Folder disappeared when trying to copy it to a bin

This has happened before and it infuriates me.

I was trying to copy my music folder into my Master bin. Usually this works okay but twice now Resolve has lost my entire folder during a botched copy operation. I should have learned the first time to make a backup of my curated music collection before allowing Resolve to mishandle it again but I didn't.

Here's the scenario. I want to make my my entire music folder with its subfolder structure intact so that all my music downloads can be available to a project. I click on the folder in order to drag and drop it into the Master bin in my Media Pool but before I drop it, I change my mind and decide to do something else first. But when I release the mouse button, the folder disappears. This has happened twice, once with the free version (v 19) and now again with the Studio version I just purchased today.

How can a product as sophisticated and competent as DaVinci Resolve allow this to happen? I brag about the power of Resolve all the time but this horrendous behavior is hard to understand. Where are my files? How can a blunder during a copy operation delete an entire folder?

I know I'm not the only one that's experienced this. Is there a way to recover my lost files? They're not in the Recycle Bin nor anywhere on my external SSD. Can they be saved using a file recovery program?

How can a blunder during a copy operation delete an entire folder?

I'm not sure it can. Meaning, I'm not convinced Resolve did this.

One way to fully avoid that possibility, though, is to use the Media Storage panel on the Media page for all Import operations.

Sounds like you may be using an EXFAT formatted drive … this is especially dangerous if you are on a Mac.. if an operation fails or the drive get disconnected accidentally the FAT can be corrupted .. if you fix it you may see you files return .. disk drill is one utility for this ..

Where in which section of the media pool were you dropping the files in resolve? I think one section replicates the folders from hard drive as bins, the other ignores it. If on the other hand something happened on your hard drive, I don't think resolve is writing or deleting files on your hard drive, it references it. If something happened to your files on hard drive, it sounds like something related to hard drive issues.

I was trying to copy my music folder into my Master bin. Usually this works okay but twice now Resolve has lost my entire folder during a botched copy operation. I should have learned the first time to make a backup of my curated music collection before allowing Resolve to mishandle it again but I didn't.

As far as I know, Resolve can't delete or hide a folder on a drive in your operating system just because it's adding it to your Master Bin on the Media page. Has the source folder completely disappeared from your source drive? Is it possible the OS did it inadvertently?

Bear in mind that all that's actually being copied are links (pointers) to the media, not the media itself. Which specific version of Resolve are you using? Which OS? What hardware (CPU, GPU, RAM, disk I/O)? How are the drives formatted? How are the permissions set on the drive?

In general, this can actually work very well and it will retain the structure of folders added as bins. Dragging to the Media Page is relatively new (I want to say it's been around for about 4-5 years), and I generally try to use the Import command instead when I can. Of course, if you have media with multiple levels of folders, that's not very convenient for automatically creating multiple bins.