I had AP 7 installed and everything worked fine. If I went to create or edit a midi file, all the instrument definitions (patch maps) were in place. In AP 9 they are all gone. The directory they should exist is empty. I ended up finding them in old directories defined in AP 7 although they were ages old and didn't include many of the new synthesizers. My guess is that during the AP 9 install things were treated as an upgrade instead of a new install and things got out of synch. AP 7 wasn't my first product either. I had a number of versions of Sony products along the way and never uninstalled any of them.

For years I had an old synthesizer which had wonderful sounds but a horrible PC interface to it (old tech that didn't stay up to date with later Windows versions) so I only used software for audio work and forgot about MIDI. I just purchased a Korg PA 700 and am trying to get it to work with this software and it's worthless with the crap install. I have zero control over instrumentation and control changes within AP 9. I'll be damned if I'll manually create some new patch map for that synth with it's over 700 voices.

Of course over the last decade I've created tons of audio projects that are scattered all over my hard drives. I want to ensure that, if I uninstall any prior versions that those areas are not wiped clean. I could simply find all the .acd files and move them but they all contain links to other directories where the track audio files exist. Moving them will certainly remove those links.

So I have a simple question. Will uninstalling also remove project directories and files?

uninstalling shouldn't remove projects or their files. The AP9 install is a complete program install NOT an update . As a matter of fact you can installing AP7,8,9, and 10 on your computer all at the same time as stand alone programs. BUT you will have to go into each programs 'Options' then 'Preferences' and tell the program(s) about file locations, sound cards, MIDI etc as well as VST locations, it won't do it automatically. So you have your work cut out for you..😀 Keep in mind if you open a AP7 project in AP9 and SAVE it you won't be able to open it again in AP7. One other thought, is your Korg using a standard MIDI cable or a USB cable?

The Korg is using a USB cable. I can attach it with MIDI cables since I have a digital interface with MIDI ports although I've yet to do that since the USB seems to work. I've made backups of all my projects and their associated wav files and have uninstalled AP 7 and Music Studio 9. I'll next uninstall AP 9, clean up the computer and registry of all references, and then reinstall it from scratch.