Hard Drive / Memory issues / Blue screen of death.

[Chris Collacott]

Hi Brian!

 I use a PC, Win 10, 128GB or RAM, SSD drive for OS, and 6TB drive for Data drive.  I also have a M.2 1TB drive as a "scratch" disk where I point photoshop to use as a temp folder drive.

When editing very large files in photoshop (and this only happens when using photoshop), I would get the blue screen with the code Memory_Management.  I use an internal drive as my "data drive" where the file is saved, and after the system reboots - that drive is not present on my system at all.  The only way to get it back is to do a full cold boot (shut down completely, and restart).  The image files I work with are larger than 4GB that seem to cause the issues and it could be anything from saving the file to brush strokes, adding a layer etc.  The only other time the system blue-screens is when I'm not at the computer, so that sort of contradicts (only when using photoshop)...  but that is how it happens.  

I looked at the event viewer, but it does not give me much info other than what I know... that the computer restarted unexpectedly.   One theory I have is that the hard drive itself may be becoming unstable... so when the system is trying to read/write to the hard drive, that causes it to crash.  I did do a full RAM diagnostic and basic HDD scans.. but they have all come back as a PASS.  I still have to do a long scan on the HDD.

[Brian]

22 hours ago, Chris Collacott said:

One theory I have is that the hard drive itself may be becoming unstable... so when the system is trying to read/write to the hard drive, that causes it to crash.

You are onto something there.

The next step is to see if your SSD drive and M.2 Stick Drive need any firmware updates. The reason that I say this is I had a computer once that I was playing around with, installing Windows Server 2008 R2, etc. It just had a 256GB SSD Drive. Everything would install fine except that it would completely crash, get a BSOD etc., ONLY when I promoted it to a Domain Controller. It would work fine until I ran the DC Promo Wizard. Heck, it even got 90% of the way through the wizard and then BOOM!! BSOD, reformat and reload the whole flipping thing. I went round and round and then tried installing the firmware update as a last-ditch effort and guess what? I was able to finally fully promote it to a Domain Controller after updating the firmware.

So the moral of the story is, stay on top of Firmware updates when it comes to a SSD drives and other flash-based media. I would try that next.

Second thing, I would never use a SSD Drive or any device that is Flash Media based for the Adobe Scratch Disk unless I absolutely had to. It is highly recommended by me to use a traditional 7200 RPM SATA Drive for that. Even a RAID 0 with a couple of 7200 RPM Sata Drives would be better. 1TB or 2TB is fine. Unless you are doing huge panoramas, in which case 4TB or more is recommended. I like Western Digital Caviar Black SATA Drives.

[Chris Collacott]

Thanks for the response.  I will first update the firmware and see what happens.

In your opinion, why would you not use M.2 drives as scratch disks?  The reason why I thought it would be good is the write speed is so much faster than traditional hard drives which are limited to 350MB/s vs 2100MB/s (M.2).  I work on some panoramic images that are 30GB and more..  so doing anything causes the temp files to write like crazy.  If I remember correctly flash type memory has a finite number of reads/writes.. is that perhaps the reason why?  

 

[Brian]

I don't like using flash-based media for a device that has a finite read/write limit. Cache files go on a traditional HD. I'm an old stubborn dog who is reluctant to change. 

If you have an old HD laying around, try it for the PS scratch disk only. See how it works. 

[Brian]

If you really want PS to run faster, have more RAM available, like 32GB+ and have a beefy video card that has lots of its own video memory 4GB+. Adobe's current products are tapping into the video card's processor and memory for a performance boost these days. It's not so much based on the processor and hard drive, though they do play a role. I'm also wondering if the M.2 stick and the way it writes/organizes data may cause issues with PS. It's just a thought and no real evidence to base this idea on. I still say try using a traditional hard drive for the PS scratch disk and see if things work better.