Hi All, I have photoshop CS2 on my desktop computer (XP). The hard drive is partitioned and I have photoshop scratch disk on its own partition (10GB). I have photoshop CS3 on my laptop (Vista Premium, 2GB ram). There is only one hard drive in the laptop. It is already partitioned into three – C drive: windows + programs, S drive: system files, X drive: recovery. My question is do I keep my scratch drive on the C drive or can/should I partition an external hard drive (250GB) and put my photoshop scratch disk on there? The external drive is via USB. Thanks in advance.
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Thanks for the quick reply Dave. I read elsewhere that you should not place the scratch disk on the same partition the windows page files are. My only option is to use an external drive as I don’t want to mess with the internal hard drive which has already been partitioned into three (when I bought the computer).
I read elsewhere that you should not place the scratch disk on the same partition the windows page files are.
Not quite correct, it shouldn’t be on the same physical drive. Partitioning makes no difference whatsoever in this context. Pagefile and scratch disk will still compete for the same read/write head.
USB is way too slow to be effective as scratch disk. If you have FireWire, or even better, eSATA, that will work. If none of those are possible, make sure your HD has enough free, contiguous and defragmented space at all times.
‘What’s the difference between "Windows" and "System files"?’
I don’t know. The laptop hard drive is 120GB. In disk management it gives an un-named volume as status Healthy (EISA configuration) size 9.5GB, free 9.5GB. Elsewhere in (I think) disc cleanup it names the drive (X) Recovery. I’m guessing this is to do with my recovery disc in case of mishaps. The next volume is Vista (C): total size 101GB, free 59GB then System (S): total size 1.5GB, free 1.4GB.
I keep my photoshop pics on the external (250GB) drive but I do accept that I cannot use it as a scratch disk. As Dave says, ‘if you have only one drive you don’t have a choice’.
p.s I forgot to say in my original post that my desktop computer has two internal hard drives and my scratch disk is NOT on the same disk as Windows XP.
Previous comments about inadequate performance from USB external drives are accurate.
USB2 drives, including the faster thumb drives, are considerably faster, and may have adequate performance to use as a swap drive. For a notebook, the throughput may be better than the notebook’s internal drive. I use a free program called DiskTT to compare performance.
I use a free program called DiskTT to compare performance.
good tip on the program cm, i’ll check it out tonight! i have a 500gb seagate i just added and it’d be interesting to see how it stacks up to the internals on the desktop and to the internal in my notebook. thanks.
If you have an eSATA port and drive then data will transfer to the external SATA drive at the same rate as it would to an internal hard drive and across the same system bus. The latter is not the case for USB or Firewire of any ilk. Maximize system RAM for the biggest boost in performance and set Photoshop to use all available RAM and disable unneeded background programs and processes for the biggest boost in PS performance, more than scratch disks et al can provide. The advantage of multicore CPUs is that they will divert some of this background crap to the other cores and PS can use one (rarely 2) of the cores, but all the background crap in Windows and Apple OSes still slows things down. Regardless of OS I guarantee if you uninstall Itunes you will see a performance boost in your machine, particularly a laptop (I use Itunes but it is the epitome of a resource hog that eats system resources even though you are not directly using the program). Most people think they are going to get a boost in using CS4 on Vista 64 with more than 3gbs of RAM. They will be wrong but they will convince themselves they are right because all that RAM is finally getting "used". Most people’s file sizes are not big enough to bump into performance hits with an optimized 32 bit system as it stands now. The most interesting promised aspect of CS4 is that it will tap into the parallel processing power of a 3d GPU: the Radeon 4870 in my desktop can outperfom the Intel Quad Core CPU in terms of sheer processing power but lies unused outside of 3d games. I eagerly anticipate the independent tests of this and hope that third party plug-in vendors follow suit (applying filters/plug-ins is where the performance boost should be seen).
You wrote, ‘Previous comments about inadequate performance from USB external drives are accurate.’
You then wrote, ‘USB2 drives, including the faster thumb drives, are considerably faster,and may have adequate performance to use as a swap drive. For a notebook,the throughput may be better than the notebook’s internal drive.’
Me no comprendo? Are you saying external drives on a notebook may be used as a scratch drive? The external drive I use is a western digital My Passport (250GB) USB2 drive. My only choice is to use that or the C drive in the notebook.
Are you saying external drives on a notebook may be used as a scratch drive?
I think he’s saying that usb2 is acceptable (but i’d still be wary). the drive may be usb2 but is your notebook? iirc, part of the usb2 spec is to degrade gracefully, that is, if plugged into a usb 1 port, the usb2 device should slow down.
One factor is the size of image files that you will be manipulating. Large files need a large, fast scratch drive and I don’t know if a USB2 connection will be fast enough. And the External drive would always have to be on when you used PS.
You could always make one of the internal primary scratch and the external secondary.
This is my first topic that I have started here and I must apologise for not giving the full information (but I’m learning). My notebook is only three months old, has windows Vista Premium and is USB2 compliant. There are three USB sockets, I have an epson R800 printer plugged into one, my external drive plugged into another and my optical mouse & keyboard dongle plugged into the third. I should add that the external drive is powered by the USB. There is no mains power source. I have taken the battery out of the notebook as I have it running off the mains power. With that setup do you think it possible to put the scratch disk onto the external drive?
My images range in size from 5MB to 150MB depending on what I’m doing. Like I wrote in the opening topic I have a desktop computer with CS2 and an epson 1290S attached. Just now I do almost all my work on the desktop and I’m just evaluating CS3 on the notebook.
You wrote, ‘You could always make one of the internal primary scratch and the external secondary.’
I don’t understand that? The consensus here in the topic is that you should not have the windows page files & the scratch disk on the same drive. Also all the partitions on the internal drive are to do with the operating system. I don’t want to meddle with them.
i’d try the program curvemeister recommend to check the times of the drives. if the external hanging off the laptop is close to or better than the internal, you should have no problem, other than having to make sure that the drive is connected every time you run photoshop.
This is my first topic that I have started here and I must apologise for not giving the full information (but I’m learning).
no problem at all wille! welcome to the adobe photoshop forum! 🙂
Thanks for the welcome. I might just try that program DiskTT. I’ll google it. The external drive is on all the time the notebook is switched on, I don’t see the need to switch it off. Anyway there isn’t an on/off switch on the drive (I know I could switch it off through Windows but like I say I’m not concerned about it).
I googled the program DiskTT and downloaded it from a website called ‘Snapfiles’. I then ran it through an on line virus checker ‘Virus Total’. I got one hit out of 36 (suspicious file). I took the gamble and ran it. I don’t pretend to understand the program but here are the results. Can anyone interpret them?
Internal drive (C): sequential write: 3563MB in 152.12sec = 23.4MB per second sequential read: 3563MB in 104.93sec = 34MB per second random access: 3563MB in 1.11sec = 3215.7MB per second
External drive (D): sequential write: 3663MB in 256.92 sec = 14.3MB per second sequential read: 3663MB in 160.23sec = 22.9MB per second random access: 3663MB in 1.15sec = 3174.2MB per second
I don’t know why it added a 100MB to the (D) drive but it did. Looking at the result it appears that the (C) drive wins. Anyone any thoughts?
you internal is about 40% faster in reading, and 34% faster in reading.
i’m not saying DON’T do it, you might certainly try it since you already have the drive, then you can decide for yourself if it seems to hold you up. create a file that’s around the largest you use and play around with it. see if you start seeing lags or delays.
very interesting test. please let us know, if you decide to play around with it, if it seems to work for you or if it’s too slow.
I set my external drive as the scratch disk, opened a 250MB psd and played around with a couple of actions and filters and everything ran smoothly. There were no stalls or hangups. I’m very impressed so I think I’ll use the external drive as a scratch disk. I opened up the external drive and there was a photoshop temporary file of 933MB. Anyway thank you guys for your comments & suggestions. I’ve got to say (reading all the topics here)that this is a great forum. muchas gracias!
Update on my external scratch drive. When I bought the drive I ran all the way home with my new toy and quickly plugged it in to the notebook. Vista recognised it and I immediately transferred over 150GB of backup copies of my pics that I had burned to DVD’s….I then read the instructions. The drive was formatted as FAT32 and of course Vista is NTFS. I promised myself that I would reformat it someday. Today I burned my stuff to DVD’s and formatted the drive as NTFS. I then partitioned it as a 200+GB (D)drive and a 34GB (F)scratch drive.
I ran DiskTT to see if there were any difference in the speed compared to what I wrote in message #17. Here is the result.
Internal drive (C): sequential write: 3036MB in 124.35sec = 24.4MB per second sequential read: 3036MB in 95.57sec = 31.8MB per second random access: 3036MB in 0.95sec = 3189.1MB per second
External drive (F): sequential write: 3036MB in 173.49sec = 17.5MB per second sequential read: 3036MB in 134.40sec = 22.6MB per second random access: 3036MB in 0.97sec = 3136.4MB per second
bear in mind that the packet it wrote/read (3036MB) is less than the previous test (3563MB/3663MB)
Update on my external scratch drive. When I bought the drive I ran all the way home with my new toy and quickly plugged it in to the notebook. Vista recognised it and I immediately transferred over 150GB of backup copies of my pics that I had burned to DVD’s….I then read the instructions. The drive was formatted as FAT32 and of course Vista is NTFS. I promised myself that I would reformat it someday. Today I burned my stuff to DVD’s and formatted the drive as NTFS. I then partitioned it as a 200+GB (D)drive and a 34GB (F)scratch drive. I ran DiskTT to see if there were any difference in the speed compared to what I wrote in message #17. Here is the result.
Internal drive (C): sequential write: 3036MB in 124.35sec = 24.4MB per second sequential read: 3036MB in 95.57sec = 31.8MB per second random access: 3036MB in 0.95sec = 3189.1MB per second
External drive (F): sequential write: 3036MB in 173.49sec = 17.5MB per second sequential read: 3036MB in 134.40sec = 22.6MB per second random access: 3036MB in 0.97sec = 3136.4MB per second
bear in mind that the packet it wrote/read (3036MB) is less than the previous test (3563MB/3663MB)
Any thoughts?
This is not surpring since the external drive has the overhead of the PCI bus plus the overhead of the USB. The internal drive has only the overhead of the PCI bus. I would expect the read/write buffer to be the same for all methods. Where did you find DiskTT? My search didn’t find it. Jim
Hi All, I have photoshop CS2 on my desktop computer (XP). The hard drive is partitioned and I have photoshop scratch disk on its own partition (10GB). I have photoshop CS3 on my laptop (Vista Premium, 2GB ram). There is only one hard drive in the laptop. It is already partitioned into three – C drive: windows + programs, S drive: system files, X drive: recovery. My question is do I keep my scratch drive on the C drive or can/should I partition an external hard drive (250GB) and put my photoshop scratch disk on there? The external drive is via USB. Thanks in advance.
if it works for YOU that’s what counts. it’s good to know that it’s possible to get external usb2 to act as a scratch in some cases. good show on the research! 🙂
IMHO, (yes, I AM Ho :)) eSATA is the only (reasonably priced) viable bus for an external scratch volume. If you can’t go that route, test your USB drive against your internal using Photoshop as the testing tool, not some synthetic benchmark.
Hi Ho (I feel a song coming on), What you say about eSATA is correct, but unfortunately neither my notebook or external drive is eSATA so that route is a nono. All I want is a solution using the equipment I have. I am testing my drives using Photoshop and I have had no problems usng either drive. What do you suggest – (C) drive or external as the scratch disk? What scratch disk do others use who are using a notebook?
"use the one that gives you the best performance. If it’s a toss-up, use the one with the most free space."
That is the reason I started this topic. As it stands just now the (C) drive has 55GB free but it is the windows drive with the page files. The external drive I have set to 34GB but I could set it to 200+GB. Surely 34GB is enough for a scratch disk? Also if in the future I get problems using the external scratch I can always go back to the (C) drive. Thanks for the input.
The answer is maybe. It depends on how large your working files normally are. I have a 40GB partition (on my 3rd internal HD) as my primary Scratch and it overflows from time to time. I have the other two drives available for Scratch when that happens.
Ho, you have three internal HD’s – I’m talking about a notebook. What would you do – use the internal (C) drive or the external?
Dave, I’m a digital photographer (at least I hope so), my files are from a Nikon D70S about 6MB in RAW. Usually I’m just cleaning them up and enhancing them and printing out A4 size. Sometimes I stretch to A3 with my epson 1290S if I’m feeling creative. I could use the entire external drive but my archives (150GB) are on it. I just picked the 34GB scratch out of thin air – I thought if I did that I would still have 200GB+ for my archives. At the end of the day if 34GB is sufficient then fine, if not I’ll increase it.
Since you like experimenting, why not open a few of your usual raw files in PS and take a look in Explorer at the size of the Photoshop Tempxxxx files on the drive. Then do a bit of editing and see what effect this has on the file(s).
You can also see the scratch size for an image by picking the appropriate option in the little area at the bottom left of the image window.
willie, is the external partitioned? (sorry if i missed that). in this day and age i wouldn’t partition (nearly) any drive less than a TB or three. i’ve got a 500GB usb2 external for backup, use folders, not partitions.
Ho, you have three internal HD’s – I’m talking about a notebook. What would you do – use the internal (C) drive or the external?
Use the faster of the two drives (real-world Photoshop speed). The fastest performing drive is always the first choice. Your notebook’s drive will be faster than your USB externalor at least it should be.
However…
With only 55GB free on your system drive, you run the risk of running out of Scratch space. Monitor your Scratch usage for a few days to get a feel for where the file typically peaks during your work sessions. You *might* get away with using the system drive.
Safest option: Use the USB drive and forget about it. If Photoshop seems unbearably slow, it’s time for new hardware.
Safest option: Use the USB drive and forget about it. If Photoshop seems unbearably slow, it’s time for new hardware.
agreed.
If Photoshop seems unbearably slow, it’s time for new hardware.
yes, but conversely, if photoshop performs as well as you expect it to (not lagging or stuttering) then you’ve found a workable solution for your workload.
John, I forgot about the scratch size for an image in photoshop. Thanks. 141.6M/3.18G – that opened my eyes – I’ve never seen a file (scratch)as big as that. I have a 250MB psd – I’ll open it and check.
Hoy, that’s what I’ll do, use the external and if I ever get problems then I’ll use the (C) drive.
Dave, sometimes I can’t see the wood for the trees. I had it in my head that an exclusive partition is the best for a scratch disk (apart from having a complete disk to itself). Of course you are right. I don’t need the partition, if I use the whole of the external drive and keep my archives on it it will still give me about 100GB as a scratch. Obviously it will get smaller as I add my pics to it, but it will take some time and I will just keep monitoring it. muchas gracias amigos!
John, I forgot about the scratch size for an image in photoshop. Thanks. 141.6M/3.18G – that opened my eyes – I’ve never seen a file (scratch)as big as that. I have a 250MB psd – I’ll open it and check.
Hoy, that’s what I’ll do, use the external and if I ever get problems then I’ll use the (C) drive. Dave, sometimes I can’t see the wood for the trees. I had it in my head that an exclusive partition is the best for a scratch disk (apart from having a complete disk to itself). Of course you are right. I don’t need the partition, if I use the whole of the external drive and keep my archives on it it will still give me about 100GB as a scratch. Obviously it will get smaller as I add my pics to it, but it will take some time and I will just keep monitoring it. muchas gracias amigos!
You might want to partition the outboard drive, for two reasons: 1) if you share the scratch drive with other files you will eventually run into fragmentation problems, and 2) if you have a partition bigger than 137GB then you need to make sure that LBA – large block addressing – is enabled.
OS’s from Win2000 SP2 and above are LBA capable, but inexplicably, the default is ‘off’.
The insidious bit is that a drive bigger than 137GB without LBA will work quite normally until the 137GB limit is passed, then the file addresses wrap back to the start, overwriting other files.
Standard block addresses use a 28-bit number for disk addressing, but LBA uses 48-bit addressing. Google it for more info.
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