then by developer. For libraries with multiple types I tend to put them in the "type" that I use them the most. That is my Library order on Kontakt, as well as my Quick folders there.

On my SSDs that is a different story. Not super organized though I tend to keep all of similar libraries together.