After Effects seemingly uses up over 4GB of storage just by opening

[andrewr45739960]

I've been using after effects for years now, but I've recently come across an issue that's almost halted my entire usage of the software.

I frequently have low disk space, but I'll usually have somewhere around 4-6GB free on my c drive. Now I have 4 or 5 other drives in my PC with TBs of available storage, but my C drive is only 128GB. Annoying, I know. 

Anyway, frequently when using AE, I'll look at my C drive and see that the available 4-6GB of free storage is now GONE and I get error messages telling me that I'm out of storage. This will happen especially when running ram previews or using rotobrush. Then, when I close After effects, the 4Gb is right back on my SSD.

***Now here's the kicker: I've set EVERYTHING to be stored in my G DRIVE, including my media cache, autosave, etc. Also, clearing my disk cache does NOT redeem my storage. Only once I close AE does the 4GB magically reappear.

WHAT IS RANDOMLY CONSUMING MY STORAGE AND HOW DO I MOVE IT TO A DIFFERENT DRIVE?

[andrewr45739960]

Also forgot to mention, AE isn't even installed on my C drive

[Mylenium]

It's not random, it's a normal Windows thing in conjunction with some general stuff like the CC Libraries and activation system. Windows itself will reserve at least 2 GB as soon as you launch any app for hibernation caches and the rest is usurped ball those tiny auxiliary processes. You need to face the reality that your situation is simply unworkable and you seriously need a bigger system drive.

Mylenium 

[nubnubbud]

okay, uhh, brief intro- AE is old, super old, older than cores in computers, older than GPU's, older than 2gb of RAM being a lot, blah blah..

AE is supper sloppy with media storage. it just is, it throws files around and there's quite often a cache in the install location. It shouldn't be swap space, as that space is a pre-allocated at the partition level, or should be, on windows. but... yeah, I had a 256gig boot drive for a while, and I did run into this before my troubled upgrade. I think an upgrade is in order in your case. It's only a hundred dollars, which I would say is a pittance considering some of the other experts here told me to just buy a mac or a new computer with a new gpu.I personally eat storage like nobody's business though, so I need to pace myself.