Participating Frequently

P: Video Cache is out of control

Forum|Forum|10 years ago
October 19, 2015
148 replies
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I recently upgraded to Lightroom 6.2.1 So far there has been a lot of fuss over the import dialog... ok, well sure, it has a few issues, but they can be either worked around or just revert back to 6.1.1

I would like to report and ACTUAL bug in 6.2.1

My D drive recently ran out of space... I tried deleting some stuff I didn't need, but still it kept running out of space... So I finally ran windirstat and had a look at it.. Nearly HALF of my drive was FULL of D:/temp/Adobe Local/Lightroom/caches/video/media Cache Files. Now here's the kicker... NONE of these video files are even on the hard drive that has my catalog on it. My lightroom database is on drive L:\ all my lightroom photos and very few lightroom videos are all on L:\ I have a few scans on drive K:\ that I import to lightroom... but these videos are ALL on Drives E:\ and F:\

here's another thing.. I knew Adobe wasted space caching videos, and I do have a GOPRO and I record a little video,.. .VERY LITTLE, maybe 1 video a year... so I don't really want ANY of the video cached.. I will wait for it to load... SO a long time ago, I set my video cache in Preferences>File Handling to the minimum of 1GB (It's was always a BUG to not allow 0GB) I don't want to cache any videos!!!!!!!!!! but here it is.. NEW BUG It's STILL SET TO 1GB!!!!!!!!!!! How is it gobbling up almost 1TB of space when I have it set to 1GB??????????????? So.... here's another problem... I have Cache files that are 4GB for a movie that only takes up 2GB on my hard drive.. what's up with THAT??????????????? I randomly checked a few, and the worst one was a 5GB cache file for a movie that only takes up 750MB on my hard drive... two things, first of all... you NEVER EVER EVER need to cache an entire movie... caching more than 1 minute of a video is useless... if you're going to watch the video in lightroom, it can just play the video on the hard drive fast enough that it doesn't need further caching.. second... DON'T CACHE THE VIDEO AT ALL!!!! just capture the thumbnail of it so you don't have a blank square on the catalog and call it a day... if someone wants to play the video, it will load and play plenty fast enough, Lightroom Can't work with video files, only play them, so WHY BOTHER TO CACHE THE WHOLE THING?? come on Adobe, some COMMON SENSE please!!!!

so now ANOTHER BUG, it's already set to limit video cache to 1GB, so I figure, the new import thing must have built this RIDICULOUS Cache, so I will just Purge it, that will bring it down to 1GB right??/ WRONG!!! It pops up a message saying "Video cache is being purged, this message will be dismissed when the purge is finished... I wait 5 Seconds, and the message disappears, I have NO hard drive activity, and well... I STILL have 1GB of Video Cache files!!!!!!!!!!! Ok, maybe it didn't take.. let me set it to 2GB, then purge.. NOPE! let me set it back to 1GB then purge, NOPE..

ok, so I suspect how to fix it will be, (I Hope) click import, and select the movies folder and then select Ignore source... by the way, how do I add my E:\scans folder as a legitimate source.. I just removed a source, how do I add a nice shortcut button for a new one? ok, now that source is removed, I hope it won't scan it again... now that it will HOPEFULLY not scan that hard drive again, I'll manually delete the offending Video cache.. ok manual delete complete, Ahh my drive can breathe again.. Lets open light room and see what happens.... ok.. open.. lets open the Import dialog because eventually I'll need to import something... oh-o..... What's this??? Scanning Common Locations... OH-NO!!!!!!!!!! first of all E:\Moves and F:\TV are NOT COMMON LOCATIONS FOR PHOTOS Second, I REMOVED THOSE LOCATIONS.. It has a valid location listed, WHY IS IS LOOKING FOR SOMEWHERE ELSE????? Yes it's now scanning VIDEOS and the only reason for it to be taking so long is it went back to my E and F drive... lets look at the cache folder... oh yes, MediaCache already has 3,876 files in it.... not looking very good. Why is it caching files that are not even imported into lightroom??? and why is the cache for each file taking up more space than the entire video??? If you want to make a video cache.. just cache the THUMBNAIL ONLY!!!!! we don't need or want anything else cached.. a thumbnail is all we need cached for our few relevant videos so we don't have a black square in our catalog.

Crap, I'm going to be FORCED to revert to 6.1.1 even though I had every intention of working around the other 6.2.1 issues. TEST TEST TEST Test your software!!! the monkeys you have testing it are not doing a good enough job! send it to me, I'll test it for you, It needs to be tested on a real computer, one that is used for other things.. that way you would KNOW it's finding stupid things like CD cover art and every movie and tv show on my hard drive. I seem to find glaringly obvious issues within one day of using the product. I've been developing software for the last 28 years, I know how it should be done, and how things should be tested, and this is NOT being done AT ALL. Your programmers are sub-standard and are missing the mark, and your non-existent SQA department is NOT testing even the simplest of functions.

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andrewfreeman

Participating Frequently

I think I've discovered a bug with LR: it seems to be creating a cache of videos without it being told to, or even importing the videos. LR also disobeys the preference of how much video cache to keep.

Last week I cleaned up my HD, so I knew exactly how much space I had on it.

Starting it up today I found I had 12GB less so I used a program that analyses the hard disk space.

It showed that in C:\Users\[User]\AppData\Local\Adobe\Lightroom\Caches\Video\[All subfolders]

were numerous cached MP4 files from tutorials that I have collated over the years.

These tutorials are on a memory stick and not on a HD.

Previously I had imported some images from the memory stick and copied them onto the HD via LR, so I knew that was where they had come from. I did not import any videos.

I deleted the video cache and tried the following:

1) Open the folder above
2) Insert the memory stick
3) Open LR (nothing happens)
4) Open the import dialogue box and select the memory stick as source, but not do anything, certainly do not import. (at this point notice that files start appearing in the above folders).
5) Cancel the import dialogue box. (notice that files are still going in the above folders)
6) Watch, with LR still open, the above folders bloat out.

I've repeated this several times with the same effect. As I type this it's still growing. I'm now up to 30GB... and it's still going.

My video cache is set to 1GB.

Anyone else had an issue or can repeat this?

32GB now.....

LR6.1,

Operating system: Windows 7 Home Premium Edition

Version: 6.1 [7601]

Application architecture: x64

System architecture: x64

Logical processor count: 4

Processor speed: 2.5 GHz

Built-in memory: 7862.7 MB

Real memory available to Lightroom: 7862.7 MB

Real memory used by Lightroom: 351.6 MB (4.4%)

Virtual memory used by Lightroom: 328.7 MB

Memory cache size: 2.0 MB

Maximum thread count used by Camera Raw: 1

Camera Raw SIMD optimization: SSE2

System DPI setting: 96 DPI

Desktop composition enabled: No

Displays: 1) 1366x768

Input types: Multitouch: No, Integrated touch: No, Integrated pen: Yes, External touch: No, External pen: Yes, Keyboard: No

D

Uglook

Participant

Hi,
"Library/Caches/Adobe/Lightroom/Video/Media files" cache
folder is eating ALL the available space of my HD. Videos files are constantly scanned and copied in this folder, even after purging the cache, and this directory out of control is now over 150 gb on my small SSD drive.

All my file are on an external storage drive for good reason.

I just can't use this software as it kills my HD space. There should be a way to limit the size of this folder (the option in the preferences DON'T have any effect on this folder) or move it. Better: we should be able to prevent this behavior: there is no point in limiting the size of this folder if the system keeps indexing videos continuously, overwriting files contantly to respect the size limit of the folder.

Disabling video caching would be best.

FeedbackCommunityMember

Inspiring

Serious problem. I have an SSD drive of 120gb which I keep for basic program files windows etc. But LR can max out my drive in minutes which you can imagine is critical for a computer. I have a large internal drive for storage of large files but LR wont let me move the video cache location. Help !!!

FeedbackCommunityMember

Inspiring

In LR CC 2015, I can change the location for the camera raw cache, and limit its size. In the same preference panel, there is an option to limit the video cache, but no option to change its location. Currently, LR puts the video cache on my (small!) boot SSD, where I'd like to have it on my (big!) other SSD. That prevents LR from creating a slide show that combines images and video, as it runs out of cache memory (I observe the drive is full and the files sit in the LR app data folder (this is Windows). I do not even get an error message from LR, it runs forever -- however, once I then kill LR, the drive has enough space again. Currently I cannot use LR for that simple task.

urixl

Participating Frequently

Thank you for your discussion.
I understand Adobe product management's task is to sell more copies of Lightroom via enabling video import in it.
But what can I do with video in Lightroom? Basically, nothing.
There is cheap Adobe Premiere Elements where I can do almost anything with video, why should I bother importing video in Lightroom?
So, the management told the programmers to integrate video import in Lightroom. And there is no way they will take it back.
So, we all have to clean Lightroom video cache folders every time after we browse drives with lots of video with Lightroom.

Or, as I've done - rename dynamiclinkmediaserver.exe to any other name (or delete entirely) hence disabling video import feature.

Just in case, your video cache files are ocated in 2 (TWO! places) (in Windows)
1st is Adobe Premiere/Adobe Lightroom shared cache
C:\Users\<you user name>\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Common\Media Cache Files
2nd is Lightroom only cache
C:\Users\<your user name>\AppData\Local\Adobe\Lightroom\Caches\Video\Media Cache Files

Clear them, rename or delete dynamiclinkmediaserver.exe (make sure it's not currently running and caching another video you wouldn'd import) in
C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Lightroom\Helpers\DynamicLinkMediaServer\dynamiclinkmediaserver\1.0\

and you are free!

TomFidd

Known Participant

Nothing recently that I've seen. Lightroom completely filled my SSD a few days ago - 30Gb of cache. However, the problem is now semi-solved by a quit/open cycle, which triggers a purge of the cache.

FeedbackCommunityMember

Inspiring

Have the same problem... any progress to report?
thanks

jamesr33423836Author

Participating Frequently

Your second option is how video cache is currently working. The only time you get cache files as large or larger than the original is during the import cache bug.

If you do this quick test... purge the cache, then go to a lightroom catalog location where you have videos already imported... then go check out the cache, you will see the video cache files are they are intended to be.. they are defiantly not the entire video, they are smaller files, the largest seemed to be about 1/5 the size of the original video. It is nice to set the preview frame, and I believe the cache is what enables you to do a quick preview by moving your mouse around inside the frame in grid view.

I believe this test shows the cache working properly and while not ideal, it does seem to be under control and not just running wild.   I looked at two videos in a folder with 7 videos in it, and it cached the two I was looking at first, and then everything else in the folder, which I guess makes sense.. perhaps to get me faster response if I did want to go preview something.. but it also cached videos from other folders as well.. a total of 13 videos were cached. so it could have a tighter control and only cache videos that I actually look at. After running my test, my video cache settled in at 610MB and Dynamic Link server terminated by itself.

When looking at the cache, I see that most of the files there has a duplicate.. there are files like gopr0176.mp4 48000.cfa and gopr0176.mp4 48000_1.cfa both identical files. both exactly 119,296K if you got rid of the duplicates my cache would only be 305MB.

The problem is this caching system was designed before SSDs have become so popular and so with everyone having 1TB hard drives for their C drive, they didn't have to care how many writes they made to a drive or how much space they gobbled up. but now we do care about write efficiency and especially about space.   One good solution to both these issues would be to let us choose where the video cache is stored, the way we are able to choose where the camera raw cache is stored. A lot of people with an SSD for their OS also have a mechanical drive for data, so giving the option to move the video cache to the much larger and non-write sensitive data drive makes perfect sense.

There are two very good reasons to prevent the above mentioned duplicates. first, there ARE a lot of users who have nothing but an SSD on their computer. second, if you do have a cache size limit (that works), why fill the allowable space with duplicates, it would be much better to have that allowable space for twice as much content, instead of wasting it with duplicates.

When the cache is running out of control during the import dialog, it's running in a way that is not how it is meant to run. I can safely be completely disabled during the import dialog... you do not need to preview your videos during import, either just import them all and decide later, or if you aren't sure you want to import them, then just go browse your import source with windows and figure it out.

I agree that even with files 1/5 the size of the video, the cache is using up more space than it should for users who are mainly interested in photographs and who have space-sensitive SSDs So I would really like to see an option for the video cache as to cache "thumbnails only" or "video Preview" I would prefer thumbnails only, but I could see where some people might like the existing video preview, so why not give an option in the cache settings box?

It would also be great to allow user control over the cache resolution or frame rate. so if someone did decide to use video preview mode, they could perhaps to 1 frame out of 1000 instead of 1 frame out of 100... just as an example there could be an option to help balance this..

Summary of action items:
1. disable caching during import.. it is not needed and that is the only time the problem shows up
2. fix dynamic link server so it can never run out of control under any circumstance
3. allow an option to cache thumbnails only or cache video preview
4. allow user to define location of video cache same as camera raw cache
5. make the cache more efficient.. there is no need for the duplicate files there.

TomFidd

Known Participant

I don't think a 0 cache limit is the answer, because then you have no video thumbnails (at least that's what happens when you rename the dynamiclinkmediaserver to prevent it from running).

However, fixing the root cause is not merely a matter of the dynamiclinkmediaserver behavior. The very idea of creating a larger cache file for an entire video, when the original is potentially huge already, makes absolutely no sense for Lightroom, which can't edit the video anyway.

One of the following would be a far better approach for Lightroom:
- cache only a thumbnail image for the video, and run playback straight off the original file (if VLC can do it, surely Adobe can figure this out)
- cache the video, but at greatly reduced resolution and/or framerate, so that the cache file is much smaller than the original (this would be handy for quick previews, but seems like overkill)

jamesr33423836Author

Participating Frequently

I've been begging for a Zero setting to be allowed in video cache for months. Seems like it would be easy enough, but still, I'm forced to a 1GB cache for something that is rarely used on my SSD

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