is there a way to retrieve lost work when Finale (v 25) hangs?

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JAS ADAMS Edited November 13, 2017 10:44

I was working on a Smartscore .xml file that Smartscore had opened in Finale 25 when Finale suddenly hanged and the computer froze up. I had to restart the computer and now I cannot find the Finale work I was doing. Is there any way to retrieve lost work when Finale freezes up the computer (Windows 7 professional)? Other programs let you recover files -- Windows allows for this -- so why won't Finale allow recovery of work when Finale closes abruptly or hangs? I lost literally hours of of work. I need hardly say this is extremely frustrating!! Is there a temporary file somewhere that I can retrieve? I did not do a save in Finale, but why isn't there the ability to retrieve unsaved work when Finale causes the PC to freeze up?

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Date Votes

J ADRIAN VERKOUTEREN Posted November 13, 2017 15:26

Did you have autosave activated?

Usually Finale tries to automatically restart and load the temp file it was working on when something like this (rarely) occurs, but sometimes the work is irretrievable.

(Full disclosure: I have never worked with Smartmusic files, so perhaps someone familiar with those will chip in and give us more info.)

MIKE ROSEN Posted November 13, 2017 17:41

Save your work. A lot.

Otherwise, it’s not a question of will you lose it, it’s a question of when will you lose it. Never depend on Autosave or anything else. DAMHIKT.

Ruben Reyna Posted May 24, 2023 04:20

My Finale 2011 just crashed on me in my Windows 10 as I was saving my work, and after opening Finale again, my saved file was GONE (it had turned into a .temp file), but after some digging, I found out Finale saves back ups of PREVIOUS save files on your documents folder.

Open Finale, and under Existing Music choose Open. Next, look for files in My Computer > Documents > Finale Files > Backups and it will be blank at first. Now, change the "Files of type" from "Finale Notation File (*.mus)" to "All Files (*.*)". A list of .bak files should appear. Look for your desired work and click to open. Finally, make sure you Save As your now recovered file in the desired folder by changing the .bak extension into .mus.

The work you did before you saved it, or before the process of saving was interrupted, will be lost, but at least you won't have to start from scratch. I know I'm 6 years too late, but hopefully this comment can help someone in the future.

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