What are "scratch discs"?

[AlicePalice]

I keep getting an error message in Elements saying it cant do what I want it to because the scratch discs are full. What does that mean? How can I empty them!?

[frank abramonte]

This is the way it works on a mac, I'm fairly certain is the same on a PC.
Your scratch disc is usually your HD. Elements writes all your actions to the scratch disc and that becomes your history. This allows you to go back and correct a mistake without having to redo the entire work over again.
If you don't have enough available space on your HD you will get this message.
Go to Elements>Preferences>Plug Ins & Scratch Disc here you can find which is your scratch disc. If the start up box is checked then it's your HD.
If you have a backup disc you can assign that as your primary scratch disc or as a secondary scratch disc.
Also, if you quit the application and/or reboot you will free up all the disc space that was previously being occupied and start all over again.
If the condition is chronic then I suggest you get a firewire external backup drive and assign it as the scratch disc. The response time will probably be a little slower than accessing your HD, but it will allow you to do more work on a project before getting the message. Or you may not get the message anymore.
Perhaps a PC person will come along with additional info.

[Wendy]

Hi Alice ...

Just close down Elements and then reopen it that should clear your scratch disk (it certainly does on the Mac)

An easy way of describing a scratch disk is to think of doing complex mental arithmetic ... when your brain gets too full of the numbers and you can't cope with anymore then you have a pad next to you where you can jot things down.

That pad is just what a scratch disk is ... when Elements doesn't have enough memory to do a particular task then it uses the scratch disk as a temporary store of some of the information :)

I have an internal 500GB hard drive which is completely empty and I use that as a scratch drive. Even so I managed to fill it today and had to close down Photoshop before I could continue.


Wendy :)

[Brewer]

A friend was getting a new computer, and gave me his old one. I took out the 70GB hard drive and put it in my computer, reformat it, and assigned it as my scratch disk. PE runs a little faster.