Posted by Ken Watkins on September 5, 2015 at 9:30 AM
As a Canon user I have never really had this problem before but now that I have a 5DS( Raw size 50mb) my computer seems to be showing its age.
I have PS 6 but would prefer not to enrich Adobe even more.
My system runs on Widows 7 Professional 64 bit
I only have 8 gb RAM installed so probably need to increase this.
Does any body have any further ideas?
Posted by Jim DeWitt on September 5, 2015 at 11:17 AM
Ken -
I'm aMac user, so I'm not much help, but when I went from PS 6 to PS CC processing Canon 1D-X files I had to goose my RAM from 8 to 16 GB and buy a 3 TB SATA drive for the swap files to get decent performance on a 3-year old Mac.
1. Install more RAM. 16GB would work, but 32 would be better, assuming you can afford it.
2. Purchase an SSD for your primary (C) drive. Install your OS and apps on it. There are apps you can use to clone your existing primary drive to a new SSD so that you don't have to reinstall everything. Prices on SSD's are falling, so they are good bet and will really increase performance. there are some really relaible SSD's out there, but the reviews I've read give high marks to Intel and Samsung SSD's.
If you go with the new SSD, consider upgrading to Win 10 at some point. I have already upgraded and, once I got used to it, it's a nice and snappy OS.
I keep my 'working' files on my SSD. I have 16GB of RAM. CS6 opens and is ready to go in less than 5 seconds, and I can open a 1.5 GB PSD file in about 7 seconds.. I do plan to upgrade to 32 GB of RAM (the max for my motherboard).
I hope this helps.
--P
Posted by Richard Ditch on September 5, 2015 at 12:34 PM
"...when I went from PS 6 to PS CC processing Canon 1D-X files I had to goose my RAM from 8 to 16 GB..." - Jim DeWitt
Am I reading this correctly? Just changing to PS CC, with the same camera raw file size, required the memory increase?
Preston has the right idea. 16GB is probably OK, but the SSD for a primary is a wowser. My wife and I both have 32 GB machines, hers from Puget with a one TB Samsung SSD fro a primary. A wonderful machine! The SSDs are coming down in price to a pricepoint I can afford (soon, I hope).
In partial answer to Richard's question, I don't see the need to change RAM size with the simple change from PS6 to CC. But there may have been plugins, Lightroom, etc that get bundled together. Even at that, without the peripherals for either LR or CC the programs together only take up about 1.2 GB loaded. There just may be so much else that Jim has not accounted for in the upgrade. Hopefully, he will explain. My wife and I upgraded our RAM To 32 GB before we switched to CC and are happy with the way it runs.
Showing my ignorance, as I have never had a MAC, I thought you couldn't upgrade RAM on a MAC, that you had to go to a new machine? Jim? Richard?
Posted by Jim Zablotny on September 5, 2015 at 5:58 PM
Hi Ken,
You need to find details on your computer's motherboard that include the type and total amount of RAM the board can take and also is your board compatible with SSD technology. If so, then that might be the cheapest way to upgrade. Good luck and I hope you find a solution.......................Jim
Posted by Richard Ditch on September 5, 2015 at 10:01 PM
"...Showing my ignorance, as I have never had a MAC, I thought you couldn't upgrade RAM on a MAC, that you had to go to a new machine? Jim? Richard?" - Phil Hodgkins
I think the ultra light Macbook Air has a fixed amount of RAM at the time of sale - no user access to any internal components including the battery as far as I know. But MacBook Pro, Mac Pro towers, iMacs, have easy user access to the memory slots. Probably the "low end" MacBook and maybe the Mc Mini allow this as well.
My MacBook Pro from 2011 is maxed out officially at 8GB; the 27" iMac I'm working on at the moment (from 2009) has the factory 4GB but can go up to 16GB (I'll buy another 8GB for it in a couple of weeks for the two empty RAM slots). My old 2006 iMac (20" and an early "Intel Mac") was upgraded to 4GB.
For the Mac-curious I highly recommend the free application Mactracker. It covers every model ever sold, listing processor and speed, internal bus, ports, memory, OS originally included and the latest it can run, dates of sale, etc.
Jim is right on regarding the type and amount of RAM your motherboard can use. If you install the wrong stuff, your PC might not even boot! If you know the specific make and model for your motherboard, you should be able to find its manual on line.
With regard to RAM--don't be taken in by all the hype of fancy (and expensive) RAM. Once you know the type of RAM you need and the amount, hop over to Kingston or Crucial. You should be able to easily find what you need.
Most PC's built within the last several years will have no issues with an SSD, so you should be OK. (my computer was built in 2011, and I had no problems at all.)
I found a couple of articles at How To Geek about installing an SSD and then migrating your current OS to it.
Both articles are nicely detailed as to the steps you need to take.
Adding more RAM and an SSD is a very cost effective way to upgrade a PC (or a compatible Mac--Thanks for the Mac info, Richard).
Have fun!
--P
Posted by David Bostedo on September 6, 2015 at 7:42 PM
Ken - A couple of things :
1) How well maintained is your PC? I.e. are you certain there's no malware or virus, the registry is fairly clean, you've tuned or turned off unnecessary startup programs that can suck up memory, etc?
2) With Windows 7, if you install and SSD and go the "clone" route and don't do the full re-install of the OS, it may not work properly. I spent several weeks trying to get an SSD to actually work properly on my Windows 7 laptop before giving up, and re-installing a standard drive. Ther issue was that the SSD . I spent a lot of time tweaking and changing settings, and reading a lot of several sites, before ultimately giving up.
I've heard that Windows 8 and beyond handle current SSDs much better though, so YMMV.
Posted by Ken Watkins on September 7, 2015 at 9:48 AM
Thanka everybody for your suggestions, most helpful.
I think that more RAM is the clear best bet, I have an SSD drive but it could do with being bigger.
As for Windows 10, if only I could update for free, I might.
SSD's need free space for best performance. If your SSD is more than 75% full, that will cause it to slow down. If you have another drive (internal or external) you should move any files you don't use regularly off the SSD.
David is correct. Disabling startup apps you don't need to run will speed things up. Doing a virus/malware scan is a really good idea. I would leave the registry alone. From what I've read, cleaning the registery doesn't do much in terms of performance increase. If the registry is corrupted, you would know it.
As for Windows 10, if only I could update for free, I might.
Why can't you upgrade for free? If you have Win 7 SP-1, you should be able to upgrade, unless you have a version that's not eligible.
--P
Posted by David Bostedo on September 7, 2015 at 1:29 PM
If you have Win 7 SP-1, you should be able to upgrade, unless you have a version that's not eligible.
Posted by Anil Rao on September 7, 2015 at 3:41 PM
I wonder why 8 GB of RAM is thought to be insufficient for working with 50 MB RAW files. Even when using multiple layers in Photoshop I doubt your file size will go past 1-2GB. So you might want to see what is consuming the rest.
Before you invest in an hardware upgrade, I would like to suggest taking a close look at how the hardware resources are being used in your computer. You can open up the Windows Task Manager (Cntl-Alt-Del) and go to the Performance tab. There you will see the actual CPU, Memory, Storage (and Network) usage. Do this test while you are editing one of your picture files in PS.
If your memory use is low then an upgrade from 8GB upwards won't buy you much. If your machine is old, it could just be that you have a slower processor.
Discussion
13 repliesAs a Canon user I have never really had this problem before but now that I have a 5DS( Raw size 50mb) my computer seems to be showing its age.
I have PS 6 but would prefer not to enrich Adobe even more.
My system runs on Widows 7 Professional 64 bit
I only have 8 gb RAM installed so probably need to increase this.
Does any body have any further ideas?
Ken -
I'm aMac user, so I'm not much help, but when I went from PS 6 to PS CC processing Canon 1D-X files I had to goose my RAM from 8 to 16 GB and buy a 3 TB SATA drive for the swap files to get decent performance on a 3-year old Mac.
Jim
Ken, I have a couple of ideas...
1. Install more RAM. 16GB would work, but 32 would be better, assuming you can afford it.
2. Purchase an SSD for your primary (C) drive. Install your OS and apps on it. There are apps you can use to clone your existing primary drive to a new SSD so that you don't have to reinstall everything. Prices on SSD's are falling, so they are good bet and will really increase performance. there are some really relaible SSD's out there, but the reviews I've read give high marks to Intel and Samsung SSD's.
If you go with the new SSD, consider upgrading to Win 10 at some point. I have already upgraded and, once I got used to it, it's a nice and snappy OS.
I keep my 'working' files on my SSD. I have 16GB of RAM. CS6 opens and is ready to go in less than 5 seconds, and I can open a 1.5 GB PSD file in about 7 seconds.. I do plan to upgrade to 32 GB of RAM (the max for my motherboard).
I hope this helps.
--P
"...when I went from PS 6 to PS CC processing Canon 1D-X files I had to goose my RAM from 8 to 16 GB..." - Jim DeWitt
Am I reading this correctly? Just changing to PS CC, with the same camera raw file size, required the memory increase?
Preston has the right idea. 16GB is probably OK, but the SSD for a primary is a wowser. My wife and I both have 32 GB machines, hers from Puget with a one TB Samsung SSD fro a primary. A wonderful machine! The SSDs are coming down in price to a pricepoint I can afford (soon, I hope).
In partial answer to Richard's question, I don't see the need to change RAM size with the simple change from PS6 to CC. But there may have been plugins, Lightroom, etc that get bundled together. Even at that, without the peripherals for either LR or CC the programs together only take up about 1.2 GB loaded. There just may be so much else that Jim has not accounted for in the upgrade. Hopefully, he will explain. My wife and I upgraded our RAM To 32 GB before we switched to CC and are happy with the way it runs.
Showing my ignorance, as I have never had a MAC, I thought you couldn't upgrade RAM on a MAC, that you had to go to a new machine? Jim? Richard?
Hi Ken,
You need to find details on your computer's motherboard that include the type and total amount of RAM the board can take and also is your board compatible with SSD technology. If so, then that might be the cheapest way to upgrade. Good luck and I hope you find a solution.......................Jim
"...Showing my ignorance, as I have never had a MAC, I thought you couldn't upgrade RAM on a MAC, that you had to go to a new machine? Jim? Richard?" - Phil Hodgkins
I think the ultra light Macbook Air has a fixed amount of RAM at the time of sale - no user access to any internal components including the battery as far as I know. But MacBook Pro, Mac Pro towers, iMacs, have easy user access to the memory slots. Probably the "low end" MacBook and maybe the Mc Mini allow this as well.
My MacBook Pro from 2011 is maxed out officially at 8GB; the 27" iMac I'm working on at the moment (from 2009) has the factory 4GB but can go up to 16GB (I'll buy another 8GB for it in a couple of weeks for the two empty RAM slots). My old 2006 iMac (20" and an early "Intel Mac") was upgraded to 4GB.
For the Mac-curious I highly recommend the free application Mactracker. It covers every model ever sold, listing processor and speed, internal bus, ports, memory, OS originally included and the latest it can run, dates of sale, etc.
Ken,
Jim is right on regarding the type and amount of RAM your motherboard can use. If you install the wrong stuff, your PC might not even boot! If you know the specific make and model for your motherboard, you should be able to find its manual on line.
With regard to RAM--don't be taken in by all the hype of fancy (and expensive) RAM. Once you know the type of RAM you need and the amount, hop over to Kingston or Crucial. You should be able to easily find what you need.
Most PC's built within the last several years will have no issues with an SSD, so you should be OK. (my computer was built in 2011, and I had no problems at all.)
I found a couple of articles at How To Geek about installing an SSD and then migrating your current OS to it.
How to Install an SSD
How to Migrate Windows 7 to an SSD
Both articles are nicely detailed as to the steps you need to take.
Adding more RAM and an SSD is a very cost effective way to upgrade a PC (or a compatible Mac--Thanks for the Mac info, Richard).
Have fun!
--P
Ken - A couple of things :
1) How well maintained is your PC? I.e. are you certain there's no malware or virus, the registry is fairly clean, you've tuned or turned off unnecessary startup programs that can suck up memory, etc?
2) With Windows 7, if you install and SSD and go the "clone" route and don't do the full re-install of the OS, it may not work properly. I spent several weeks trying to get an SSD to actually work properly on my Windows 7 laptop before giving up, and re-installing a standard drive. Ther issue was that the SSD . I spent a lot of time tweaking and changing settings, and reading a lot of several sites, before ultimately giving up.
I've heard that Windows 8 and beyond handle current SSDs much better though, so YMMV.
Thanka everybody for your suggestions, most helpful.
I think that more RAM is the clear best bet, I have an SSD drive but it could do with being bigger.
As for Windows 10, if only I could update for free, I might.
Ken,
SSD's need free space for best performance. If your SSD is more than 75% full, that will cause it to slow down. If you have another drive (internal or external) you should move any files you don't use regularly off the SSD.
David is correct. Disabling startup apps you don't need to run will speed things up. Doing a virus/malware scan is a really good idea. I would leave the registry alone. From what I've read, cleaning the registery doesn't do much in terms of performance increase. If the registry is corrupted, you would know it.
Why can't you upgrade for free? If you have Win 7 SP-1, you should be able to upgrade, unless you have a version that's not eligible.
--P
You can find out more about the free Windows 10 upgrades on this page : https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/Windows-10-faq
I wonder why 8 GB of RAM is thought to be insufficient for working with 50 MB RAW files. Even when using multiple layers in Photoshop I doubt your file size will go past 1-2GB. So you might want to see what is consuming the rest.
Before you invest in an hardware upgrade, I would like to suggest taking a close look at how the hardware resources are being used in your computer. You can open up the Windows Task Manager (Cntl-Alt-Del) and go to the Performance tab. There you will see the actual CPU, Memory, Storage (and Network) usage. Do this test while you are editing one of your picture files in PS.
If your memory use is low then an upgrade from 8GB upwards won't buy you much. If your machine is old, it could just be that you have a slower processor.
Anil's idea to check to see what's happening with overall system performance before you spend your cash on new hardware is a good one.
Here's a blog post from Adobe about fine tuning CS6 for best performance. It's worth checking out.
Let us know what you find and also if the tweaks referenced in the Adobe article made a difference.
--P