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My work just went poof! - "Save failed because access to the file was lost"


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1 hour ago, PaoloT said:

Couldn't Affinity save to a local temp file, and then move it to the network drive?

The error message is "Access to the file was lost" may indicate (as mentioned earlier) that the problem is with reading the rest of the file, as part of the Save operation, not with writing the file.

And in that case, your suggestion can't work. But it's a good thought, for some other situations.

For the general case, it probably would be appropriate for Affinity to:

  1. Provide a mechanism to copy the file to local storage when you Open it; and then
  2. Save it to local storage when you Save; followed by
  3. Copying it to its original non-local location.

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
PC:
    Desktop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 64GB memory, AMD Ryzen 9 5900 12-Core @ 3.00 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 

    Laptop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 32GB memory, Intel Core i7-10750H @ 2.60GHz, Intel UHD Graphics Comet Lake GT2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU.
iPad:  iPad Pro M1, 12.9": iPadOS 17.4.1, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard 
Mac:  2023 M2 MacBook Air 15", 16GB memory, macOS Sonoma 14.4.1

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1 hour ago, PaoloT said:

Couldn't Affinity save to a local temp file

In my understanding this appears to happen currently in the "autosave" + "temp" folders, though as incremental data only, not as full copy of the Affinity document + all its possible resources.

With "PersonaBackstore.dat" used to be reports about huge temp data (up to 100 GB). This is not reported any more for quite a while, which might indicate there was a change implemented in temp file handling, in the last V1 or in V2.

https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/search/&q=PersonaBackstore.dat&quick=1

On mac I never could notice a large size of this "PersonaBackstore.dat" … whereas the number of "Save failed…" + related issues increased to me with one of the last V1 updates (ca. 2 years ago / ~ any 1.10.x).

macOS 10.14.6 | MacBookPro Retina 15" | Eizo 27" | Affinity V1

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1 hour ago, PaoloT said:

Couldn't Affinity save to a local temp file, and then move it to the network drive?

What if the total size of all open files is too large to fit all of it into the local drive's temp storage?

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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On 4/28/2023 at 6:07 AM, v_kyr said:

Save instead locally and copy the local saved file afterwards manually over to the network drive. - Remote drives might have connection access timeouts, be in power saving mode and the like, which then will yield to such a behavior. Thus better save locally first of all!

Interesting thread. For the 'software and computer talk for dummies', I'm guessing relying on your work saved in an Affinity file is not optimal? If so, I've been lucky so far, but I use Affinity Photo for hobby photoshop work, nothing work related. Still, I am painfully aware of what it is like to lose all your hard work in a flash, very frustrating, often impossible to fully replicate, even if you had the time.

So what do you mean exactly by 'saving locally'? What means and how exactly do you do that? Then what is a network drive again? So you're talking about two forms of backup here? Sorry for the ignorance. But if you could simplify it it just a little more for Mr. Dummy here. Sincere questions. I'm just not that computer/tech savy. Like to learn and tinker, though. Thx in advance for any help.

I too, am looking to maybe be a  little smarter, and avoid potential lost data.

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Note: The explanation below is very simplistic, doesn’t not cover all of the details, and isn’t totally accurate in a technical sense; it’s just a basic overview.

A ‘network drive’ is a hard disk (or other storage device) which is not physically installed inside your machine.

It will typically be either a separate device – a box that just sits there by itself – or it will be physically installed inside another machine which your machine has access to, either with a cable or via a wireless connection.

Because a network drive isn’t fitted into your machine, your machine can’t make sure that it has a permanent connection to it – i.e. the network drive may power down to save energy, or the connection to the drive may be lost for any number of reasons (e.g. the internet connection was lost, or the other machine has been switched off, or something else).

Because of the way that the Affinity applications load and save files – they don’t always load/save the whole file, just the parts or the file that they need to be using at the time – if the connection to the network drive is lost, the applications cannot be certain that they can properly save the new version of the file since they only have part of it in memory – the rest of the file is somewhere they can’t access.

Because of this, it’s generally recommended that you only work with files that are on a storage device which is physically fitted inside your machine – which the machine has permanent access to – (generally called ‘saving locally’) and also make backup copies (if necessary, and usually advisable) of those files on another device, which could be a network drive.

Does that help to explain things a little better?

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6 hours ago, cutout3 said:

So what do you mean exactly by 'saving locally'?

5 hours ago, GarryP said:

Note: The explanation below is very simplistic, doesn’t not cover all of the details, and isn’t totally accurate in a technical sense; it’s just a basic overview.

In addition to what GarryP has written I would like to give you an overview of my setup. And it is overly simple as was GarryP's.

My Mac with its own built in SSD (the internal drive) and an external hard drive connected by a Thunderbolt cable. Both these are "local" drives. I have had not problems with saving files and working with files on the external hard drive. There is a time lag at times if the external drive has "gone to sleep" but the lag is the OS waking up the hard drive. Writing and Reading to and from that external drive has never failed me. (oops, now that I have stated that all hell will break loose [thwarted hubris face emoticon])

The only network I have is the Internet. I could use the Internet connection to store my files on Apple's iCloud, I don't. 

I could have my own Network connected to my Mac using a router or a hub, the network would consist of one or more hard drives that are available to any computer attached to the router or hub. I don't have a network of my own.

Mac Pro (Late 2013) Mac OS 12.7.4 
Affinity Designer 2.4.0 | Affinity Photo 2.4.0 | Affinity Publisher 2.4.0 | Beta versions as they appear.

I have never mastered color management, period, so I cannot help with that.

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1 hour ago, Old Bruce said:

My Mac with its own built in SSD (the internal drive) and an external hard drive connected by a Thunderbolt cable. Both these are "local" drives.

My opinions...

It is true that your external hard drive is not a network drive. But in some sense it is also not local. That term really applies only to the built-in drives. And yes, it's risky to use Affinity to save or open files from it.

It is, though, much less likely for a connection problem to happen in your scenario than over a network.

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
PC:
    Desktop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 64GB memory, AMD Ryzen 9 5900 12-Core @ 3.00 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 

    Laptop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 32GB memory, Intel Core i7-10750H @ 2.60GHz, Intel UHD Graphics Comet Lake GT2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU.
iPad:  iPad Pro M1, 12.9": iPadOS 17.4.1, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard 
Mac:  2023 M2 MacBook Air 15", 16GB memory, macOS Sonoma 14.4.1

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2 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

That term really applies only to the built-in drives.

I think that any drive directly connected to the computer, whether internal or external, should be considered a local drive. The only real problem with external ones is that they might become disconnected due to a loose or faulty cable, but as long as the cable is tight & not defective, there should be no problem using  it to store Affinity files.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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26 minutes ago, R C-R said:
2 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

That term really applies only to the built-in drives.

I think that any drive directly connected to the computer, whether internal or external, should be considered a local drive. The only real problem with external ones is that they might become disconnected due to a loose or faulty cable

Like @Walt I am used to understand "local" drive as internal only. Note that a volume connected via an external plug, including a wireless stick or card, can get unmounted while the computer is sleeping / on idle. I have an external SanDisk SSD which unfortunately gets disconnected when my mac is in sleep mode, causing an error / warning message when I reactivate the mac. – Compare …

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/usb-device-not-recognized-after-resuming-from/bac74b2e-94ea-4d9c-afb8-201c768c444c

https://superuser.com/questions/1350975/how-to-stop-usb-devices-from-disconnecting-on-sleep

https://www.reddit.com/r/chromeos/comments/8nt1r5/sd_card_unmounts_in_sleep_mode/

macOS 10.14.6 | MacBookPro Retina 15" | Eizo 27" | Affinity V1

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10 hours ago, GarryP said:

Note: The explanation below is very simplistic, doesn’t not cover all of the details, and isn’t totally accurate in a technical sense; it’s just a basic overview.

A ‘network drive’ is a hard disk (or other storage device) which is not physically installed inside your machine.

It will typically be either a separate device – a box that just sits there by itself – or it will be physically installed inside another machine which your machine has access to, either with a cable or via a wireless connection.

Because a network drive isn’t fitted into your machine, your machine can’t make sure that it has a permanent connection to it – i.e. the network drive may power down to save energy, or the connection to the drive may be lost for any number of reasons (e.g. the internet connection was lost, or the other machine has been switched off, or something else).

Because of the way that the Affinity applications load and save files – they don’t always load/save the whole file, just the parts or the file that they need to be using at the time – if the connection to the network drive is lost, the applications cannot be certain that they can properly save the new version of the file since they only have part of it in memory – the rest of the file is somewhere they can’t access.

Because of this, it’s generally recommended that you only work with files that are on a storage device which is physically fitted inside your machine – which the machine has permanent access to – (generally called ‘saving locally’) and also make backup copies (if necessary, and usually advisable) of those files on another device, which could be a network drive.

Does that help to explain things a little better?

Yes, very well explained! Dissecting now...ching, ching, rattle, attempting to ...assimilate. That's always the hard part. And remembering things, ha. :42_confused:

Just kidding. No, you wrote that extremely well. Thank you. It helps!

So, with your information in mind, I try to save my Affinity creations often, during and, of course, after completion to a USB flash drive. I could, if I wanted, also save them to my laptop (pictures, documents, etc.), but haven't been, lately. Would saving to my flash drive constitute saving it to a 'network drive' (not inside my laptop)? And if I saved it directly to my laptop (eg, pictures/documents, etc.), that would constitute saving it locally?

But how can I save a created image/photo/picture internally, or externally, the way Affinity can save it? Affinity saves things the way you created it, all the steps in the Layers panel are there to show you what you did. Each layer or step can be manipulated, turned on or off, etc. Is there an outside source (outside of Affinity) that saves your images the way Affinity does? If so, that would be great, I will get it and start using that, for sure.

My gut tells me that there is no similar way of saving or backing up images, the way Affinity does. You simply have to manipulate the Affinity image the exact way you want it, save that, then manipulate the image again, save that, etc., etc. The way Affinity stores an image (or document, I guess), can have nearly an infinite amount of different finished images within it (by turning on, or off, the different layers), all in one saved file. 

Recently I had the Affinity file I was working on get corrupted, lost data, I thought (I was messing around with the History panel, not knowing what I was doing), and I was no longer able to open it. LUCKILY, I had saved several different copies on my flash drive, and I was able to go to the corrupted Affinity file, which I had not yet closed, dial up the History panel, get most of the latest steps I was working on back, and save that to another renamed Affinity file. So I was not too upset, I only lost a couple of minor steps. Definitely a learning experience, and one that makes me want to backup my stuff better!

Another question. Is there an external program (in 'the cloud', maybe) that can 'save your stuff automatically as you go? That would be great!! Then if something went wrong with Affinity storage, you could go to that cloud storage, pick up immediately where you left off?

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5 hours ago, Old Bruce said:

In addition to what GarryP has written I would like to give you an overview of my setup. And it is overly simple as was GarryP's.

My Mac with its own built in SSD (the internal drive) and an external hard drive connected by a Thunderbolt cable. Both these are "local" drives. I have had not problems with saving files and working with files on the external hard drive. There is a time lag at times if the external drive has "gone to sleep" but the lag is the OS waking up the hard drive. Writing and Reading to and from that external drive has never failed me. (oops, now that I have stated that all hell will break loose [thwarted hubris face emoticon])

The only network I have is the Internet. I could use the Internet connection to store my files on Apple's iCloud, I don't. 

I could have my own Network connected to my Mac using a router or a hub, the network would consist of one or more hard drives that are available to any computer attached to the router or hub. I don't have a network of my own.

Would something like Apple's iCloud automatically store/save your Affinity progress as you go? Also, would something like that 'save' it (your images) the way Affinity Photo saves it (all the layers, steps, etc.)?

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2 hours ago, thomaso said:

I have an external SanDisk SSD which unfortunately gets disconnected when my mac is in sleep mode, causing an error / warning message when I reactivate the mac.

For what very little it is worth, I have never had an external drive directly connected to my Mac disconnect when I put my Mac in sleep mode, although said drives often go into their own sleep mode if not accessed for a while, which could cause some issues with Affinity (& maybe other apps?) if it takes too long to wake.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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1 hour ago, cutout3 said:

Would something like Apple's iCloud automatically store/save your Affinity progress as you go?

No. It only saves when you save a file to iCloud.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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4 hours ago, R C-R said:

I have never had an external drive directly connected to my Mac disconnect when I put my Mac in sleep mode, although said drives often go into their own sleep mode if not accessed for a while,

Unwanted unmounting during sleep mode can happen if the drive gets its power from the bus (e.g. USB, Thunderbolt):

»Some Mac laptop users routinely keep an external drive plugged in, and they may have encountered a problem with unmounting (…)

(...) if you’re using a bus-powered drive—one that gets its juice from a USB or Thunderbolt 3 port of your Mac, or a connected hub—you can wind up with settings that power down the drive and thus unmount it without proper safeguards.

This is typically an issue only with a Mac laptop, and not a desktop, as laptops are designed to reduce wear and tear on the battery, even when they’re plugged into power. And not all drives work the same: readers report that some drives recognize sleep mode and properly power down, while others lose the connection with the Mac, resulting in an error when it wakes back up.«

https://www.macworld.com/article/331915/how-to-set-up-sleep-mode-on-a-mac-that-has-bus-powered-external-storage.html

macOS 10.14.6 | MacBookPro Retina 15" | Eizo 27" | Affinity V1

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1 hour ago, thomaso said:

Unwanted unmounting during sleep mode can happen if the drive gets its power from the bus (e.g. USB, Thunderbolt)...

But as your quote from the link you provided mentions, this is typically only an issue for Mac laptops. Like I said, I have never experienced this with my Mac, which is a desktop iMac. 😁

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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Yet another file lost today to this bug. :40_rage:

Affinity Photo 2.3.1 for Windows  OS: Windows 10 Pro x64 ver. 22H2  CPU: AMD Ryzen 7950X 16-core  RAM: 64 GB DDR5-6400  GPU: MSI GeForce RTX 3090 Suprim X 24GB / driver 526.98  NVMe SSD Samsung 980 Pro 1 TB  Monitors: 2x Eizo ColorEdge CS2420 24"

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4 minutes ago, Alex_M said:

Yet another file lost today to this bug. :40_rage:

Even you saved it locally, so on your computers main partitition drive?

☛ Affinity Designer 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Photo 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Publisher 1.10.8 ◆ OSX El Capitan
☛ Affinity V2.3 apps ◆ MacOS Sonoma 14.2 ◆ iPad OS 17.2

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I forgot that I opened a file on the network drive so when I saved I got the error message and lost all my work. This is an extremely serious issue with this software and should be fixed ASAP. I hope the Affinity team works on the fix.

Affinity Photo 2.3.1 for Windows  OS: Windows 10 Pro x64 ver. 22H2  CPU: AMD Ryzen 7950X 16-core  RAM: 64 GB DDR5-6400  GPU: MSI GeForce RTX 3090 Suprim X 24GB / driver 526.98  NVMe SSD Samsung 980 Pro 1 TB  Monitors: 2x Eizo ColorEdge CS2420 24"

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On 4/30/2023 at 8:44 AM, firstdefence said:

that Affinity can get on top of these problems

From the beginning of the numerous occurrences of corruption and data loss, it is evident that the proposed architecture of files and working with them is not optimal (perhaps fast, but definitely not safe and definitely not efficient in terms of file size). Therefore, I personally assumed that the V2 version would bring some major change in the file format, because the frequency of negative experiences and the declared incompatibility with V1 directly encouraged it. Unfortunately nothing.

Affinity Store (MSI/EXE): Affinity Suite (ADe, APh, APu) 2.4.0.2301
Dell OptiPlex 7060, i5-8500 3.00 GHz, 16 GB, Intel UHD Graphics 630, Dell P2417H 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155.
Dell Latitude E5570, i5-6440HQ 2.60 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics 530, 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155.
Intel NUC5PGYH, Pentium N3700 2.40 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics, EIZO EV2456 1920 x 1200, Windows 10 Pro, Version 21H1, Build 19043.2130.

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1 hour ago, Alex_M said:

I forgot that I opened a file on the network drive

Another case where a warning about working with an external/network drive could help.

Affinity Store (MSI/EXE): Affinity Suite (ADe, APh, APu) 2.4.0.2301
Dell OptiPlex 7060, i5-8500 3.00 GHz, 16 GB, Intel UHD Graphics 630, Dell P2417H 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155.
Dell Latitude E5570, i5-6440HQ 2.60 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics 530, 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155.
Intel NUC5PGYH, Pentium N3700 2.40 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics, EIZO EV2456 1920 x 1200, Windows 10 Pro, Version 21H1, Build 19043.2130.

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13 hours ago, Pšenda said:

I personally assumed that the V2 version would bring some major change in the file format

Personally, when I read V2 announcements in the forum or here about
"redesigned" + "all-new" + "much more to the redesign than aesthetic" + "painstakingly remodelled"
I assumed that the code of known, logged / tagged bugs would have been rewritten "by design" … before it got extended by features.

815374124_affinitymarketingredesignedannouncement.thumb.jpg.333be250d782f19902a4101b48e6836c.jpg

macOS 10.14.6 | MacBookPro Retina 15" | Eizo 27" | Affinity V1

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15 hours ago, Alex_M said:

Yet another file lost today to this bug. :40_rage:

Sorry to hear this. Obviously your files are larger than mine, but still, this shouldn't be happening. It sounds like reverting back to V1 might be a partial fix, but only a 'partial' fix, as there were documented problems with V1 also? In the meantime, I'd revert back to V1, get your money back on V2, and hope for some further resolution by Affinity?

How often are you saving your document(s) that you are working on? Any way that you could pause and save the document more frequently, before it gets too large? Would that help solve 'some' of the problem?

 

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7 hours ago, cutout3 said:

as there were documented problems with V1 also?

Just look at the forum - there are dozens of cases.

For example:

 

 

Edited by Pšenda

Affinity Store (MSI/EXE): Affinity Suite (ADe, APh, APu) 2.4.0.2301
Dell OptiPlex 7060, i5-8500 3.00 GHz, 16 GB, Intel UHD Graphics 630, Dell P2417H 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155.
Dell Latitude E5570, i5-6440HQ 2.60 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics 530, 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155.
Intel NUC5PGYH, Pentium N3700 2.40 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics, EIZO EV2456 1920 x 1200, Windows 10 Pro, Version 21H1, Build 19043.2130.

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In order to repeat and sum up here what is meant with a local drive.

  1. A ssd or harddisk which is the main internal drive of your computer, usually your computers internal boot device which is always powered accordingly
  2. So a ssd or harddisk which is not externally or remote connected to your computer via an USB cable, or the local network (via ethernet), or via some external cloud service etc. here

Everything named from point 2. can yield to data losts and has already shown so in the pasts, the forum is full of such former user reports!

☛ Affinity Designer 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Photo 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Publisher 1.10.8 ◆ OSX El Capitan
☛ Affinity V2.3 apps ◆ MacOS Sonoma 14.2 ◆ iPad OS 17.2

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46 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

In order to repeat and sum up here what is meant

… respectively what is "the" vs. "a" culprit for these kind of error and messages: To me they happen quite frequently but entirely without ever having an external drive in use for Affinity and its related files. Means, an unambiguous relation between these errors and external drives appears to be unclear … while external drives are no condition for the issues but rather one of various aspects – or 'just' coincidence, since there are also users without having these issues when using their external drive.

The fact that "the forum is full of such former user reports" does not mean that it is not also "full of" reports of users who did not use external drives but are affected by these issues, too. External drives appear to be a less reliable reason for issues than those issues that get caused by hardware acceleration on different platforms and operating systems, for specific tasks at least and reproducible for certain users.

 

macOS 10.14.6 | MacBookPro Retina 15" | Eizo 27" | Affinity V1

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