Daz directory confusion
DannyH
Posts: 10
My problem: My Daz (Windows tabletop) install is split between two drives. The OS drive (small) and a large data drive. This is causing all sorts of problems.
Background: When I first installed Daz on this tabletop computer - back in 2019 I think? - I just put everything on the main drive with the OS. Before long, with all those accumulated assets (happens to the best of us, you know...), I was desperately running out of disk space. So I installed a large secondary drive and had all the space I needed. The Daz exceutable are still on the C: drive but "My Library" and "My Daz Connect Library" are on the secondary drive. They are currently set up as follows in Daz Content Directory Manager:
CMS Cluster Directory:
C:/Users/(myname)/AppData/Roaming/Daz 3D/cms
Daz Connect Data:
E:/Daz3d/My Daz Connect Library
Daz Studio Formats:
E:/Daz3d/MY Library
C:/Users/Public/Documents/My Daz 3D Library
C:/Daz 3d/Appplications/Data/DAZ 3d
C:/Daz 3d/Applications/Data/Daz 3D/My Daz 3D Library
Now there are problems I'm having with this setup...
Problem 1: It can be very, very confusing!
As a recent example, I read on this forum the neat trick that allowed you to use G8 expressions on G8.1 figures. I tried it on my laptop (where everything is installed on the huge main drive) and it worked. So I also tried it on the tabletop computer...and it didn't work. I did the same exact things (zip and remove the two directories) and was at a loss...until I decided to make a search and discovered that on the tabletop computer, copies of the "base pose head" and "expressions" directories could be found in no fewer than three other places (IIRC, E:/Daz3d/My Daz Connect Library, C:/Users/Public/Documents/My Daz 3D Library, C:/Daz 3d/Applications/Data/Daz 3D/My Daz 3D Library)...I had to disable them all to make the trick work. I was this close to giving up or posting here for help.
Heaven knows how many other weird behaviors this complicated directory structure with stuff here and there is causing!
(Oh, and if you ask why I'm still using G8 and G8.1 figures in 2025, the answer's simple. As you noticed, I started in 2019 so it's a safe bet that I have collected a lot of assets specifically for G8/G8.1 - plus approximately 50 G8/G8.1 based figures I have personally sculpted and textured.)
Problem 2: Some assets are not happy with this split directory structure
The most obvious examples are UltraSceneryXT and UltraScenery2. No matter where I put the content, they just can't find it. They work just fine on the laptop where everything is on the same drive. (The good old plain UltraScenery works fine on both computers, although it renders very slowly on the tabletop one.)
So...I'm looking for your expert advice
What should I do? This obviously can't go on forever. I'm constantly running into issues most users don't have and can't help me with.
Is anybody else running a multi-drive setup? How do you handle it?
Any help and suggestions are welcome. I'm just hoping it isn't "nuke everything and install it on one drive".
Thanks!
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Comments
The first issue I see in your setup is that you have nested content directories: both "C:/Daz 3d/Appplications/Data/DAZ 3d" and "C:/Daz 3d/Applications/Data/Daz 3D/My Daz 3D Library" are listed as DS content directories, and that can cause problems.
What do you have in "C:/Daz 3d/Appplications/Data/DAZ 3d"?
Secondly, it seems you used several different installation tools to instal the same content multiple times (G8 starter essentials and the G8 morphs, for example)
Since items are installed multiple times it's wasting space and there are likely old versions of some products in one directory and updated versions in another.
For the record, if a product is installed both via Connect and via DIM, the Connect version will be the one used, so if you updated the DIM version DS likely will ignore the update.
Morphs are a special case: DS will look in all content directories listed and load all morphs it can find (not sure how it handles finding multiple versions of the same morph though).
Another thing you should know is that Connect can't install plugins, and complex script products often don't work properly when installed via Connect. So for scripts and plugins it's recommended to use
Thank you for responding!
Good catch there with the nested directory structure, I have no idea how that came to be. Let's see if removing that helps at all. I will get back when I have tried that.
Yes, I am by now quite aware that assets with functionality generally need to be installed through DIM. That's how I installed the UltraScenery and related stuff. Only... they work on the laptop but not on the desktop computer and I'm starting to suspect the flaky directory structure may have played some role in that. But USXT and US2 seem to handle stuff differently from the old US anyway and do not play nice with this directory structure. (Is there any waycontact the author, I wonder?)