BIAB newbie here with a few questions about running BIAB from an external HD.

Background is that I bought Ultra+ 2019 on an external HD last year; took option 2 and installed the software (but not the files) on my MacBook's internal SSD; and played around with it but never wound up creating files

Now I have my shiny new update of Ultra+ 2020 on an external HD, Build 403, and am ready to do some quarantine projects. Questions:

- To install the 2020 update, do I need the old 2019 folder on my laptop for anything or can I delete it? (Which would save 17 GB on my laptop's SSD now down to 10% capacity.)

- Do I need last year's 2019 external HD for anything or can I wipe it? (I could reuse it for something else.)

- Can I still update from 2020 Build 403 to the current 2020 Build 412 if I use the external HD strategy? (The installer says no, you need the program to be where Mac OS runs from, meaning I'd have to go back to Option 2 and install the software on the laptop after all. If that is really the case, delete last year's folder or update over it?)

- That 2019 Bonus 49Pak -- do those I bought last year automatically convey to my 2020 external HD, or do I need to fish them out of last year's file structure somehow?

Thanks -- I did check the owner manual, search the official Forum, and email customer support over the weekend, but no answers yet from those sources. 

Updates since I spoke to customer support on the phone: It looks like I don't need the 2019 folder or 2019 external HD for anything (since no original files were created there). So she told me that yes I can free up space by deleting last year's BIAB folder from my internal HD (now done to make room for 2020), and yes I can repurpose last year's external HD. 

She also confirmed that in order to keep updating to the new builds, it's necessary to use option 2 and install the BIAB application on the bootable internal HD where the Mac OS lives, not try to run it entirely off the external HD which would limit me to 2020 Ultra Pak+ Build 403. 

My remaining question is about the Real Tracks 1-328 that I bought last year, along with the 2019 Bonus 49Pak, and Xtra Styles Pak 7: Does all this content appear on the 2020 external HD I now own? They're not numbered that way so it's hard to tell.

Or do I need to fish them off last year's external HD, or else download them from my account on the website? If I had kept last year's internal HD folder (now deleted) would they still be there?

What about this year's 2020 Bonus 49Pak -- does that need to be downloaded regardless or is it on this year's external HD?

This ReadMe for 2020 doesn't exactly make clear where last year's 2019 content now lives for us external HD customers:

Further updates in case any other newbies are wondering about these things:

I got Customer Support into an online chat on this and Deryk told me: 
"The 2020 hard drive will contain all the RealTracks and 49PAKs, but NOT Xtra Styles. You have to manually install those. You would download and install them to your BB folder -- in your case, on the external drive. Anything else would be taken care of in the setup process when you install from the hard drive."

(The downloads being accessible by logging into their website and accessing your Account page.)

He added:
"For clarity, if you go to Help | What add ons do I have, it'll list what is installed here."

(This is the Help menu bar item when you're running the BIAB application itself, not the online help on your Account page on their website.)

On 7/22/2020 5:56 PM, Andrew Craig wrote:

Does that mean 2019 HD can be on sold to another  user?

[snip]

No -- Morally it would be wrong since that would mean that even though we've only paid for one license and an upgrade, there would be two full licenses being used.

When we buy an upgrade from one version to another user we get a very discounted price which is only for using the new upgraded features. We are not buying a brand new license so that we now have two valid licenses which would allow one to be sold on.

To get BIAB to work when we install it we have to activate it with PGMusic -- that means that they have tied that serial number to a specific user. No other user will be able to activate that serial number.

So while we can sell on the 2019HD to another user it would be fraud since the purchaser would not be able to activate it. And such things are what drive software companies to take stronger and stronger anti-piracy steps, making things much more inconvenient for the vast majority of users who are very honest about such things.



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*****
David H. Bailey
dhbailey52@comcast.net
http://www.davidbaileymusicstudio.com