The other response I made to someone else going from a Montage classic to a MODX M applies here too.  If you haven't started adding anything important to the MODX M I would save a backup file (X8A file for MODX classic) and load this into the MODX M.  Everything would be restored just as you had it on the original MODX.  All libraries and user content and ... everything.

If you've started customizing THE MODX M then the part of that post about saving a library file on your MODX M to back up the user area might apply here.

Thanks Jason. I guess my question wasn't supposed to be so much MODX M specific but more about how the saving process works with performances and libraries. What do you get if you save a performance to USB? Do you need to import a library performance before saving a modified version of it to USB? 

If you have a library with custom Waveforms inside the library then create a user Performance that uses those Waveforms the Performance you created in the user bank will "point to" custom Waveforms in the library area.

And, going further, if you save the user area alone as a user file then this (or these) Performance(s) will no longer have a valid Waveform unless you happen to restore the user file with the Library still intact at the same location ("slot" ).  This is why creating user Performances that point to the Library area can be "dangerous".

The "better" way to create a user custom Performance based on a Library Performance is to first do a Library import of the Performance you wish to customize.  This will "pull in" the sample (Waveform) and other custom data inside the Library and make a copy of it in the User area.  A copy - not move - so the same data is in two banks.  Not an issue, but something to understand why doing too much of this could eat up memory.  

After the library import your customized user bank version of the Performance will not point to anything in the library area and wouldn't need to have the Library installed.  You could save a user file and (as a thought experiment) wipe the Library area and restoring this user file would work without any Library.

It's worth mentioning that a Library bank Performance doesn't have to have any outside Library data.  By outside I mean data that you would have to import to the user area to keep it decoupled from a Library.  If the Performance relies completely on preset waveforms, preset curves, etc then you could just save (store) this Performance to the user bank and it would be decoupled with no ties to the Library area and no benefit to importing.  It's a much longer post to walk you through how to check for all of this.

I'd prefer storing a Performance that started out in the Library warn you that the newly stored Performance is going to be coupled to the Library and ask if you'd rather import the Performance, apply the edits you've made, and store a decoupled version of the Performance.  All of this is feasible if the firmware developers decided to code this kind of 'are you sure' that doesn't exist yet.  But that's a topic for another platform ...

That's kinda what I thought. Just wanted to make sure.

If you have time I would love to hear how to check if a performance is coupled to a library. That would be really helpful I think in determining which performances I have that need to have the library performance imported.

Unfortunately - we know of no way to determine the library dependencies. If you delete a library then any user perfomances that referenced objects in that library will be broken without warning.  

Someone did submit an IdeaScale suggestion related to that: https://yamahasynth.ideascale.com/c/yamahasynth/idea/190925

The high level is you would first go to various screens to see if there are any non preset waveforms and curves and such and as a second pass figure out if those are in the user bank or library.  It's a lot of menu diving.  Not an easy one click answer (which it should be).

Correction - user performances are NEVER 'broken' in the literal sense - they just won't work the way they should. Referring to this:

If you delete a library then any user perfomances that referenced objects in that library will be broken without warning.  

A user performance that referenced a waveform in a, now deleted, library will STILL reference a waveform. It just  won't, and can't, reference the one in the library that isn't there. We didn't do exhaustive testing but one test using Init Normal (AWM2) had the one element reference a waveform in the Inspiration In a Flash library and when that library was deleted the element referenced waveform #1 in the data list doc.

We suspect it works the same way for any other object. Our hypothesis is that the OS will never leave a reference null but will point it to 'something'. So the performance still technically has all of the pieces needed to work - they are just the wrong pieces and you won't have any way of knowing it happened.

If you examine element 1 you won't see an empty space where the waveform info should be. There will be data there but it will be data from the preset bank.

We've decided to make one of the strangest IdeaScale suggestions we have ever made and suggest that actually 'break' a performance when it gets altered by the OS because of a library deletion. 

The perf won't actually be broken. You can still load it, alter it, play it. But at least you will get an asterisk (*) or something on the search screen to let you know it has been altered. If you then save the performance again it should clear the 'broken' flag since it will have done its job.