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Participant
November 6, 2025
Question

Could not initialize Photoshop Elements

  • November 6, 2025
  • 1 reply
  • 57 views

I have Premiere Elements 2024 and an earlier version that I also use. There has never been a problem until now when I tried to open either version, I received an error message: "Could not initialize Photoshop Elements because the disk is full."

I have no idea what this means. I pay for these and I want to use them. What can I do? Please help!

1 reply

Glenn 8675309
Legend
November 7, 2025

It means, typically the hard disk they are installed on is basically full.    A reasonable rule of thumb: Keep at least 10% of your capactiy free- it 's used for temp files. 

It can also mean that whatever disk you are using for your adobe temp directory is full- often just choosing another partion is enough. 

If on windows:  I first search for *.tmp files on my c: drive.   The asteric means "find all the the files that end with tmp."  Find them, and delete them. 

It sound's like it's time to get a bigger hard drive:  SSD is the way to go.   A new hard drive in your case needs to be bigger than the old one- usually this means going from 1 TB to 2TB, or larger.

I purchased some software that lets me transfer stuff to a new hard drive- you simply cannot drag and drop program folders.

A big space hog for me was all my picutres:  JPG, PNG, and PSD's-- something around 125GB- so I moved them to an external hard drive.

I also purchased an expansion card, which lets me add new hard drives.   One with 4 ports in it- I can plug in two more hard drives.   Curently I have 4 Hard drives- 3 are SSD's (solid state drives- no moving parts) and one is a regular HHD- plus I have one external 3  TB HHD.   I've got copies of copies of backups.   If I start to run out of space (One program alone MS flightsim 2020 currently hogs up 345GB of space) I will just buy another SSD, plug it in and Im good. 

IF YOU HAVE A LAPTOP:  You can clone a small hdd to a larger hdd-- SSD is the way to go.   Use an adaptor to clone the old hard drive to to new one (connected thru a USB port), then swap out the old hard drive in the laptop with the newly cloned hard drive.   It might take a while to do- the last time I cloned a 2 TB SSDd to another SSD using a usb port- I just started the cloning process, and went to bed. 

I also have 3 ssd's and 3 HHD's just sitting in a desk drawer- I play with those. 


Glenn 8675309
Legend
November 7, 2025

I just  ran ccleaner and freed up around 20 GB of garbage.  

I have around 194 GB free on a 2 TB SSD, for me: I try to not go below 150 GB free, reason?  Just because. 
I have 209GB of images- various formats on my c: drive- nothing I will ever need to move- I don't rely on Organizer so I'm not concerned with that.

IF YOU WANT TO MOVE IMAGES AROUND- LIKE TO A DIFFERENT DRIVE:  Do that from within Organizer, if you rely upon organizer.`