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chrisdpage7717237
Known Participant
November 2, 2018
Question

Scratch Disks - Primary, secondary, third... USB3 HHD, internal Fusion, USB2 HHD mini...ect

  • November 2, 2018
  • 1 reply
  • 523 views

I found this page to help Optimize performance Photoshop CC

However I am wondering what the best practices are when it comes to what Type of drives should be in which order.

I have an iMac with:

- Internal 1TB Fusion Drive       (530GB Available)

- External 2TB HHD USB3        (1.3 TB Available)

- External 2TB HHDmini USB2 (1.7TB Available)

What is the best practice here?

Q: 1

I'm thinking the order i have here is best, but maybe PS doesn't treat a Fusion Drive the same as an SSD. or does it?

Q: 2

the mini HD. Am I better off NOT connecting this drive?

If there is an answer for this already, sorry i couldn't find it.

Any help is appreciated.

This topic has been closed for replies.

1 reply

D Fosse
Community Expert
D FosseCommunity Expert
Community Expert
November 2, 2018

USB2 is useless - far too slow. USB3 is better, but internal is always best.

I'm not up to speed on what "fusion" means, but if it's equivalent to PCIe/M.2/NVMe, it's the ultimate solution. These drives are so fast that for all practical purposes it's as fast as RAM - and the amount of RAM thus of less importance.

C
chrisdpage7717237Author
Known Participant
November 2, 2018

A Fusion Drive is basically an SSD and HHD in one. Apple made this about 6 years ago.

I think the 2TB drive has about 128GB of SSD. I just don't know if PS uses that at all. that might only be for the OS. I don't know

Assuming PS doesn't recognize the SSD, would using the External as the Primary be the better choice?

D Fosse
Community Expert
D FosseCommunity Expert
Community Expert
November 2, 2018

Ah, OK.

There's no reason SSD shouldn't be recognized - people use that as scratch disk all the time. If you see the full free capacity listed in PS preferences, there shouldn't be any problems.

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