Ableton Forum

Hi dear forists,

I apologize if that's a noob question, but my forum search didn't turn up anything.

I just bought Suite and am already happily downloading my factory packs from inside Live. But given that they'll be around 80 GB total and my internet connection is very poor here on the land, I would like to avoid re-downloading them, just in case I need to ever reinstall my OS once in the future.

I found the folder where Live stores the *.alp files intermediately, but as soon as I install them, they vanish there (which is primarily good, of course), and the corresponding pack folders reappear elsewhere.

So, how should I best backup the packs? Is it better to grasp the *.alp files before installing them, or is it also fine to just backup the pack folder once all are installed, and replay the backup to a future installation?

Many thanks in advance!

This is how I do it myself:
All sounds, samples, project files, data from installed plug-ins, even the installed packs etc. are located on an extra drive. The paths are set accordingly in Live. The operating system and all programs are on the main drive. The data on the main drive are easy to restore as I would only have to reinstall it. The data containing my work on the extra drive are important.

If I have to reinstall the operating system, update it or whatever, I can set the paths again in the newly installed Live and everything is as before.


I also make an incremental backup of the entire system on an external hard disk every few weeks or days. This doesn't take long and I can restore the system exactly as it was with the help of a USB stick I made beforehand. The reason for this complete backup is that it can take a lot of work and time to set up the OS again so that it runs perfectly as a DAW.


If I only had 1 drive in my computer, I would make a complete backup (at longer intervals) and one of my data at shorter intervals - always on an external drive.

I don't keep the installation files for the packs as I no longer need them. The packs are on my extra drive after installation. In your case, the packs are in the location set in Live.

Thanks, x3000!

I can set the paths again in the newly installed Live and everything is as before.

That soothes my concerns about there possibly being some hidden (registry or whatever) information about the packs that's not being backed up. Live seems to be very uncomplicated in this respect.

The reason for this complete backup is that it can take a lot of work and time to set up the OS again so that it runs perfectly as a DAW.

So true. Best example: It took me some time until I noticed that the Realtek ASIO-Driver sucks by a margin of ~10x the latency of the properly configured ASIO4all. I wonder why Realtek even bothered to write such a sh!tty driver...

If you download the packs from the Ableton website (the packs section) you can keep the installers for future reinstall

B4L wrote: ↑

Thu Sep 19, 2024 10:55 am

If you download the packs from the Ableton website (the packs section) you can keep the installers for future reinstall

You might want to keep the downloaded Ableton packs in case packs are discontinued. However, installing packs from within Live's browser is way faster. Select all available packs and download them in one go. When finished, select all and install them in one go.
But when you make a backup of the Factory Packs folder, you can simply restore it. No need to reinstall everything. Same for copying everything to another computer.
If you keep a backup of the Packs folder, you don't have to worry a discontinued or third-party packs because everything is already installed.

Thanks to everyone for the consistent answers. I have decided to keep the original downloads (*.alp). As I mentioned, if you are downloading from inside Live, you can also access them as long as you haven't installed them (on my Windows C:\Users\<MyName>\AppData\\Local\Ableton\Cache\PackDownloads; note: AppData is a hidden folder).

The advantage is, they are still compressed (which I conclude from the filesystem size being smaller than Live reports).

Nevertheless, I will also keep in mind the general backup option of my Ableton data, as you suggested.