How do I uninstall EVERYTHING for a clean start?
Starbase 1 - Nick
Posts: 91
I want to rebuild everything to do with Daz Studio and Install Manager for a clean start.
This seems surpringly difficult to do - I can uninstall products 1 at a time, but I have over a thousand! Is there a way to set everything to uninstall and let it chug through, kind of like the opposite of a clean install?
Daz Studio does not show up under windows add/remove programs. if I remove it from DIM, then reinstall it comes back the same as before. Unistalling DIM itself doesn't seem to affect anything else, and ewhen I re-install, it's all back the same as before, with nothing changed.
I did a google search, but this suggests poking around hidden folders, and it generally looked to be a mess best avoided.
When I come in clean on a new windows install, or a new PC, everything goes nicely normally. I want to get to the point where I can do that.
All clues gratefully received,
Nick
Daz 3D is part of 
Connect
DAZ Productions, Inc.
7533 S Center View Ct #4664
West Jordan, UT 84084
Licensing Agreement | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy | EULA
© 2026 Daz Productions Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Comments
What are you trying to achieve? Uninstalling an application will not reset its options - if there is a clean uninstal option it will not be the default.
You can batch uninstall in DS (if you used Connect) or DIM by multi-selecting the installed items (DIM has a master checkbox at the top of the lists in the installed tab). If you want to clear out the content databse (including entries related to your own saved files) then you can do that by opening the Content DB Maintenance dialogue form the Content Library option menu (the lined/hamburger button in the top corner) - or just choose a new location for the Content Cluster. Most settings in DIM and DS can be reset to their defaults, either by alt/opt click or from the right-click menu, but I am not aware of a global reset feature.
I want a clean start, reinstall everything from freshly downloaded versions, rebuild any databases from clean.
Uninstalling from DIM has left a huge amount of stuff on my C drive, (Over 800 Mb in AppData/Roaming alone. And elsewhere.
Nick
What is in Appdata/Roaming? The database will default to there, so will the Temp folder if it wasn't poperly cleared on the last exit, but those should usually be the only substantial things.
Thanks Richard.
OK, manually hunted down all the installed folders, and deleted them. (My own projects were saved separately)
Uninstalled and reinstalled the Daz Install manager.
Worked out how to stop it filling my C drive, diverting content to one with a lot more spce, and set it running overnight to reinstall everything.
A couple of things needed a retry, but overall it worked without reporting errors.
So I just fired up Daz Studio, and most items are shown with no picture, and a dotted green line around the frame. (I've attached a screenshot).
I thought maybe it was a cosmetic error, so I tried to load up a product, andgot a "file not found" error. (Another screenshot is attached).
Also, with some products, the illustration is there, but is shown in greys rather than in colour.
I looked at the most recent info in the log file, and found entries along the lines of:
Could not adjust thumbnail path from support path: /Runtime/Support/DAZ_3D_8019_The_Guildhall.dsx
So it looks like there's an internal database of some sort that is messed up about the file locations?
All clues on how to fix this VERY gratefully received, as I'm currently unable to access about 98% of my content.
Thanks,
Nick
Smart Content will show products it knows you own, in grey if theya re not installed - so it seems you must have allowed DS to go online since the last database reset. Smart Content relies on the database and the file locations - it is better to start by checking the Content Library under Daz Studio Formats and then the Content Directory DIM is using.
It looks as if DIM is not installing to the paths DS is checking for you content - if you download and run this script (by dragging the file into the Viewport) you should add the DIM install location to DS http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/dazstudio/4/referenceguide/scripting/api_reference/samples/file_io/install_manager_config_import/start
Thank you so much, that is VERY helpful, I will give it a go!
Nick
Right, I think I'm just about there.
After getting stuff to show in the smart content tab, but still missing in the content tab, I did some rummaging. I managed to fix it by right clicking the content tab, and telling it to search the drive where I had installed stuff. (Screenshot attached)
Big thanks Richard!
Is it just me though, or is it a rather serious big that the Install tool doesn't talk to stufio, so the DIM has no real idea if the install worked, and the Studio can't find the files without manual intervention?
Nick
No, it is by design - DIM may be installing for use in a future project using a differnt directory set up, so it should not make changes toi the DS settings.
Having to search for files implies that there was still soemthing wrong with the DS settings not matching those in DIM, even after running the script.