Scratch Disks & Media Cache settings for Macbook Pro

[Fix It In Post]

Hi all,

I'm working on editing a TV show and I have a question about how to maximise premiere pro's performance. I got the latest M1 Max Macbook Pro with 1TB of storage. My video files are stored on an external SSD, and while that is fast, I'm curious as to how I should go about setting up the scratch disks and where I should save the project files. 

The internal SSD is definitely going to be a lot faster than the external, but at the same time, I want to stay organised. So let me know if this would work:

If I keep my scratch disk settings as "same as project folder" and then I create the project folder somewhere in the internal SSD, edit for a while, and then, when I'm done, resave the project file on my external SSD in the same folder that has my raw video and audio files, and then, when I resume editing later, I copy the project file back onto the internal, and then save it onto the external when I'm done, would that work smoothly and would that optimise performance?

Basically, I'm asking if I can save project files temporarily on my internal, crank out an editing session, then save the project file back onto the external with the rest of my files. Would that cause any organisation problems? And would that make a difference in terms of premiere pro's performance? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[Steve Griffiths · Accepted solution]

While not quite the same disk environment (we have fast shared external storage + super fast external cache), that's exactly how we do it at a TV network with multiple suites.

Premiere Pro project files are kept externally along with all media but each project file is copied to the local desktop and opened from there. Once finished it's copied back to it's external location. This is NOT the case when working on a 'shared' Premiere Pro project using 'Production' ... but that probably won't affect you. 

However, is there a better way? Perhaps.

You could leave your project in place on the external drive but manually set your scratch disks in Project Settings to send 'previews', autosaves to the internal drive. Also set your cache location to the internal drive in Preferences.

Outside of the TV network I also work on my own MacBook Pro.

And that's probably what I would do if I had media files on an external drive. Fortunately I have 4TB internal on my MacBook Pro, so I keep everything on the internal while editing and just backup everything to an external drive for safety only.

[Fix It In Post]

Thanks a lot for the response! I was thinking about the 'better' option you mentioned as well - my only concern with setting a separate location for scratch disks is that what would happen if I edit on a different computer, like a PC? (I occasionally edit on a desktop in my computer lab on campus) I'm guessing that premiere pro project would have scratch disks path as a mac directory, but if I open the project on windows, would it ask me to specify a whole new set of scratch disks and would those have to be made again? Thanks!

[Steve Griffiths]

Yes it will ask you to reset the scratch disk locations if you move the project to another computer ... but not that difficult to do.

And if you've only assigned preview and cache files to your internal drive - everything you need will always be on the external drive.

The only time suck (as you note) is having to re-generate previews and cache on the 2nd machine ... but that's not too bad as long as it's not an hour long program.