Stupid Scratch Disks

[foolery]

Hi, folks. Newbie on the forum but not necessarily to Photoshop. However, I have encountered the following error - a familair one to Photoshopeprs, but with a decidedly odd twist...

I am running Windows 7 on a Dell XPS 720 with 8GB RAM. I have been running Photoshop 7.0.1 (yes, I know it's ancient, but it does all I need for now) for a long time. A month or so ago, I added an Avid Mojo to my system and had issues with it, which required me to wipe my OS drive and reinstall W7.

Mojo works fine, but now I cannot run Photoshop because I get the error stating it cannot initialize because the scratch disks are full.

I tried UNinstalling and then REinstalling on ALL my six disks (four internal, two external), each of which has at LEAST 1 TB free. I cannot get into Tools or Preferences, because Photoshop will not open (as soon as I click out of the error screen, the program closes).

Suggestions? Thanks in advanced for any help. Tom

[admin]

Did you try resetting Photoshop preferences?

[foolery]

Thanks for the fast response. My problem with that is that I cannot even get INTO Photoshop, because after it starts to open and gives me the error, it IMMEDIATELY closes once I select "okay" (the only option in the Scratch Disks Full error message window). I was once able to hit "ALT-SHIFT-CTRL" (or some odd combination thereof) and get into a drop down settings where I was able to assign the four default scratch disks, but even then, once Photoshop started to open, I still got the "disks full" error message.

Probably a stupid question, but is there any way to alter the Photoshop Preferences without opening the actual program? I read one forum that suggested deleting the Preferences file, but that didn't seem to work either (plus it was sure hard to find that file).

Thanks again, and any other ideas are VERY welcome. Tom

[admin]

If you read the instructions in the link I posted, that will clear the preferences before actually starting Photoshop, did you try it?

[foolery]

Well, whoops. I didn't see that it was a link - the color looked like the rest of the text... Will try it right away and get back, thanks.

[foolery]

Okay, yes. I had tried this before (holding down CTRL-ALT-SHIFT while starting Photoshop)> I get the prompt asking if I want to delete the file, to which I reply "yes" - but then Photoshop still errors me that it cannot initialize because the scratch disks are full (and then immediately closes). Interestingly, from then on, trying to open Photoshop while holding doen the C-A-S does NOT get me to the "Do you want to delete" prompt window - - it then goes directly to the "cannot initialize" window until I reboot my system (at whoch point I can C-A-S the one time but still eventually goes to the error message).
SO, to try to explain this quickly, I DID try the file deletion but still got the error and the program closes. Tom