Lightroom Classic accesses original files along with Smart Previews during browsing

[Vlad Sobosov]

Dear colleagues, I found what seems strange to me in Lightrooms beaviour when Smart Previews (SP) are in place.

LR Classic 12 and 13, Windows 10.

Original files stored on Q: and the catalogue with SP on P: When I go paging down through thumbnails in library browse mode, I see in that the drive with original files in extensively workloaded. When I put Q: down and disconnect it, browsing goes as it expected, smoothly and obviously with out the original files. Editing is available, so SP are all ok. But when I bring down the drive with original files, LR again involves it into browsing.

Any idea, what would LR been after looking on the drive which I'd expect being avoided until generation of output files? Do I get any advantage of using fast SSD with the catalog and SP if it still goes to a slower HDD storage with the rel files?

[Vlad Sobosov]

Sorry, some corrections: "...I see ... that the drive with original files IS extensively workloaded...", "browsing goes as .. expected", "But when I bring the drive up...".

[JohanElzenga]

If Lightroom Classic encounters a preview that is not up to date, it will rebuild it based on the original if that original is available. That is regardless of a smart preview that may be available too. Only in the Develop module you can give using smart previews priority over using originals. That is a setting in the preferences.

[Vlad Sobosov]

I see. I also would mention that this repeatedely happen each time even just after simply rebooting Lightroom.