Photoshop CS4 is a disaster

Hugh,

Although I have onboard perc/SAS etc. I actually have one 10K hard drive (SATA) for the operating system and programs, a 1TB hard drive for my working files and two 150GB 10K raptors in a RAID 0 configuration dedicated to PS scratch. My OGL is enabled but all the advanced settings are disabled.

I have tried just about every different setting in the nVidia display drivers and have settled with the following:

Ansitropic filtering - off
Antialiasing - Gamma correction - off
Antialiasing - Setting - Application-controlled
Antialiasing - Transparency - off
Buffer-flipping mode - Auto-select
Conformant texture clamp - Use hardware
Enable overlay - off
Error reporting - off
Exported pixel types - Color indexed overlays (8 bpp)
Extension limit - off
Force stereo shuttering - off
Maximize texture memory - off
Maximum pre-rendered frames - 0
Multi-display/mixed-GPU acceleration - Compatibility performance mode
Stereo - Display mode - Use on-board DIN connector
Stereo - Enable - off
Stereo - Swap eyes - off
Threaded optimization - Auto
Triple buffering - off
Unified back/depth buffer - on
Vertical sync - Force off

OGL is working great, really fast zoom and rotation. Typing text is smooth and fast.

I use blackviper.com to help trim some of the services. I have 26 processes running after startup (3 of them are for the Wacom intuos 3)and no errors in the event viewer.

Snoop filter is on and HT is enabled.

I use a free disk defrag utility (JKdefrag64)I also have Ad-Aware SE, Qimage, Office 2003, Quark Xpress 7.3 and Corel X4 along with a heap of plug-ins, AutoFX Dreamsuite and Page Edges, neat-image 32 & 64 bit, HP print drivers and Epson scanner driver. Opera, Firefox 3, IE 7 (32 & 64 bit)CS4 Design premium, Lightroom 64, FotoFusion, PowerDVD, Roxio, Silkypix and ESET smart security.

Many newer systems should be faster than this - I purchased this system in September 2006.

Jacqui

Edit: p.s. for Hugh BIOS is A07 and Intel chipset 5000:
Title: Chip Set: Intel Chipset Software Installation Utility Driver
Version : A14
OEM name : Intel
OEM Version: 7.3.0.1012

Jacqui,

Wanted to thank you for reminding me about HT. I have stopped using the app that was giving me problems, so I re-enabled. Overall system performance is greatly improved. Not just PS, but the entire system. I am assuming you are using the Intel chipset. What BIOS and driver rev for the chipset? What memory options are you using?

I can not touch your numbers for the speed test. Suspect some of my more invasive apps are in the way ... just too lazy to reconfigure. Shaved a bit of time, but not much.

Thanks again,

H

While we are on the subject of tuning and improving overall PS performance, I will share the utilities that I use. Some are freeware, some shareware and some commercial:

System Mechanic Pro
Reg Defense
Diskeeper Pro (you need to be careful here)
ServWin
XPepius
Dirsize
Driver Sweeper
Empty Folder Nuker

I have no stake in any of these utilities. Just want to pass-along some tools that I have found useful.

Also a good FAQ on tuning XP can be found at:

http://www.videoguys.com/WinXP.html

H

ProArtist,
Glad you are making progress.
Q

Jacqui,

We have almost identical systems. I disabled HT because I was having problems with some apps. My card is a newer generation than the 4500 -- although I love the 4500 and am going to e-bay it this week. Should go for about $600 -- considering what I paid, that is sad...

I use XP SP3-32 exclusively.

Same vid driver. Did you get OGL to work? Do you disable "Allow Application Settings" in the driver?

I am assuming with these numbers, you are splitting everything up to separate spindles. 15K SCSI?

BTW, I checked their site; it looks like 31s is close to the fastest time ever reported.

Want to have a race?

H

I ran the test and got 31.1 sec using the 64-bit app and 31.8 sec using 32-bit. Not much difference really. Both with OGL enabled. Latest 180.20 drivers for Quadro FX4500 (posted yesterday). Outlook and Opera and AV/firewall running in the background.

My system is over 2 years old.

I don't think this test is valid for the brush/clone issues since it doesn't push pixels around my 2560 x 1600 monitor. On some files, some relatively small 2500x2500px with lots of adjustment layers and layer effects, I have to make the image the size of a postage stamp to get anything moving with any speed.

XP-64
16GB DDR2 5300 RAM (running in quad channel mode)
twin xeon dual core processors 3.73GHZ (8 cores with HT on)
Quadro FX4500 180.20 drivers

Everything else works perfectly on my system and for the work I do normally, it outperforms CS3.

Nvidia is clearly trying to squeeze everyone into their overly priced "high end" hardware. You have only one real choice, buy it or go screw.

I'm sure that will take them far in this wonderful economy.

Hopefully Intel will put Nvidia on the defensive soon and provide much more functionality at the multi core level.

I love Nvidia but they lost their mind and their dedication to affordable power.

I should have clarified my earlier post on the speed test. I was interested in a real-world scenario, so I simply downloaded the files and ran the test on my existing system in its normal state and got a time of 53 seconds. After turning-off a few things (Bridge, LR, PP and stopped iTunes from blasting Depeche Mode), I got the speed test to 41 seconds. I still have some very invasive stuff running (AVP, Ghost, etc), but I seldom disable them.

I have noticed some very long times being reported in this thread. I just tried this on my laptop and get a time of about 1m.20s.

In a previous post, I mentioned that for those PS folks who are not into NLE or compositing, you should visit some of the sites. These folks have made an art out of sucking every last ounce of performance from a system. After all, a 60 second fully composited broadcast commercial can take 4 hours to render. The documentary I am working-on takes 43 hours. Every minute counts.

There are some excellent 40+ page PDFs on tuning. Adobe has also published a pretty good one. When I install an XP setup, I can disable about 20 services just dont need them. I also need to make about 20 registry entries. It all adds-up. Google is your friend.

This is all CS4 and it all works fine (and this is important, for me) some glitches along the way (I am working with AE engineering on one now). To be clear, there are problems with PS OGL does not work at all (for me). Many of PPs problems are addressed by some patches. The engineering teams are working the issues.

Now, if you want to see truly hostile threads, just visit the LR forums.

Hope it helps,

H

Scott,

There is an interesting thread on DVi for this particular topic.

There appears to be a nasty rumor going-around that nVidia is encouraging folks to step-up to the FX line by starting to disable some of more advanced features from the other lines. Several folks have reported that as they update to newer and newer driver levels, some features that they used to have are no longer available --- not that they dont work, simply not available. INW, the card can do it, but it is patched-out from the driver. The 8800 is mentioned as a target. It is also supposedly happening at different rates for different platforms. PP overlay is also specifically mentioned.

I have no idea if this is true; I have used FX cards since their inception, so absolutely no first-hand knowledge of the other lines.

Hope it helps,

H

I still think it's the nvidia 8800's fault. I know that in Premiere Pro the 8800 can't do video overlays although it's spec'd as being compatible.

How many of you have these problems and also own a 8800?