locked out of program after changing scratch disk

FF
Posted By
Fred_Farrell
May 13, 2004
Views
412
Replies
8
Status
Closed
I’m running (or trying to) PS 7.01 on XP Pro.

I recently made a change in the Option settings for the scratch disk. The primary scratch disk was originally set to use the "installation drive" (pardon me if that’s not the exact wording, I forget now) and there were no settings for the secondary, etc., drives.

The program is installed on the E: partition of the first of two hard drives in my system. I changed the primary scratch drive setting to a second hard drive, and the secondary scratch drive setting to the E: drive on disk 1, where the program is installed.

The reason I did this is that I have plenty of room over on the second drive, and not much left on that E: drive. I didn’t set any third or fourth scratch drives.

I then closed and relaunched Photoshop. Or tried to, anyway. The launch procedure gets about 80 or 90 percent of the way through (just prior to loading plug-ins, I believe, but don’t quote me), then it errors out. The error message is: "Cannot initialize due to a program error." Nice and specific, huh?

I don’t know that this error is related to the settings I had just made, but it would be a heck of a coincidence if it was something else. I’ve looked for a config file somewhere, or some obvious reference in the registry, but can’t find a thing. And, yes, I’ve tried uninstalling and re-installing. That did no good. So apparently some setting outside of the program directory is persisting after an uninstall, and it’s keeping the program from launching.

Anyone know how to solve this problem? Thanks!

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CW
Colin_Walls
May 13, 2004
Reset prefs per FAQ.
FF
Fred_Farrell
May 13, 2004
Colin:

Hey — thanks! I couldn’t find any FAQ file (is there supposed to be one?), but there is a reference in the online Help file to resetting preferences. Also in the manual. Of course, I should have thought to look there in the first place, but I wasn’t thinking of… well, I just wasn’t thinking.

This is an annoying situation, however. Adobe makes a reference to how the program can exhibit "unexpected bahvior" due to "damaged preferences." I’m no programmer, but it seems the program shouldn’t be so susceptible to "damage" by simply changing a preference setting to an allowed value. I followed Adobe’s guidelines for selecting an appropriate drive, but apparently my choice was still something of a bomb. You’d think the program would be better protected.

Well, at least I know how to reset everything now. Thanks again!
CC
Chris_Cox
May 14, 2004
Fred – the FAQ is at the top of the forum listing.
CW
Colin_Walls
May 14, 2004
Fred:

I too have wondered [to myself and in this forum] just why PS is so sensitive to any corruption to its prefs data.
DP
Daryl_Pritchard
May 14, 2004
Colin,

Agreed…while this particular problem arising after a change to the scratch disk settings would invite one to think that a preferences reset might help, I’ve long thought it very peculiar that resetting the preferences can often be this wonderful "cure all" for problems that one might never consider related to preference settings.

Daryl
CC
Chris_Cox
May 14, 2004
We wonder about that as well – and we have worked pretty hard to make it difficult to corrupt. But somehow it keeps happening.

Sigh.
ND
Nick_Decker
May 14, 2004
Agreed, and this goes back to my Mac days. They always told me "If Photoshop starts acting funky, delete the prefs."
DP
Daryl_Pritchard
May 16, 2004
Well, for whatever the reason that PS is finicky about corruption of the preferences, at least resetting them does often provide a quick and easy fix…and that’s certainly better than none at all. 🙂

Daryl

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