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photoshop performing extremly slow?? help please


grandad

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hi there...i am new to this board and i have to say after looking thru some threads it seems very freindly and helpfull..

i am sorry to make this my first post but it is a problem that has been bothering me for some time..

ok onto the problem..

i use version 6.01
i have the primary scratch disk set to my mian drive ...c 6 gig free
then set to my other drives d..(partition) 16 gig
e..(secondary drive) ...18 gig

amount of ram was set to 85 % (then moved back to 50%)
i have also tried using the other drives for my first scratch disk..

everything seems to take ages to do even the smallest of things
i thought it may have been the size of the image i was using but even smaller ones (20 meg) things are very slow..
i have formatted ...reinstalled (twice) and ran photoshop without any other program installed ...still the same..
i have defragged all drives and partitions..

i used to have a p3 550 that ran better than my current system ...

which is...

windows xp pro

amd 1600+ o/c 1800+
640 meg pc 133
30 gig 7200 rpm
40 gig 5400 rpm

any help / tips ect would be greatly appreciated

thank you
grandad:(
 

Erik

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"You currently have Adobe Photoshop's primary scratch and Windows' primary paging file on the same volume, which can result in reduced performance, it is recommended that you set Adobe's primary scratch volume to be on a different volume, preferably on a different physical drive".

This is the message you get when installing Photoshop.


Scratch files are empty spaces on Hard Disk Drives on which PS can write info withwhich it is working.These free spaces have to be in one block, and if they are on the same partition as Win (for example, and most probably C:\) you're in trouble because when Win is active it writes on the drive in a very chaotic way, blocking PS's work.
And the more your Cdrive is filled, or the more progs you have running (in the background or not), the greater the probability of crashes or slower workflow.

I'm not familiar with XPPro, but I guess it's something like my Win2KPro.
So I have a few questions for you:

1/ Do you work with several layers? because if you have say 5 layers with 20MB each, there is some calculation to do...and if you say that 20MB is a small file fro you, how much is then a normal one?
2/ The first scratch file should be on your second HDD. That it's "only" 5400 rpm is no issue as the access and write time for this speed is quicker that that of a 7200rpm HDD. (the speed difference is mainly important for movies etc). But it should also be in one block. Did you try to run defrag?
3/ How many progs do you have running at the same time?
4/ How many progs have you running in the background? (Because Resources are no RAM). See the task manager (Ctrl+Alt+Del in Win 2K)
5/ Where is your Win scratch file?
6/ Is this only a problem of Photoshop or are the other apps suffering too?
7/ What videocard do you use?
8/ How many RAM does your mainboard support? What brand of mem did you buy, or is it bulk, ie nameless? How come you have 640? Did you try to do it with 512 and take the 128 out? Just an idea...
9/ Why overclock a processor that already runs like a Ferrari but produces heat like some supernova? AMD is known for its overheating...if you're a gamer who changes PC like someone else changes shirts, then I can understand, but for normal use overclocking will only shorten the life of your processor. The differences in actual speed-gain will be minimal.

And finally: what do you call slow? What are you expecting? A 1600 is not twice as fast as a 800.

Just some thoughts and questions that enter my mind, and that give an idea how I would try to tackle the problem.
 

kiwi

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Thats great stuff Erik :)


Grandad would an example be for instance painting a brush stroke and their being a time lapse before you see the stroke appear on your image?



Stu.
 

grandad

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hello..firstly thank you for the replies...

to answer some of your questions Erik...

i have had the windows swap file running on c drive an the primary scratch disk on my d drive (5400)...it made no difference..i have set my windows swap file to min 600 meg - max 600 meg (as suggested by a freind)

i have tried to minimize the programs running in the background...ctrl alt del...as i said earlier ...i have reformated reinstalled ONLY photoshop and ran it with the same results...slow

yes sometimes i do run with a few layers open...

the file sizes vary.. one particular file i was working on was 300 meg..

i am not a guru with photoshop by any means i am only a newbie to this extensive program..we bought a new printer (epson 870) and scanner (hp 4400c)..an i am trying to figure out the best resolutoins to scan and print in..(reading thru tutorials ect)

yes this is the only program that runs slow..

i have a pixelview geforce 2 ti 64 meg video card

as for the ram...my motherboard is a msi k7t turbo -r limited edition it supports upto 1.5 gig...the ram is noname...i have tested the ram using a program called memtest 32 one stick of 256 is according to memtest defective...i have taken it back an had it replaced (twice) stil says its defective...after searching for answers it seems that some ram dont like the amd cpu's...yes i have removed the defecive ram swapped the ram to other slots and run photoshop...to be honest i did not notice any diffrence

my amd cpu does not run hot at 1800+ it is still below 48 deg cel..i just like the idea of getting more speed from it ..
i have also put the cpu back to its default speed and ran photoshop no change

as for the expectations of speed difference...i would have thought i would see a very noticable speed difference between a intel p3 550 and an amd 1600+...i know that intel will perfom complex calculations a lot faster and better than amd but i dont think its to this extent

i call slow having to wait some 30 secs or more to open a file...ect...

kiwi...yes it is slow between the stroke an actually apllying it
some plugins i use are extremly slow...what used to take the blink of an eye now takes a cat nap ....

i realise very big files will take time to calculate ect but the small ones do to



are there any setup tutorials ect i can look at ...i just want to get the best performance from photoshop... i am happy to try any suggestions that are put forward ie: changing windows settings an or photoshop settings

is it better to alocate 85% of my ram to photoshop? or should i leave it at the default?.i normaly only have photoshop running and no other program...apart from what windows needs to run in the background

thank you both again for replying i appreciate it very much
grandad
 

grandad

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i have a few more results ...
as i said earlier ..i am not to savvy when it comes to this techy stuff ..so hopefully somone can make some sense of this...


i have scanned a photo it is at 1200 dpi...in explorer it says its 11,745 kb when i hold the mouse over the file ...it says dimensions...9400 x 11784...in photoshop (it takes ages to open the file)...at the bottom you have the stats bar when i set it at...document sizes it reads...317M/317M..set to scratch disks it reads...470.2M/508.9......set to efficiencey it reads eff 42%

i have also opened windows task manager...
it reads...
TOTALS...
handles 5548
threads 285
processes 24

COMMIT CHARGE (K)
total 643072
limit 5532536
peak 652240

PHYSICAL MEMORY..
total 654832
available 21436
system cache 45864

KERNEL MEMORY...
total 38616
paged 15544
non pages 23004


hope this info helps

grandad
 

kiwi

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I am wondering if you have a temp file that is not being erased on quitting Photoshop Grandad.I use a Mac so I dont know where the file would be stored,but if it was not being erased that might explain some of the problems as your memory would be being sufficently drained to cause a slow down.


Stu.
 

grandad

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hello there...

OZ ...i had a look at that site most of what is there i have done....
i will try a few more suggestions that are there though ...thank you..

KIWI..i have checked the folders i know of under xp...
D:\Documents and Settings\grandad1\Local Settings\Temp

D:\Documents and Settings\Default User\Local Settings\Temp

D:\WINDOWS\Temp

cant find any adobe temp files or folders...nothing that is very large...

this is starting to get to me lol ...

thanx again for your time

grandad
 

Erik

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i have scanned a photo it is at 1200 dpi...in explorer it says its 11,745 kb when i hold the mouse over the file ...it says dimensions...9400 x 11784...in photoshop (it takes ages to open the file)...at the bottom you have the stats bar when i set it at...document sizes it reads...317M/317M..set to scratch disks it reads...470.2M/508.9......set to efficiencey it reads eff 42%

If your image is 9400x11784, we know that:
1/ by dividing by 1200 how big it really is: 7,83x9,79 inch
2/ by multiplying both sizes how big one channel is (some 110MB) and because in RGB we have three channels, its size must be some 330MB. If you're in CMYK, it would be some440MB. Because PS shows some 310MB, I assume you are in RGB mode.

It is perfectly normal that a file size like this is slower, and that any action you undertake will even be risky. If you add one layer-PS treats every layer as a separate image- you end up with 620 MB, so there's no room for Windows. Windows prevents this action to safeguard your entire system, result: PS writes to the HDD, and this slows everything down as the data aren't stored in RAM anymore. OK?

Now the painful question: why 1200?????
I can only see one reason, the one I use these high settings for, and that is to use your scanner as a sort of microscope.
But neither for the Web (only the sizes, height and width count) nor for Print or even for printing to film (transparancies, negatives) you ever need 1200.
For your inkjet printer, scanning at 150 samples per inch and sending to the printer in RGB (the printer does the CMYK conversion in its own software) is perfect. And laser printers require even less. For a real offset printing press, you need 220 to 300 (300 is softer tha 220)...

So why 1200?

i have also opened windows task manager...
it reads...
TOTALS...
handles 5548
threads 285
processes 24
24 processes eat up your systems resources. try to take some out

PHYSICAL MEMORY..
total 654832
available 21436
system cache 45864
You only have 21MB of RAM left. The rest goes to HDD

set to scratch disks it reads...470.2M/508.9
this means that470MB RAM is used by the open image and that there are 508MB RAM available. (see your manual at p.79!)
This leaves you a meagre 38MB to play with...

......set to efficiency it reads eff 42% . on p. 79 of your manual you can find that if this % is less than 100, PS writes to scratch disk which reduces the speed of calculation.

Be logical: Win XP is RAM hungry, and PS is so too. XP has to be content with some 130MB if you have nothing else opened.
Leaves you 508MB. Then your scan uses 470MB RAM. Leaves you 38 RAM. Your efficiency is 42%. And then you ask why Photoshop slows down?

Hope this helps...
 

grandad

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hi there...

Erik thank you for replying again..

the reason i scanned at 1200 dpi was because we (granny and i)..dont know the correct dpi to scan images and we were experimenting..i know that if i want to scan an image that is say
4x4 inches ...and i want to print it at 10x8 inches...it is better to scan at a high resolutoin...is that correct?

i have also in the meantime read some articles on scanning...i realise that an image that size will cause photoshop to run slowly ...

but its slow even with smaller images ...10 meg 30 meg ect...

i am going to un-install photoshop an install it again after i delete some programs ect i dont really need or want...then i am going to try some different windows settings ect ..hopefully i will be able to get it to run at a satisfactory speed..

i thank you and everyone else for your patience and suggestions trying to help me figure this out..

hopefully i will be able to contribute next time ..(in my own small way)

thanx again
grandad
 

Erik

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This may be a solution, but anyway: when you don't get any better results, we continue digging together untill this is solved, ok?

problem is I don't have any experience ith XP, but the Pro version cannot be bad.

about the scanning: I don't know which scanner you have, but normally you can specify how big the output must be, either in size or in %. The resolution is in fact used for the amount of detail you want.: if you have 300 dots in one inch, then you can easily see a detail that is 1/150th of an inch wide. If you have 100 dots in one inch, you can't see a detail that's only 1/150th. See what I mean?
You can use the resomution for changing the size of an image by changing the number of dots/pixels per inch in Image>Image size if you uncheck the resampling box.

Try this: scan something at say 150dpi and then at 15 dpi. Look at what happens.

succes, and 'till soon, hopefully with good news.:perfect:
 

Revert

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Hey Grandad i'm not a Photoshop expert, unfortunately. I am A+ and MCSE certified though so i know a little bit about Windows. Wow, those are some big files you are working with. I run XP with a lesser system than you and i don't have slow downs. Biggest files i've worked with though are 48mb's. I have an AMD thunderbird 1.2, 512mb PC133 Crucial Ram. ATI Radeon graphics card. I have a 40 gig 7200 rpm and a 10 gig 5200 rpm drive(it's totally dedicated as scratch disk). I generally set my Ram to about 50% in Photoshop, had no problems with that setting.

From your description if you're having probs with small files too it certainly sounds like a memory issue. On boot up watch the screen for the Ram count. If all is working you should see 640 if their installed and working correctly. Did you check your motherboard manual for your Ram slots? Not all boards are identical but there are limitations on your memory configurations. An example of mine, an EPOX 8kta3+. I can place either single or doubled sided in dimm 1 and 2. If i place singled sided in dimm 3, dimm4 has to be single and same spec. If i place double sided in dimm 3, dimm 4 has to be empty. The same applies if i install to Dimm 4 first, dimm 3 has to be configured correctly. As well as this, it's generally not a good idea to mix different brands of ram. Then you have cas latency, some memory modules run at cas latency of 2, some at 3, again, not good to mix them. I've had problems in the past mixing modules now i stick with one brand, same cas latency and everything runs smooth in Photoshop. If you're in the US, consider crucial ram, www.crucial.com. They can select the correct ram for your system and last time i used them, free delivery. In most peoples opinions, they also make the best. Worth thinking about as these no name generic modules sometimes can be really poor quality. You have a pretty good system, shame to waste it with cheap ram.

Quick mention about processes running in XP. I have 27 running and that's a pretty standard with XP, doesn't cause any slow downs for me.

Oh yeah, the recommendation from Microsoft for Ram is Ram +12. For you that's 652 and 652, making them the same size helps prevent your paging file from defragmenting.
 

kiwi

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Thanks Revert :D



Photoshop 6 did have an issue with not erasing temp files on quitting Photoshop,but apparently the engineers fixed the problem with 6.0.1 :)


There was a lot of discussion on the Adobe useres group about this issue,so check out their knowledgebase as well it might be helpfull :)


Cheers

Stu.
 

Revert

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Stu, i did have problems with memory in Photoshop, crashing until i upgraded to 6.01. It's a big improvement.
 

grandad

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hi ya...

REVERT...thank you for your input...your points are very intersting
and i will be looking into the ram issues and slots ect on my motherboard...on boot up it shows 640 megs...but i have not checked on the dim slots... i will do that today however...

i am going to save for more (better brand name) ram...although now its quite expensive again..
i live in australia and things arent cheap as they are in the US

KIWI...i have the update installed and i have checked the knowledge base but cant find a lot

i will be doing the changes today to my system i will let you all know how things go if you are interested in the outcome...

i am totaly amazed at the freindlyness and the eagerness by members to help newbies such as my self out with problems..

this is truly a GREAT board and i look forward to being able to do the same for others

i thank you all again for your help and suggestions

grandad
 

Revert

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Good luck, i'll be interested to hear if you resolve it or not. There's lots of tweaks that i know for XP to improve performence but to be honest, with the system you have, you shouldn't have to tweak. Fast processor, you're board is very good, normally stable and a good graphics card, only the Ram lets you down :) .

May also be worth your while to run a full scan on your hard drive, to include the surface scan. Never mentioned it before as you said you have no probs running other software. They may not be as memory intensive as photoshop though. So you may as well check it out. If XP performs like you expect it to then it certainly seems like it's hardware related. As great as XP is lots of people have problems with running applications. It sucks really that i had to pay for the full version when i should have been able to purchase just the upgrade but it's not a good choice right now. Way too many problems with upgrading.

Wish i could just pop over, be a lot easier to diagnose. I know you're searching for articles relating to photoshop but i really think it's down to your particular system. There's a piece of hardaware in there right now that's not particularly happy and the no1 suspect is ram, followed by hard drive, followed by motherboard and lastly video card, though unlikely.
 

Erik

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I agree with Revert. From the first moment it struck me as odd to have 2x256 and 1x128. This 128 seems to be added separately because it just isn't logical. A friend of mine who had a PC assembled for her had problems with her software and after I changed the, how do you call it: brandless RAM, into Apacer, it all worked fine. At the shop they tried to convince her that it was the mainboard or the processor and that she did do something wrong so there was no more guarantee on those parts...
 

theKeeper

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Hey fellas...

I haven't read all the posts here thoroughly, so i don't if you've tried this or not grandad...

Find your PS Prefs file and rename it, then restart Photoshop. If this doesn't solve anything, change the prefs file name back to what it was.

Recently i had a situation whereby opening a 512x512 default, single-layered document, caused PS to create a 270+mb swap file. I resolved this by letting PS recreate the prefs file.

Now, it uses only a 100-130mb swap on the same size file. Which is something i can deal with.


If you can't manually find this prefs file (with a .psp extension), use the search function with this as your criteria: *.psp

Chances are if you're using W2K or XP that the file will be in a hidden folder. In which case, when you do your search, use the extra options and tell windows to search within hidden files & folders too. Either that, or manually "unhide" your system files/folders before searching.

If you have a problem with finding this file, let me know.
 

fdeaton

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:) Erik nailed most everything in his explanations, but I have found that rather than looking at scan dpi numbers I look at the filesize to determine what I want to do. Normally a 20meg file is more than enough for an 8x10 color print output, in fact an image 8x10 @ 240ppi should be optimum. I'm not familiar with your printer, or it's software, but I would experiment in there some.
I work in an environment where we have a negative archive of several hundred thousand negatives. When we archive these negatives we do it at 10"xwhatever the small dimension falls to. Negative sizes are 35mm to 70mm, and we archive @ 300ppi. This satisfies most publications I deal with.
Scratch disk--yeah-you need a totally separate volume for this separate from everything else. All of my machines run at least 1 gig of ram, but Photoshop always uses the scratch, no matter what! I normally keep my ram usage at about 50-60% with Photoshop.
I would try some other tweaks before reloading Photoshop, and your processor (AMD) should be great for PS--the Adobe engineers love the AMDs and all have great things to say about them.
This has been a long post for me--did I help any? Stay in touch and we will sort out ur problems. I have found that Photoshop runs extremely stable on my W2K box and should also on Xp although I have no experience on it. BTW, my home box is a 600 Intel Cele OC'D to 900 and it will run some operations faster than my dual processor Mac G4s--all running 1 gig of ram!
 

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