Max 2025 will not release textures and shaders

[CreativeFRV]

I've seen this before and have just sort of accepted it... but max 25 will not let go of textures. In order for my files to use update textures I have to give them a new name, updating them does not work at all.  And now, its  doing the same for the complete shader.  I've just started a new project, brand new file, did a bit of modeling then opened the material editor to build some shaders and all the shaders from my previous project were there... that's a new one for me. Flushing caches does nothing, it just wont let go... it has to be a directory structure thing but I cant figure it out... 

Thoughts?

Frank

[CreativeFRV]

I posted this back in mid August, I'm surprised no Autodesk admins have offered a solution. If anyone know who I should ping please lmk or do so in a comment... this is a real problem. I have to have version numbers for all my textures, I literally can not use the same name for a texture if I need to change it. 

[Diffus3d]

Once, I had this problem and for some reason Photoshop wasn't releasing the file between saves, which caused 3dsmax to have nothing new to load. I think this ended up being because I was running Photoshop as administrator for some reason. 

I remember another time when I was working out of a web folder (gdrive, onedrive, etc.) and it wasn't releasing  because the file was being uploaded at the time or being otherwise processed by the version control in the web folder.  In that case I think I did my texturing in another folder and then moved them over and relinked with asset browser.

I don't know what to make of the shader issue, but maybe solving the texture problem will solve the other one.  I have some questions:

When you save the updated texture out of whatever software, does it look updated in windows?  (like when you go to that folder and open the file with windows or photoshop?)

When you press "reload" in the 3dsmax bitmap node, does it update the texture?   

Is the file open in another software at the time?  (Like photoshop?)

Are you working out of a web folder?  (gdrive, onedrive, dropbox, etc.)

Do you have file encryption software or something in Windows that monitors files in real-time that might be holding onto the file?

Best Regards,