Inspiring

Answered

Graphics Card for photoshop CC 2017 and Lightroom

Forum|Forum|8 years ago
August 9, 2017
5 replies
45966 views

Hi, I need some help, I have looked at the adobe site which discussed the Graphics card they have tested, both AMD and NVidia, however they refer to what I believe may be old or obsolete cards. The manufactures I want to use to build my PC don't make reference to them. I have two quotes which are using different cards;

4GB AMD Radeon RX550

6GB Nvidia Geforce GTX1060

Are these cards compatible, can anyone recommend one which they are using and are having no issues. I will not be video editing.

FAQ

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Correct answer JJMack

If all you are concerned with is Photoshop you do not need to invest in a high end Display adapter. Money would be better spent on a better processors, RAM and SSD. Photoshop can be quite resource hungry application. Processor speed, Cores, SSD and RAM will help greatly there. While Photoshop requires a GPU today for some features to work at all. Photoshop uses GPU acceleration in some features however it is not alwaye being used. Photoshop is not really Graphics intensive application. Photoshop is basicily and interactive image editing application where you zoom, rotate, liquify, stroke and do other image manipulation interactivle. You want good performance in all features. So you need a GPU for that. However, Photoshop is not merging video streams into frames or trying to render frames for an action shootem up game as fast as possible. Photoshop has many requirements to support many large layers and open documents. Displaying images or parts of image and rendering changes is a small part of what Photoshop does.

KShinabery212

Community Expert

I actually went to the Nvidia press conference at gamescom, they have some new graphics cards that are amazing. Granted these cards are meant for 3D rendering and would set you back a lot.

If you are working with only Photoshop and Lightroom then why not consider buying a Wacom Cintiq Companion 2 or Wacom MobileStudio Pro?

They basically are a laptop that allows you to draw directly on the screen. This could be a great solution for editing photos and the graphics cards in theses devices are top notch!

Unless you already have a Cintiq monitor that plugs into your computer... then I would continue the route you are going.

But it is something to consider and it would speed up your work flow. Plus you can go anywhere with it! Being mobile is also a big benefit for a new computer or device.

Just something to consider.

Let's connect on LinkedIn. https://www.linkedin.com/in/kshinabery/

ImagesByLaw

Participant

There are a few factors here that no one seems to know about.

1: The functions that Photoshop uses the GPU for are priceless for me. The two biggest things are the ability to rotate an image using the R key and facial recognition liquefy. I do a lot of portraits and these two tools I use every single time. Or at least I used to. That brings me to my second point.

2: The people that create Photoshop hate AMD. I have a very expensive and powerful graphics card. Every single time Photoshop releases a new version, it doesn't recognize my graphics card at all. I am going on 4 months now and the people that create Photoshop refuse to update with a patch that recognizes my AMD graphics card. This happened for the 2015 and 2017 updates as well. I just invested in an AMD monster of a machine with a powerful Ryzen 7 processor, 64 GB of DDR4 Ram, 1TB m.2 solid state hard drive, and an AMD RX Vega 64 graphics card. However, Photoshop, and now for the first time (cc 2018) Lightroom do not recognize my GPU. Premiere Pro still does, but I am mostly a photographer, I do very little video.

I am not sure why the people at Adobe hate AMD so much, but it's really making me consider jumping ship to the newer companies. Lightroom is insanely slow anyways. I have been using Photoshop and Lightroom for over a decade now and I am very frustrated with this. I bought what I thought was going to be the dream editing machine and Adobe seems to just not care about it's consumers. I have had similar problems with other AMD video cards. Apparently Adobe wants you to buy the twice as expensive Intel chipset.

Before anyone says anything, yes I have done everything possible to update my drivers including rebooting windows from scratch and doing a total clean install of all drivers and adobe software.

JJMack

Community Expert

IMO you are entitled to you opinions there your. I do not believe Adobe has a hate AMD policy or Guideline for their employees. When I was installing Windows 10 Previews with most new install update Photoshop failed to see my Nvidia Quadro device diver supported OpenCL. I had to reinstall the quadro device diver for Photoshop to see that. I do not think the Microsoft has it out for Nvidia and at the end Microsoft got it right. Photoshop is large and complex software has many features and bugs. With each new Photoshop release new feature and new bugs are added. If your opinion would be Adobe Development, Testing and Support is poor I would agree with you. However I do not think Photoshop is a poor Application it may be too rich and it is making Adobe a pile of money. I do not believe Adobe has a hate AMD culture or policy I know for sure there are bugs in Photoshop. I do not even install Lightroom it is a choice you make.

Adobe want to make money Adobe want you to buy into Adobe no matter what hardware you use. Including AMD hardware. I have had more problems with ATI/AMD device drivers then with Nvidia Quadro device drivers. So I now prefer to buy Quadro display adapters. A choice I made myself. I have use Photoshop for over twenty years.

Intel and AMD have the same weekness Meltdown and Spectre are not confined to Intel

JJMack

ImagesByLaw

Participant

I understand Photoshop is a very powerful tool. I use it every single day. It just frustrates me when they update and it takes away tools that I am used to using every day.

I am not saying Adobe is anti AMD. I have never had this problem with Premiere Pro or After Effects and only recently has it effected Lightroom. However, it always always happens with Photoshop. I have been using Photoshop for 15 years because no one else comes close to their capability. But because of their lack of QC, others are making competing products from the ground up which will be much faster. Albeit it will take them a few years to figure out and implement all the tools Photoshop has created, but they're coming.

D Fosse

Community Expert

If you want to be in on the next big leap forward, go for an M.2 PCIe SSD as your system drive. This runs circles around standard SATA SSDs, and prices are just a tiny bit higher. The M.2 SSD is just a small card that plugs into the motherboard, with transfer speeds previously unheard of.

I/O has always been a bottleneck in Photoshop, which is an application that shuffles huge amounts of data around. Previously the most efficient way to deal with it was to add more RAM.

As for video card. If you don't do a lot of gaming, swap the GTX1060 for a Quadro K420. They cost roughly the same, but the Quadro will be much more useful for what Photoshop does.

A

agh01Author

Inspiring

Pierre and JJMack, thanks for your responses, I will focus on getting the highest spec. processor my budget will allow.

JJMack

Community Expert

All new Nvidia and AMD adapters will work with Photoshop. Photoshop is not very demanding when it come to Display adapters. Games and Video are. So if you want to do Video Adobe Premier Pro I would think the way to go would be with a Nvidia Quadro adapter. If you do Gamming a highend Nvidia Geforce adapter these will work with Photoshop.

I'm not familiar with new AMD adapters and drivers. In the past I have had issues with old ATI display Drivers. I have installed many versions of Nvidia Device drivers and found them to be very reliable.

JJMack

A

agh01Author

Inspiring

JJMack, thanks for the reply, the two companies I have received quotes from to build a PC don't quote for Nvidia Quadro adapters ( is an Adapter the same as a Graphics card) just Geforce. I have read in other threads, particularly Lightroom there are issues with certain Graphics Cards that make Lightroom very sluggish. My PC is aging and the Graphic card is a Geforce G210 and I would hate to spent a lot of money and don't see a vast improvement in performance.

JJMack

Correct answer

Community Expert

If all you are concerned with is Photoshop you do not need to invest in a high end Display adapter. Money would be better spent on a better processors, RAM and SSD. Photoshop can be quite resource hungry application. Processor speed, Cores, SSD and RAM will help greatly there. While Photoshop requires a GPU today for some features to work at all. Photoshop uses GPU acceleration in some features however it is not alwaye being used. Photoshop is not really Graphics intensive application. Photoshop is basicily and interactive image editing application where you zoom, rotate, liquify, stroke and do other image manipulation interactivle. You want good performance in all features. So you need a GPU for that. However, Photoshop is not merging video streams into frames or trying to render frames for an action shootem up game as fast as possible. Photoshop has many requirements to support many large layers and open documents. Displaying images or parts of image and rendering changes is a small part of what Photoshop does.

JJMack

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