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Known Participant
August 12, 2026

Mac OS Photoshop Keeps Having to be Reinstalled during to Damage

  • August 12, 2026
  • 3 replies
  • 7 views

Mac M4 Max 64GB RAM, 2TB SSD, OS Tahoe 26.5.2, MacBook Pro 4588

I regularly use Dreamweaver, Illustrator, Acrobat and Photoshop, occasionally other products.

I most often use my MacBook closed with an external wide screen, wireless keyboard and mouse, at home, and it works great.

When at home, I have use 2 USB-C ports for everything connected - 1 is for the super wide screen and the other goes to a hub that has various drives connected, ethernet cable from router, external devices like camera, speakers etc.  I always fully power down before unplugging these USB cables, without fail.

When I sometimes switch off the machine and disconnect it from all external devices so that I can use the laptop on its own while travelling for work, I always hit a problem when launching Photoshop for the first time in this configuration.

I get a message that Photoshop is damaged and cannot run, and I have to re-install it.  This is very tedious, and what is really annoying is that I always loose all of my personalised things like settings, themes, and automation scripts during this process.

I work with software and I am a serious Jira user and product owner, so I am can help with logs or more information if you want me to attach them to this ticket.  Please just let me know what you need.  This happened most recently 3 days ago when I travelled away from home on a photo shoot, and the hotel wifi was so poor that it was not really possible to download the installer to complete the process, so I was really hampered in my work.

I do not get this issue with other products from memory, only Photoshop.

Thanks

Steve.

    3 replies

    Claire H.
    Community Manager
    Community Manager
    August 12, 2026

    Hi ​@SewerSleuth, Welcome to the Photoshop Community Forums! The "damaged" error means macOS is invalidating Photoshop's code signature, likely triggered by something writing to the app bundle when your hardware configuration changes.

    Quick fixes:

    • Move scratch disk to internal SSD — if it's set to an external drive on your dock, go to Photoshop > Settings > Scratch Disks and switch to internal storage.

    • Check third-party plug-ins — any plug-in that modifies files inside the .app bundle will break the signature. Try disabling them to isolate the culprit.

    • Verify install location — make sure Photoshop is on your internal drive, not a dock-connected volume.

    Do you have any third-party plug-ins installed, and where is your scratch disk set? I hope this helps! ^CH

    Known Participant
    August 12, 2026

    Scratch disk - I’ve never even heard of this or have any clue what it’s for.  I checked and it’s set to the main HD, default setting I guess.

    I don’t have any plugins.

    Installation is absolutely 100% default on the main drive in the default location.

    Apart from having to re-install the application each time this happens, the part that really frustrates me more than anything is loosing my automation scripts.  Are these not backed up anywhere, or on the cloud.  Remaking these each time this happens is painful.  Can I copy them from somewhere and save myself to a safe location?