Participant

Answered

Alt click delay, eyedropper problem

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
May 26, 2019
18 replies
26422 views

My problem is very much the same as people have already asked YEARS ago like this one: Color picker lag in Photoshop CC These issues remain unanswered as if all are totally indifferent to people having such problems...

The problem is that after installing Windows 10 I noticed a considerable lag in using ALT key for color picking while I'm drawing with a Brush tool. It takes more time than before to take the color (when the color is really changed on the left panel) and that lag is really irritating. If I do it as before, as I usually did (without so much waiting) then the brush tool is activated and I have a brush mark in the place I wanted to take a color sample from! So releasing an ALT key results in un undesirable brush spot that spoils all the work! It slows down the work considerably especially when you a CG artsit and need to blend colors quickly, taking fast color samples from nearby areas, not spotting them with brush spots of the other color!

What I've tried so far to save you time and not give useless advice:

Reinstalled PS

Reinstalled Wacom drivers

Increased performance for PS (decreased History states, increased memory used and added more scratch disks, turned off GPU)

Updated PS through CC

Created PSUserConfig.txt as many forums suggested

Turned off using Windows ink

Disabled press and hold for right clicking as well as using the pen button as a right click equivalent.

Tried PS on my laptop (so as to exclude keyboard problem with ALT pushing), laptop also has Win10

All that didn't help at all...

Please do not say the problem is in my PS and its probable performance, my friend has weaker performance on his PC but he doesn't have this problem.

Please do not write that the problem is on the Windows software side, it probably is but I'm asking for real advice here!

Adobe, will you answer this question this time? Anyone having suggestions on what else can be done? That seems like a curse and a simple delay totally ruins my work and makes working in PS unpleasant to its full...

Correct answer Oana B

I managed to solved the lag by disabling windows ink in such a way that keeps your pen pressure. Here's the article i used:

https://sweetmonia.com/Sweet-Drawing-Blog/wacom-tablet-how-to-disable-windows-ink-keep-pressure-sensitivity-in-adobe-photoshop/

hope this helps you and anyone who reads this

T

Tianqin29505021a59u

Participant

Hello everyone I just accidentally solved the problem as well. I was initally going to do the window ink method but i went to disable the Press and Hold Circle and that just solved it. heres a tutorial https://matthatfieldart.com/how-to-disable-press-and-hold-circle-in-photoshop-using-wacom-tablet-in-windows-10/

jane-e

Community Expert

@albertg17081574 wrote:

My problem is very much the same as people have already asked YEARS ago like this one: Color picker lag in Photoshop CC

Moved from Photoshop Fix to Photoshop.

While this thread started in 2019, it has replies continuing to Feb 9, 2023. Photoshop Fix is no longer supported, so it languished with its 31 replies for four years in a dead forum.

Jane

О

Олег28339831sgdm

Participant

Была такая же проблема. Оказалось, что виноваты драйвера. При установке планшета в первый раз ни в коем случае нельзя торопиться его подключать к компьютеру. Вначале необходимо скачать драйвера, установить их и только потом воткнуть в usb- port разъем от планшета. Win10 нельзя разрешать использовать встроенные драйвера. Именно из-за этого возникает конфликт.

_

_UltraChristy_

Participant

Hey guys I know this is an old thread, but I think I found a few pretty quick and easy solutions that (at least for me) work like a charm.

The problem is that windows uses the ALT key as a built-in shortcut that selects things in your menu bar at the top (you can see this if you hold down alt. 'File' and 'edit' etc, all get underlined) it's this windows shortcut that messes up the photoshop colour picker, as well as many other tools in other adobe products.

Two extremely quick, temporary, ways to avoid this problem is to either:

1. use the letter 'I' on the keyboard instead, holding down any tool shortcut will temporarily switch to it, click the colour you want, then release the key to go back to the tool you were previously using (this is very useful trick for the eraser tool as well btw)
2. use photoshop in full screen mode press 'F' twice, or got to View>>Screen Mode>>Full Screen Mode.

Hey, the ALT key can't select the menu bar if there is no menu bar, but this is annoying since you can't see your other tools (pressing TAB will show/hide them).

But the permanent solution is to use this super fast program made by Taran Van Hemert, a cool youtuber guy, he made this really neat little script that fixed this for me immediately, here's the vid.

The script is a .exe file that you can find here:

https://github.com/TaranVH/2nd-keyboard/raw/master/Taran's_Windows_Mods/Alt_menu_acceleration_DISABLER.exe

I was a little apprehensive since windows defender doesn't like you running an unauthorised apps like this, and I had to click 'read more' and then 'run anyway'. Despite my concerns the dude looked pretty reputable, lots of popular videos working with adobe. So I took a chance, and I can confirm it works really really well.

I really hope at least one of these solutions helps you out!

And to Windows 10 wtf bro figure it out c'mon it's a keyboard shortcut christ on a sandwich.

G

grachik

Participant

I found solution that helped me. (credit to droidwin com)

FIX 1: Disable Native Canvas Rulers

The use of grids, guides, and rulers is beyond debatable among the most useful tools. However, as of now, it seems to be the culprit behind the software’s slow performance. Therefore, you should consider temporarily disabling it and then check out the results. Here’s how it could be done:

Launch Photoshop and go to the Preferences menu.
Then select Technology Previews from the left-hand side.
After that, uncheck “Enable Native Canvas Rulers”.
Check if it fixes the Adobe Photoshop lag issue when using the Alt key.

S

SleepyJ

Participant

I was having this exact problem. The solution was to disable the press and hold setting in the flicks menu. I'm using Windows 10. Here's the process:

- Type "flicks" into Windows Start Menu search.

- Select "Turn flicks on or off".

- From "Pen Actions" select "Press and hold" and hit the settings button.

- Uncheck 'Enable press and hold for right clicking".

- Hit OK.

- Make sure you hit "Apply".

Using Alt to sample colors should hopefully be snappy once more. I imagine the flicks settings are intended for tablet PCs, like the Surface? Unfortunately they seem to apply by default to Wacom tablets and the like.

P

Paul2250227914rm

Inspiring

This unfortunately didn't help for me. I even turned off 'Use pen as right-click equivalent' - still the same lag. It gets worse when sampling ring is turned on. Come on Adobe, I just ported from a smooth running CS5 and CC2022 is like this? People are praying for a fix on this. Please give us digital painters one.

L

Lagrotan

Participant

For the love of art, please fix this Adobe.

Dimski

Participant

Thank you! It's been driving me up the wall since I moved to Win10 from MacOS.

P

pab22869167nxar

Participant

Hello There,

This daley in the color picker drove me crazy, so I contacted Adobe, as I was explaning the problem to the guy in the support chat, he asked me to share screen and give him remote acces, for that he asked me to close all personal files.

so did close google chrome witch i have a few windows open.

As i started to show him the problem, .... there was no more Delay in the color picker when press the ALT key.

it worked fine , super fast picking color with no lag at all.

so I apologized, I told him the 5 minutes ago the problem was there, and din't know what happend.

Today the daley was back...

so checked what sofwhare i had open at the same time as photoshop.... Zbrush and a bunch of Chrome tabs.

I stared closing one by one and checking if the delay was there.. until... I close a youtube video.. DELAY GONE.

M

mandryk

Known Participant

ive tried closing all other windows it doesn't do anything. From what I can tell it's because ALT is also calling the top menu bar and there'sno way to stop that behaviour...other than appassistant - which works, but the reports of it being malware is concerning. Best fix would be for adobe to just make an option where ALT does not invoke the top menu options.

G

GijsWitkamp

Participant

DON'T USE APSSISTANT. I've been using it for quite a while, Rkill noticed it was malware, it's really pesky and it digs deep. I can't say I have another fix, someone mentioned a shortcut handler / disabler in another post, but the delay and dropdown-menu-issue persists. This is written on 25/01/2022 and I've seen results from like 2013 about this issue. Can't imagine why paint-related core-stuff gets such little love :^)
Anywho's, stay away from Apsisstant!

S

Sier22424318bk1z

Participant

I have Alt lag problem after installing win11.

We need full control for keyboard shortcuts, this hardcoded stuff is insane and makes no sense.

J

jjaccoma

Known Participant

I had the alt lag after installing win11 as well, I seem to have fixed it for now.

I updated my wacom tablet drivers, I use a cintiq 22. Then I went into Wacom Tablet Properties and unchecked 'use windows ink' which is under the Calibrate tab, for anyone using the same tablet.

Luckily I was able to get it to work again, but still the fact that alt is hardcoded to toggle the menu hotkeys is really annoying because i'll be in the flow of things and i'll accidentally hit alt and all of the sudden I'm in the file dropdown or whatever. I understand the utility of this but it would be really nice to turn it off.

M

mandryk

Known Participant

i tried with windows ink off but then PS decides pressure sensitiviuy isn't a thing. I don't understand after all these years why PS and wacom just can't play nice together. It's like a boat constantly plugging leaks only to have more spring up.

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FIX 1: Disable Native Canvas Rulers

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