LARGE Camera Raw Cache Causing SLOOOOW LR Startup?

In an attempt to try and speed things up while using LR2, which has been operating very slow on my Mac G5, I increased the Camera Raw cache size to 20gb. I have a massive abundance of HD space and didn't think the increase would hurt. Lately when starting LR2, the program takes upwards of 8 minutes to start up (no joke, I timed it using my stop watch). Is it because of the large cache? Outside of the slow startups, is there any benefit in having a cache that large? I honestly don't notice any useful performance gains since making the cache bigger.
Computer specs:
-Mac G5 dual 2.3ghz
-6.5gb ram
-200gb free space on System disk
-400gb free on disk where cache resides
-1 LR catalog, ~15,000 images on another separate disk, 110gb free on that disk
-All disks are SATA II 7200rpm, in a Firmtek 5PM SATA II external enclosure

Do what Miss Frizzle always says: Experiment!

Similar Messages

QQ about Camera Raw Cache and why mine is empty

Quick question about Camera Raw Cache:
Mine is empty. Always.
I've read that the Develop module stores information on photos it opens in the Camera Raw Cache, while the Library module stores its previews in the LRDATA directory adjacent to the Lightroom Catalog. I've also read that the former can be stored anywhere and is limited to a size specified in Preferences, while the latter must accompany the Catalog file and has no cap on its size.
So why is my Camera Raw Cache always empty? I go in and out of the Develop module, edit, switch among photos within Develop, view images at 1:1 and larger within Develop, etc. Shouldn't that cause cache entries to be generated in the Camera Raw Cache? I've tried moving my Camera Raw Cache from within Preferences, and I have the size of the cache set to 30 GB with plenty of room on the drive, but it's still always empty.

Ah, yes. I shoot only JPGs. Funny how none of the documentation or tutorials mention that. The ones I've seen all imply that Lightroom uses Raw format internally when editing photos and that's why it needs a Camera Raw Cache for holding those internal files in the Develop module. I thought whenever I opened a photo in Develop, Lightroom was converting my JPGs interally to a proprietary Camera Raw format for editing them. Guess not, then.
So where does Lightroom hold all of its internal files for JPGs that I'm editing in the Develop module? Does it use the same files it generates in the Library module for 1:1 previews? (That's so different from what the tutorials say -- for example, around 11:00 on Julieanne Kost's tutorial on optimizing Lightroom, she never says she's only talking about working with Raw format.)

Lightroom using Adobe Camera Raw Cache

Just noticed I have a lot of large files accumlating in C:\Documents and Settings\myusername\Local Settings\Application Data\Adobe\CameraRaw\Cache.
Is this normal? Should it clean out automatically (does not seem to be) or can the size be limited?
Appreciate any insight.
~Bob

Hi Bob,
SIze limit on the camera Raw cache file is controlled in the FIle Handling tab of the Lightroom Preferences (Lightroom|preferences). The default setting for LR 2.0 is 1 GB. BE aware that this setting is also controlled by any other Adobe application that supports Camera Raw (Photoshop CS3, Bridge, etc.). So, if it is changed to 4 GB in Bridge, it is 4 GB in LR. It is a cache used by the Camera Raw and it speeds up Camera Raw applications. When you have finished, you can purge the cache at any time by pressing the Purge Button in the same section that contains the maximum cache size.
Dave Huss

Curious question about Lightroom previews and Camera Raw Cache

Posted in the Flickr Lightroom Group as well:
I have noticed something about the Lightroom (3.6) previews and Camera Raw cache that have me puzzled.
I create a brand new empty catalog and purge the Camera Raw Cache.
Then I import ONE Nikon RAW (NEF) file with dimensions 2592 x 3872 (10 megapixels - 10,036,224 pixels).
Next I export that NEF file to an uncompressed 8-bit TIFF file. You would expect the size of that TIFF file to be roughly 30 megabytes (10 megapixels x 3 bytes per RGB value) and in fact the TIFF file is 30,135,830 bytes in size. If you export the same TIFF file but specify ZIP compression the resulting file size is 10,834,038 bytes. Obviously the compression obtained here is going to be highly specific to the image but so far no surprises.
During import I specify render 1:1 previews and I go into Loupe mode and view the entire image at 1:1 size. I also visit the develop module and do a bunch of manipulations on the image but no cropping.
At the conclusion of all of that I exit from Lightroom and examine the size of the Camera Raw Cache folder as well as the Lightroom previews folder. It would be my expectation that the previews folder should have a rendered full image and that the Camera Raw Cache should also have a rendered form of the raw data. What would you expect the size of those respective folders to be?
In fact - in my trials the previews folder totals a mere 1,675,264 bytes and the Camera Raw Cache which contains one DAT file corresponding to the one cached image is merely 267,374 bytes. This does not seem like nearly enough bits to preserve the rendered image nor is there a full size image tucked away in the actual catalog either - that file is not large enough to contain that. And yet I can use Loupe mode at 1:1 size and move from image to image with no loading delays (even when importing multiple files).
I'm wondering if I've missed something obvious in my analysis and if not, whether someone might care to speculate as to what magic Adobe is practicing here. Even if we grant them some special algorithm to compress their previews I don't see how they can achieve a compression so much greater than the ZIP-compressed TIFF file achieves.
And for those that might think to ask - I've repeated these experiments with multiple raw images and on both the PC and MAC platforms.
I look forward to some answers or interesting theories or perhaps someone might replicate the experiment and report findings.

MadMan and Hal - thanks so much.
So that was my D'Oh moment of what I was missing - the use of re-rendered JPGS as previews. That certainly does fit with the file sizes I am seeing. I had naively assumed that the previews might have tried to preserve the full fidelity of the image - But as you suggest that full fidelity is likely only there in the develop module.
This perhaps explains another observation from the Develop module - moving from one image to another might display "Loading" either briefly or across a longer duration. My guess is that the length of the loading process might have to do more with what is cached in RAM than cached on disk in the camera raw cache. More of a shame then that 64-bit Lightroom on 64-Bit Windows cannot grab more RAM than it seems to do at present.

LR4 and Camera RAW Cache folder

Hi all,
I know many are complaining about LR4 responsiveness and how LR3 was faster in response.
Like many others, I have a new and very fast PC, however it seems that LR4 is crawling when it comes to navigtaing through images.
I've done my share bit of tweaking LR4 to get the best optimized results such as, Optimize catalogs, Render 1:1 previews, Increase Camera Raw cache size to 30GB, move the Camera Raw Cache folder next to the catalog folder as Adobe recommends and what not.
LR4 didn't become more responsive, however I did notice something strange, which is the topic of this post.
While filddeling around with LR4 performance issues on my PC, I've noticed that even though I have over 20,000 images in my PC and some folders are rendered with 1:1 previews, the Camera Raw Cache folder is empty.
This might explain why rendering 1:1 previews didn't affect LR4 while browsing images.
For example, right after I've created the 1:1 previews (whether it's straight from import or after the fact) I'm browsing back and forth during this browsing action, LR4 renders the 2 images each and every single time I view them - that beats the purpose of using the cache folder.
So one comes to think how could it be that with such a catalog size and 1:1 previews, the camera raw cache folder remains empty? And could this be the cause that makes LR4 render each and every single image time and time again regardless if I viewed the image a second ago?
Thanks.
Gil.

Firstly, to clarify, Previews and Camera RAW files are not the same thing. Previews are simple, just jpeg representations of the raw file, at various resolutions used principally in the Library module and filmstrip.
Camera RAW cache files are used by the Develop module and contain the output from some initial RAW processing. I don’t remember exactly what processing but about half that LR needs to do to render an image. This processing is done regardless of what you actually do in the Develop module so it is done once, then cached. This is why the “Loading” appears to take longer when you initially browse to an image in the Develop module. The rest of the RAW processing (about half) is done every single time you browse away from the image and back again. This is why you always get CPU spikes when browsing through images in the Develop module. So you can create as many 1:1 previews as you like, this will have no impact whatsoever on image rendering performance in the Develop module.
So to answer your question specifically,
Can you be more specific about when exactly does this folder being populated?
A camera raw cache file is generated when you browse to an image whilst in the Develop module. Files continue to be generated until the cache size limit is reached, then as new files are generated, the oldest are deleted.

I just found an error in the file name for my Camera Raw Cache file. How do I correct it?

I just found an error in the file name for my camera raw cache file. The error is in my username. I don't know how to correct the error or if I should just leave it. I'm not sure where my cache file is stored on my computer. Any help would be appreciated.
Thank you

Since you are on a Mac if when you first set up your account you left out the i in Wilson nothing you do will change that. The REAL account name will always be alicewlson. Once an account is created you can't actually change the name of it. You can change the name that is displayed but not the REAL account name.
Simplest thing to do is stop worrying about it. Everything is as it should be, that is except Wilson being spelled without the i.
Lilac50 wrote:
When I searched finder for "alicewlson" I found a long list of files like this:
2014-07-22 12.50/File005.nef[15:16:35.212] (debug) src/ImageLoader.cpp:363: File: /Users/alicewlson/Recovered/2014-07-22 12.50/File002.nef[15:18:02.173] (debug) src/StoreXMLFile.cpp:21: /Users/alicewlson//.rpro/rpro.cfg
I believe I made the error in my user name when I first got my computer a year ago. I then corrected it under my user name but not in my Lightroom files. I also looked for files with a .lrdata extension and didn't find any.

LR 5.5 - Camera RAW Cache settings reset non-stop

Lightroom doesn’t remember the folder path in Camera RAW Cache Settings section in File Handling tab in Preferences window. I want to set my own folder Camera Raw Cache and its maximum size but every time Lightroom sets default path (C:/Users/Name/AppData/Local/Adobe/CameraRaw/Cache/) and also maximum size as 1GB. When I set all the parameters Camera RAW Cache and click OK or switch between the tabs in Lightroom preferences window or restart Lightroom and I return to the File Handling tab all the data is reset to default. The same happens when I want to change the parameters Camera RAW Cache from Adobe Bridge and Photoshop.
Second question:
When I use DNG file format with Embed Fast Load Data option in the folder Camera RAW Cache the “DAT” files doesn’t appear. Is it connected with the use of Embed Fast Load Data option? When I use the original NEF files from my Nikon “DAT” files appear.
[Win 7 64-bit, LR 5.5, Web&Design CS6]

I have no trouble placing my Camera Raw cache where I want to put it. Perhaps deleting your Preferences file would help with that problem.
Yes, if you embed fast-load data in your DNGs, LR will use that instead of the CR Cache.
Hal

PS CS6 / Bridge / ACR 8.5 - Camera RAW Cache settings reset non-stop

Adobe Bridge/Photoshop doesn’t remember the folder path in Camera RAW Cache Settings in Camera RAW Preferences window. Every time when I want to set my own folder Camera Raw Cache and its maximum size, I click OK and return to Camera RAW Preferences, I see default path (C:/Users/Name/AppData/Local/Adobe/CameraRaw/Cache/) and maximum size as 1GB.
[Win 7 64-bit, LR 5.5, Web&Design CS6]

Problem is solved!
I delete folder "C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\CameraRaw\". Then I start Lightroom and I pick my own folder in Camera Raw Cache Settings, set 20GB size and click OK. Now everything works fine. Bridge and PS also fine.

Camera Raw Cache location? SSD or HDD

Where should I set up my Camera Raw Cache location? (SSD or HDD)
My System Configuration
C Drive(SSD): Windows & Lightroom software
D Drive(HDD): Image files & LR catalog file
I know SSD has fast speed but fragmentation occurs. whereas HDD speed is slow, but fragmentation does not occur.
I'd like to know set up my Camera Raw Cache location.

Where should I set up my Camera Raw Cache location? (SSD or HDD)
My System Configuration
C Drive(SSD): Windows & Lightroom software
D Drive(HDD): Image files & LR catalog file
I know SSD has fast speed but fragmentation occurs. whereas HDD speed is slow, but fragmentation does not occur.
I'd like to know set up my Camera Raw Cache location.

Lightroom 3 and Adobe Camera Raw cache files

Lately in: User/Library/Caches/Adobe Camera Raw I've been getting tons of (cache0000019858.dat) " just an example of one of the many files"
Are thes related to Lightroom 3?
What are they and can they be deleted or moved to another drive?
I primarly use this computer only for Lightroom 3.
Thanks
David Morris

JS4653 wrote:
If you change this location will it move the files from the pre-existing location to the new one?
The question also applies to LR4, which si what I'm using.
If you mean does it move the files in the cache - I don't know, but I doubt it and it doesn't really matter. It will just use the new cache location, so will be a bit slower until it builds up the cache (and it might leave a load of stranded garbage in the old location, so probably a good idea to purge the cache before changing the location, or delete the old one manually).

Camera Raw Cache Files

Wondering if there is any guidance on retention of .dat files in the folder called User\Local Settings\Application Data\CameraRaw\Cache. I have close to 1 GB of .dat files in that folder, and am looking for ways to keep down the storage in my O/S (boot) partition.

1Gb is the minumum size. Do not put this file on the OS partition. Ideally you want this file on a physical disk other than the OS disk.
You can safely purge the cache but it just grow in size as you process raw files.
More information: Work with the Camera Raw cache

Can't find Camera Raw\Cache on my C drive

When I go to Preferences in LR4, it says my Cache is located: C:\Users\Owner\AppData\Local\Adobe\CameraRaw\Cache.
When I do a search under my C drive, I can only get as far as Owner, from there I can't find AppDate or the rest.
Any idea where else to look?

If you are having rendering or thumbnail problems it doesn’t hurt to clear the cache as an experiment to see if it helps, with the understanding that any raw images you view afterwards aren’t going to be in the cache so it will take more time to render them the first time.
You want your raw cache size to be bigger than the working set of photos for one session so it’s not continually purging and rebuilding the cache as you go through your set of photos because the cache isn’t big enough to hold all the photos in your working set.

Camera Raw cache size and location

I've been using ACR for about 3 years now, and today it occurred to me that I'm not that sure I know what the cache is actually used for. I mean, I know what a cache is, but what is ACR caching, and why?
I use Bridge for most of my photo work, displaying high quality thumbnails and previews, often full-screen ("monitor-sized previews" by default). Bridge has its own cache, which I understand contains jpegs of thumbnails, previews, and 100% views. Does ACR's cache have any bearing on Bridge's behaviour and performance, especially with thousands of raw images?
What sort of size and location of ACR cache should I be using - what factors do I need to consider?

Hi,
I'm still not sure what size of cache I should use, and what are the advantages and disadvantages of bigger or smaller ACR caches.
Maybe Eric can tell something indeep about the impact of a large cache. I'm not sure about that myself, but don't believe a larger cache is a real disadvantage, as long the disk on which it reside is maintained: defrag often). Since Bridge and ACR work hand in hand here, it might depend to your workflow and to your hardware. Sorry, I can't give a clear answer here.
As said I would put it just large enough for a certain number of RAW or some weeks work. Means, when there is a chance I'ld touch a certain RAW in six weeks again, than six weeks * x images per day I shoot.
Not sure if you are a Pro. I'm not and usually have not much new images every month. I always was fine with the default settings.
I don't work with Bridge and open one RAW after another in ACR, or maybe 20+ in a row when doing panorama ;-)
But Bridge has to do a lot of work on the fly when it generates the previews for all new RAW in a folder, like: "read the image from HDD", "process it by ACR, "write Bridge previews and metadata to HDD", "write to ACR cache " - not necessarily in this order.
And it seems it does this and some additional steps always (not only when first time reading RAW), because it f.e. needs to check if there are already processing information in ACR database or XMP file for a RAW or if they have been created in "meantime". Means ACR settings could have be changed after Bridge did a first time generation of the cache data, maybe because the RAW was openene directly via PS or by another app.
this process is fairly processor-dependent, especially now that ACR uses more sophisticated processing in version 6, and, depending on ACR defaults, this can be significantly slower than in previous versions.
And Bridges eats huge amount of memory as well - seems it holds a lot of information in memory before flushing it to disk.
After reading this post of yours I made a test with my 12k RAW the other day. I tried to let Bridge create previews for all of them in one step, but it ended up complaining that there is not enough memory after ~ half an hour.
Bridge appears to generate previews unnecessarily sometimes, because every image is already cached.
See above. Bridge/ACR checks for updated processing information in XMP or ACR database and metadata updates. If it find some it might need to rebuild its cached image.
Why would I need to reset the cache with a new monitor profile? Surely this is not applied to cache JPEGs?
You are right, sorry I mixed things up here :-( I meant ACR camera profiles. Aside that I changed monitor profile a lot over the last weeks doing some tests, and after that Bridge often refused to start until the cache was purged…
Your suggestion of a larger cluster size is very interesting, and I may try this when I have some spare time.
All my disks meant for storing large files (images, music, scratch, temp-file) are formated with a larger cluster size. It speeds things up a bit.
Supposedly Lightroom's catalogue system is superior, but I am yet to be convinced that putting all my XMP data in one basket is a good idea.
Of course LR shares ACR's cache. I don't know much about LR, but I believe XMP are not only kept in one basket here, right? They are written to the images and in case of RAW to XMP files. Otherwise there wouldn't be an interoperability between LR and Bridge. Similar to Bridge LR stores previews in it own "cache" which is as well a folder and file based "database". Check "preferences".
But as said I use another DAM, in which’s database all data needed for searching is kept, but I also write all metadata (IPTC,XMP) to the images, even for RAW files. By this I don't need a large ACR cache and also don't have XMP files around, which I hate. When saying database, I mean a real database, not a collection of files which are kept on disk. ;-)
Aside other advantages, I can take my database with me on vacations and can work on my images like I do at home. I have all my keywords and categories with me in one file and when back, I just copy the database to my desktop.

Deleting Cache in Adobe Camera Raw from Library

Hi There ~
I've seen similar questions, but not a definitive answer....
Currently, in on my Macbook Pro, my:
Users --> Lv4Tunes --> Library --> Caches --> Adobe Camera Raw folder is at 85g.
My Hard drive is only 200 gb..and I am almost at capacity.
My Lightroom library lives on an external hard drive, and my back up of that library is on another external hard drive.
Can I delete ths Adobe Camera Raw cache without losing any data?
Thanks in advance for the information, it is appreciated.

The safest way to do it would be to purge the ACR cache and set its limit to a lower amount of disk space in preferences:
This will cause some minor slow down in Develop in the beginning, otherwise no impact. A reasonable size depends on the size of your images, but generally a size of 20-50GB is recommended.
Beat Gossweiler
Switzerland

Bridge crashes with camera raw 4.4.1 installed, OK with 4.0

When I use Bridge with camera raw plugin 4.4.1 installed to navigate to a folder with at least one raw image shot with Sony Alpha 100, it consistently crashes. I can open the same image using Photoshop and Camera raw without a problem, so the image is not corrupted. Bridge works as expected with raw files from Sony Alpha 700.
If I revert to camera raw plugin 4.0 it works like a charm for Sony Alpha 100 pics, but my new Sony Alpha 700 is not supported.
I have tried using a clean user account, with no caches at all so that can not be the problem. I'm on a MacBook Pro with OS 10.5.3 and CS3.
Here is an excerpt from the crash log, showing that it is indeed the camera raw plugin causing the trouble:
Process: Bridge CS3 [802]
Path: /Applications/Adobe Bridge CS3/Bridge CS3.app/Contents/MacOS/Bridge CS3
Identifier: com.adobe.bridge2
Version: 2.1.1.9 (2.1.1.9)
Code Type: X86 (Native)
Parent Process: launchd [604]
Date/Time: 2008-06-26 08:35:41.310 +0200
OS Version: Mac OS X 10.5.3 (9D34)
Report Version: 6
Exception Type: EXC_BAD_ACCESS (SIGBUS)
Exception Codes: KERN_PROTECTION_FAILURE at 0x0000000000000008
Crashed Thread: 10
Thread 10 Crashed:
b 0 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x19849da3 0x196a6000 + 1719715
1 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x1984a976 0x196a6000 + 1722742
2 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x1984b775 0x196a6000 + 1726325
3 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x1984cefc 0x196a6000 + 1732348
4 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x19982638 EntryFM + 965714
5 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x1978dd45 0x196a6000 + 949573
6 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x196ed798 0x196a6000 + 292760
7 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x1978e63b 0x196a6000 + 951867
8 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x196eec2b 0x196a6000 + 298027
9 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x19733a15 0x196a6000 + 580117
10 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x19926a19 EntryFM + 589875
11 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x19927271 EntryFM + 592011
12 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x19921b15 EntryFM + 569647
13 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x1979c1fb 0x196a6000 + 1008123
14 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x198df7bd EntryFM + 298455
15 com.adobe.CameraRaw 0x198e1c37 EntryFM + 307793
16 com.adobe.bridge2 0x00420a35 ThumbMetaLib::CameraRawFormat::ReadDraftThumbnail(ZFileSpec const&, ThumbMetaLib::ThumbnailMetaInfo&) + 243
17 com.adobe.bridge2 0x003fc2d9 ThumbMetaLib::FBFormatReader::ReadDraft(ThumbMetaLib::FBFileFormat*, ZFileSpec const&, ThumbMetaLib::ThumbnailMetaInfo&) + 89
18 com.adobe.bridge2 0x003f3d61 ThumbMetaLib::MakeDraftFromFile(ThumbMetaLib::FBFileFormat*, ZFileSpec const&, ThumbMetaLib::ThumbnailMetaInfo&) + 207
19 com.adobe.bridge2 0x0051962e vio_timeout + 78060
20 com.adobe.bridge2 0x005e3470 vio_timeout + 905006
21 com.adobe.bridge2 0x005e8ebf vio_timeout + 928125
22 com.adobe.bridge2 0x00523699 vio_timeout + 119127
23 com.adobe.bridge2 0x003c5704 Mondo::CThread::EntryProc() + 18
24 ...ple.CoreServices.CarbonCore 0x9424955b PrivateMPEntryPoint + 56
25 libSystem.B.dylib 0x970036f5 _pthread_start + 321
26 libSystem.B.dylib 0x970035b2 thread_start + 34
Any ideas to resolve this is greatly appreciated!
Torbjørn

I'm still looking for some help.
Now that I've learned a little bit more, let me try to restate my problem. In using both a Nikon D200 and a new Nikon D300. For software I'm using PS CS3 Extended Edition, as a part of Adobe's CS3 Design Premium suite. My Dell Inspiron 530 is running Vista Home Premium.
As I've said before, my problem is that I cannot open NEF files shot with either the D200 or D300 (and they are uncompressed NEF files). I downloaded the new Camera Raw plug-in, ver. 4.3.1, and unzipped it to \program files\common files\adobe\plug-in\CS3\file format. The Camera Raw.8bi file is dated 11/30/07 and is about 10,446,000 in size. Then I run a search of my hard drive to make sure there are no other Camera Raw files anywhere. Then, in PS Bridge, I purge the cache of the file folder where the NEF files are located. Then I try to open a NEF file and get the following error message in a PS CS3 Extended box:
"Could not complete your request because it is not the right kind of document."
Then, immediately afterwards I ran another search of my hard drive, and the Camera Raw.8bi file is GONE, DISAPPEARED, VANISHED.
Is the problem with the CS3 Entended Edition?
Can anyone help me out here, particularly you Nikon shooters?
Thanks for any advice.
Bob

LARGE Camera Raw Cache Causing SLOOOOW LR Startup?

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