Photoshop eats C-drive memory even though I'm using a SSD scratch disk

Forum|Forum|2 months ago
November 19, 2025
1 reply
136 views

I'm using Photoshop on a Microsoft Surface Pro 9 and using an SSD with about 1TB as my scratch disk. However, everytime I use Photoshop, it only take a few minutes for it to use up about 10GB on my C-drive. Is there any way to avoid this?

Windows

Ged_Traynor

Community Expert

@Kimota100 how large are the documents you're working on, if you're working on large documents 10GB and more would be quite normal

Noel Orridge

Community Manager

Hi @Kimota100! Thank you for reaching out! As Ged_Traynor has pointed out, it depends on multiple factors, large documents being one of them.

Here are a few things to check as well:

1) Make sure Photoshop is really using your SSD as the main scratch disk.

-Edit > Preferences > Scratch Disks

-Uncheck the C: drive

-Check only your external SSD

-Restart Photoshop

2) Increase RAM usage in Photoshop

-When Photoshop runs low on RAM, it spills into temporary files.

-Edit > Preferences > Performance

-Raise “Let Photoshop Use” to around 70–80% (don’t max it).

Noel

K

Kimota100Author

Participating Frequently

Thanks for the response. I always keep the c-drive unchecked:

Also, I keep my RAM setting at 70%:

I understand that temp files are created during a project, and I try to purge them as I work, but it doesn't make much of a difference. I'm reaching the point where I will remove Creative Cloud apps to give me more memory and then reinstall when I need to use them.

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