Combining Two 24/48 Eight-Track Files Into One 24/48 16-track File

[LenMinNJ]

Hi,

I have two eight-track .w64  files that I need to combine into one 16-track file. They're each 5+ GB long, and both are 24/48.
I do not want to mix them down. I simply want to combine them into one 16-track file.
I've been struggling to do this in Audition for over an hour now without success.

I tried using another program (Audacity) to read in the first eight-track file, add eight empty tracks to it, and then copy the eight tracks from the second file one by one to the 8 empty tracks. That worked, but when I tried to export the file, it choked and aborted.
Is there any way to do it in Audition? I have Build 22.4.0.49.

Thanks!

[SteveG_AudioMasters_ · Accepted solution]

It's quite straightforward in Audition. You have to start with an empty 16-track 'container' first though - this is probably the bit that has eluded you. Go to File>New>Audio File, set the format to be the same as your existing files, and where it gives you a choice of channels, twirl it down and select 'Custom'. This will start you off with two channels, but if you hit the + button (above Cancel) you can add as many channels as you need. Click Okay when you're done, and you'll have an empty container as an open file. Open your other files as well. In the new file container, deselect the channels you don't want to use by clicking on their name icons on the right-hand side of the waveform display (this is the one that says 'toggle channel enable state' followed by the name of it when you hover the mouse over it). So the first eight are green, and the second eight are grey. Now go to your first file and use Ctrl+A to select all of it, followed by Ctrl+C to copy it. Go back to your new container file and with the cursor at the start of it, use Ctrl+V to paste it into the first eight channels. Now swap over the channel enables so that the first eight are greyed out and the second eight are enabled, and green and open the other file you have, and use the same procedure to copy and paste this into the second eight channels. Re-select all the channels back to green. Save the result - you're done. This actually takes longer to explain than it does to do it!

[LenMinNJ]

Thanks very much for that clear explanation!

I'd gotten to the point of creating the 16-track container  but then got quite stuck.

You wrote:

> In the new file container, deselect the channels you don't want to use by clicking on their name icons on the right-hand side of the waveform display (this is the one that says 'toggle channel enable state' followed by the name of it when you hover the mouse over it)

The name icons at the right of the waveform display were not obvious; so I couldn't figure out how to select or deselect any specific channel. I guess I'm used to looking at the left side of the display.

Now that you've pointed them out, the process was simple!