InDesign running slow. Spinning ball constantly appearing.

[scottmosher]

Ok, I'm having CONSTANT slow drag with InDesign. The spinning beach ball appears while I"m doing almost ANYTHING, even after quitting/re-starting the program, and even re-starting the OS. I'm running High Sierra on Mac, with 40GB of memory, so that shouldn't be the issue, but almost anything I'm doing, I'm getting major lag. Any ideas? This is really ridiculous. Thanks!

[Alicia Decaro]

It is a Mac running High Sierra (10.13.6)

[Derek Cross]

Which version of InDesign?

[Alicia Decaro]

2018 v13.1

[Srishti Bali]

Hi,

I completely understand and sorry about this frustration. I understand that today its practically impossible to work offline, but if it is solving the performance issue then there something which should be check by your IT team.

We at Adobe, have very limited support for Network-based Environments because there are so many other things involved with it(Technical support boundaries for virtualized or server-based environments ) but from my personal experience, I would suggest you few things which you must check:

• Check if this is happening with your user account only or with multiple users
• Check if there is any antivirus or if there is any endpoint security or if there is any restriction imposed by your IT Team. Due to this sometimes server does not allow the application to save but you are able to save outside the application.
• This generally happens when network policies or Operating System is updated, check with your IT team for the same.

Regards,

Srishti

[williamm97875483]

InDesign CC 2018 is unusable. I downloaded it two days OK. Every was OK. Today it takes 20 min to open a file. Sometimes I can see the open file, sometimes the window disappears.

I dumped my preferences file. Made no difference.

I've wasted an entire morning opening and force quitting and now I'm up against deadline. Please help. I spent six months convincing my employers to upgrade CC.

[BobLevine]

What operating system? What are the system specs? Clean operating system install or inplace upgrades?

[williamm97875483]

Mac OS Sierra 10.12.6

32gb of memory

[Srishti Bali]

Hi William,

Sorry to hear about this. As you have already tried resetting preferences. I would suggest you to please try these steps:

Removing Preferences folders Manually:

Close all Adobe applications.

Go to Locations:

~/Library/Caches

~/Library/Preferences

Delete or rename Adobe InDesign and com.adobe.indesign

Launch InDesign from the CC

If that does not help, check for permission issues: https://indd.adobe.com/view/d6f78247-7e41-4982-b380-68c0d465fd91

If that does not change anything perform a clean uninstall of InDesign: Use the Creative Cloud Cleaner Tool to solve installation problems and then reinstall from CC Learn how to download your Adobe Creative Cloud apps

Please do share your findings.

Regards,

Srishti

[dpspearhead]

Staff answering these complaints probably don't really work with InDesign much -- since they all look very young. All of the 40+ pros on here who truly work across media (Art Directors and Creative Directors who got real jobs) endure Adobe's frustrating applications.

I love saving things to IDML and loading it up on a standalone MacBook Pro Circa 2014 with no internet connection -- and the file launches in 6 seconds and you can scroll through a 120 page magazine in high resolution like you used to.  There is so much Net-mommying going on by Adobe and the font services applications (Extensis you're utter dog-poo), productivity comes to a halt.  To test a real bottleneck, download a large EPS map with font information in the map.  Load it into Indesign -- make it a two page document. And it will take forever just to swap between pages.  Adobe will recommend a PDF instead of EPS. Fine. We all know that PDF remains a total fail as it modifies the object structure upon save making editable text a mess of tangled cross objects and nested groups you never grouped in the first place.  Words no longer selectable... I suggest just sighing and fighting through.  I know for a fact several major publishers manage their print work using OLD versions on non-net managed systems.  And we're talking MAJOR publishers like Condé Nast.  No need to reply. Just wanted to add this to the chatter. There are no answers. Delete Prefs. Really. That is like saying "We don't now what the problem is."  And Adobe knows it.

[content1971]

Hi Srishti, I too am encountering this exact same problem. I've used InDesign for years and while it hasn't always been smooth, generally the program worked as expected. The past three updates have been absolutly unusable for me. Everytime I click on or off an element I get this spinning beach ball for 1-5 seconds. This is absolutely unacceptable for a paid product. I realize you're simply doing your job here and preference files do get corrupted from time to time, but I'm at the end of my rope here and we deserve better answers/results.

I've done all the steps outlined above to ZERO effect. I've gone to the trouble of turning off every single non-system font to see if that's the issue. Is there some way to figure what process InDesign is trying to call when the beach ball appears? Is it trying to get some information from a remote server? What in the actual is going on with this pitiful excuse for software??? And how to do I get the days of work missed/delayed back? I'm currently laying out multiple page documents in Illustrator because InDesign is such a joke.

See screen shot for system info.

Thanks

[zoomdust]

William your deadline has probably long past. Adobe has no resolution to this. IT will be forever an ongoign issue. We have learnt to live with this and have started to plan our projects with what we now call "Adobe Time' added. We have almsot finoshed evaluating a competitor product that does as su much as In Design and we will likely move to another platofrm. This is the best solution that can be offered.

I know this is aharsh post, however when your Adobe support person tells you to 'Check you IT' and they do not support network issue sin this day and age, you have to wonder why you oay such exhorbident subscription fees.

[sjstoyle]

Has anyone every gotten useful information from Adobe messageboards or tech support? This is ridiculous.

[patrycjar79856587]

Your solution works, thanks.
Adobe InDesign works very bad from long time. Loading spinning ball and laggy all the time, even if not doing anything.

[camryna10528936]

First of all Alicia I sympathize heavily with your sheer level of frustration. I too have been at my wits end, furiously typing in adobe forums over "solutions" that don't work. After sitting on this thread for 15 mins reading everyone's suggestions, what worked for me was adjusing display performance (the "trash your preferences" advice did NOTHING). I realize your problem was 4 years ago so I assume you've found a solution, but to anyone else struggling with this problem currently I;d go to View>display performance>fast. It makes some of your images and type a bit wonky and lower quality, but everything still exports at high quality so I'm ok with it.

[D_K-Wi11]

This worked for me, thank you.

[Alicia Decaro]

Dropping my laptop and getting a new MacBook Pro solved the issue. I really think it's an issue with upgrading from InDesign 2017 to 2018. This is an Adobe Fail.

[BobLevine]

That is a rather unfounded conclusion. The two versions have nothing to do with each other.

My conclusion is your old machine was improperly configured in some way and the issue could have to do with multiple in place operating system upgrades.

[williamm97875483]

Maybe the first part is unfounded, but the second part is true. InDesign CC 2018 is a fail. 40 seconds to save a document after adding a comma. Files forever looping in recovery mode. And the "dump your preferences" gem is straight out of the Quark Xpress playbook circa 1996.

[BobLevine]

Look, I’m not going to sing the praises of InDesign’s speed or stability. It requires a very well maintained machine and in place operating system upgrades, IME, just add to the issues.

In any event, I’m glad you’ve got it running the new machine.

[Hucksbud]

I have had this problem ever since adobe switched to a cloud based product.

The problem has existed running El Capitan to my current OSX Catalina. I recently purchased the new 16 inch macBook Pro with 64 GB memory and a 1 TB SSD... same problem and actually more frequent. I believe that Adobe has no idea how to fix this or even knows if it is an Adobe problem or an OS problem. Killing preferences is a lame suggestion because they have had numerous contacts with users who keep insisting that they have done it numerous times with no results. They should just stop suggesting it. They are like the Apple Genious Bar guys that don't have a genious in the house. Besides being a graphic designer I am also an IT specialist and I can't figure this out. Sorry for the rant but I think a lot of users think this is new and it's actually pretty old.

[mdhumpy2]

Hucksbud are you running Extensis as your font manager?

[Alicia Decaro]

I have been working on Macs and in Adobe for 25 years. My machines are kept in immaculate condition and ALWAYS upgraded. My previous machine as 5 years old and still ran like a champ. My desktop is 9 years old and I would still use it if I didn't need the mobility of a MacBook Pro. I am a huge fan of Adobe, but you can't help to admit that there is an issue that MANY people are having and they have yet to address the problem or giving any reasonable "fix" for it. I have the exact same programs with the same cloud backups and InDesign is running fine. I know it's difficult to fix a problem only affecting some of the population, but it seems like this is an issue that they aren't even addressing. My comment about the upgrade was simply based on my own experience. I took the machine to Apple and they confirmed the operating system and configuration were fine. Is it an Apple issue, an Adobe issue or a user issue? Who knows, all I know is I have lost a lot of time and money on this and there are many more that are in the same boat that cannot afford to simply replace a machine.

[Srishti Bali]

Hi there,

Old or new, system should fulfill the specifications required by an application: InDesign system requirements.

In case your system fulfills these specifications, please contact our support center at Contact Customer Care for live troubleshooting sessions. We will definitely address the issue and try our best to solve it.

In case you need any help while initiating chat please refer to this link: https://indd.adobe.com/view/71f09a02-3841-4249-b701-14276522cf0e

Regards,

Srishti

[Alicia Decaro]

I did, on 5 separate occasions. All did the same steps and no one fixed it. They blamed DropBox, Fusion and corrupt fonts. One rep did say he thought it had something to do with the Creative Cloud, but then said it may be something with my network. After many hours on the phone, I finally gave up and just had to deal with it.

[Srishti Bali]

Hi,

I completely understand your frustration. As mentioned above, if the application is working fine offline then there is some issue with network security or permissions and you need your office IT team to get involved in it. We are absolutely available in case you need any help from our end.

Regards,

Srishti