Experiencing performance related issues in Lightroom 3.x

[laurencec]

Hi

I just upgraded from lightroom 2.7 to lightroom 3. I then proceeded to import my old catalog. this all went fine but lightroom is so slow, the thumbnail previews take forever to load if I manage to have the patience to wait  for them.

is there a quick solution?? How can it be sped up?

thanks

Laurence

Message title was edited by: Brett N

[Keith Reeder]

All Dan has said is that he hasn't had as much time to do the research/collation work he refers to - it's entirely possible (likely, even?) that other folk in Adobe are throwing themselves body and soul at the issues some people are encountering.

[JayS_In_CT]

Keith_Reeder wrote:

All Dan has said is that he hasn't had as much time to do the research/collation work he refers to - it's entirely possible (likely, even?) that other folk in Adobe are throwing themselves body and soul at the issues some people are encountering.

Second what Keith said..  I'm not giving up on 3.0 yet.  If it is critical I either work my way through it with 3.0 (if I can) or if THAT critical load those files up on 2.7 (yep, means giving up 2010 Process but we've been living without it up until recently).  I'm not letting Adobe off the hook, but Dan, Melissa, et al, aren't an official support arm.  They're employees trying to gleen what they can from this user forum  I've posted this link before and someone was kind enough to pass it on to me.

http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/mmform/index.cfm?name=wishform

is where you can report bugs, provide additional detail and info to Adobe directly.  I've also called support on the phone and they will open a case number where you can provide additional detail from your own testing.  We can't rely on this forum as an official support vehicle and not sure it's fair to assume the Adobe folks who are on here represent the only support.  I'm sure they're not as well.  No one likes all the issues, and I recognize for some they may be show-stoppers, but the best way to help is to get your issues into Adobe I feel..

Jay S.

[DavePinMinn]

Well, we're now THIRTEEN PAGES and more than a FORTY-FIVE days into this problem since the thread was started on June 9...

A while ago, I suggested it might be useful for SOMEONE at Adobe that lives in a room with a door on it, perhaps even someone that's HIGH up in charge of the Lightroom project, to STAND UP and say "WE GIVE A DAMN ABOUT THE PROBLEM AND WE'RE BUSTING OUR COLLECTIVE BEHINDS TO FIX IT"...

And of course, I got the typical response from the fanboys, questioning my reading comprehension.  It'd STILL be nice to have someone with the clout to make this a very high priority tell us SOMEONE IS ACTUALLY TRYING TO FIX THIS......

[DdeGannes]

Maybe a gesture undate with one bug fix.

[goodlux7]

Seriously you should all just return your software if you want results fast.

I returned mine.

To adobe's credit, It's pretty straight forward through the web interface.

You might have to call in if it is over 30 days.

At this rate, I'll be glad to purchase it again when it is in version 3.7

[Guest]

I'd love to return the program right away, but I'm in the middle of processing two large events that I started with 3.0, and I'm going to finish them up in 3 - I don't have the time to roll them back to 2.7 and start again. I'll decide what to do when I get them done. I agree with whomever posted here recently saying all we want is for someone at Adobe to stand up and say they (1) are aware of the issue(s) and (2) they care.

It wouldn't take much for them to let us know they are on it.....Whether they are on the forums or not, these forums are hosted by Adobe, so it wouldn't be that hard for to come down and visit us little folks (i.e., the ones that buy the software and make their jobs possible) that they are working on it, and to give us some kind of a timeline.

[getho]

isyseurope wrote:

getho wrote:

I've just created a new catalogue for a shoot. It was apinful waiting for the 1:1 previews to render whilst working on images so I decided to render ALL of the DNGS 1:1 previews.  It is taking about 8 seconds to generate a preview at the moment.  Catlogue is about 1000 images

System specs below.  Is this slow for a comparable system? its going to take over an hour to render 565 images.

Lightroom version: 3.0 [677000]
Operating system: Windows 7 Business Edition
Version: 6.1 [7600]
Application architecture: x64
System architecture: x64
Physical processor count: 8
Processor speed: 2.6 GHz
Built-in memory: 12279.0 MB
Real memory available to Lightroom: 12279.0 MB
Real memory used by Lightroom: 1373.9 MB (11.1%)
Virtual memory used by Lightroom: 1406.9 MB
Memory cache size: 1493.3 MB
System DPI setting: 96 DPI
Desktop composition enabled: Yes
Displays: 1) 2560x1440, 2) 1600x1200

Hi Getho,

I'm running same specs on dual monitor resolutions. Win 7 Ultimate, 12gb mem,  but intel i7 quad processor. My system was built to optimise speed for lightroom and uses triple channel 1600ghz memory and striped RAID disks(seperate for cataloque and cache). I get around 3 seconds per 1:1 preview for my Canon 5D mkII 21mb files.

You have plenty of processing power so look at the speed of your memory & hard disk performance - these are key to LR3 performance.

v. best regards, Jon

I've got 12gb fancy geil pants ram and raid 10 storage (which is pretty quick).  Image cache is on a 10 rpm raptor., and the system drive is SSD.  (A setup tailored to lightroom photoshop, too).  So you post is even more depressing !

I did a test and reset all the develop settings on a bunch of files and recreated the 1:1 previews and it came down to 2-3 secs per file.  When I then reset them again to the preset I'm using it went up to 7-8 seconds again.  The preset has agressive noise reduction and sharpening.  I'm assuming thats what is taking the time. (I wonder if anyone else sees this).

I have to say I think LR3 is awesome, it has the potential to change my workflow, and change my style.  I can squeeze so much out of my 7d files I can almost start exposing for the highlights and getting all the detail I need out of shadows without combining shots.

I suspect that it may not be possible to speed up much:

My guess is that viewing at fit or fill size the engineers decided to apply settings changes to all the raw data in an image and then display the scaled results.  I can see why - there would be huge overheads in producing a scaled proxy of an image to work on, then applying those settings to the original raw file on completion etc. They wanted to keep the ability to jump quickly from image to image without producing a queue of backgroud tasks.  I think they need to re-examine that one! If I'm spending 10 minutes working on a file then 20 seconds doing a proxy creation and copying those settings back is well worth it for the speed increase.

I'm assuming of course that working on a  3 MP raw file is quicker than a 18MP raw file.

ANyone tried working on sRAW files?  IS it quicker?

If so then may they could think about including the proxy in the DNG - so each DNG contained the raw data plus the 3 MP proxy for lightroom to crunch.

or maybe they should talk to/buy these guys http://www.oloneo.com/ and find out they are producing a screen refresh speed of 1/20th of a second.

[JayS_In_CT]

getho wrote:

......

......

or maybe they should talk to/buy these guys http://www.oloneo.com/ and find out they are producing a screen refresh speed of 1/20th of a second.

Looks pretty fast.. worth a download.. wish they had a Mac version.  🙂   Reminescent of Raw Shooter Pro speed, which Adobe did take a liking to.  🙂

Jay S.

[getho]

JayS In CT wrote:

Looks pretty fast.. worth a download.. wish they had a Mac version.  🙂   Reminescent of Raw Shooter Pro speed, which Adobe did take a liking to.  🙂

Jay S.

just been playing with it - full screen it really is 5x faster than LR3, if not more.  Even the HDR module (which produced VERY nice results) was as fast as the raw processor. The only thing is you have to wait a few seconds as an image loads. (about 8 seconds on my system for a 7d DNG). Theres not much there at the mo - theres no noise reduction and the raw processing is not as pretty as LR3, ah but the speed...

[camerahans]

it certainly is fast.

I wonder if that also is because the app doesn't use a

big database for all the info of all pics.

[Jonathan Westcott]

getho wrote:

isyseurope wrote:

getho wrote:

I've just created a new catalogue for a shoot. It was apinful waiting for the 1:1 previews to render whilst working on images so I decided to render ALL of the DNGS 1:1 previews.  It is taking about 8 seconds to generate a preview at the moment.  Catlogue is about 1000 images

System specs below.  Is this slow for a comparable system? its going to take over an hour to render 565 images.

Lightroom version: 3.0 [677000]
Operating system: Windows 7 Business Edition
Version: 6.1 [7600]
Application architecture: x64
System architecture: x64
Physical processor count: 8
Processor speed: 2.6 GHz
Built-in memory: 12279.0 MB
Real memory available to Lightroom: 12279.0 MB
Real memory used by Lightroom: 1373.9 MB (11.1%)
Virtual memory used by Lightroom: 1406.9 MB
Memory cache size: 1493.3 MB
System DPI setting: 96 DPI
Desktop composition enabled: Yes
Displays: 1) 2560x1440, 2) 1600x1200

Hi Getho,

I'm running same specs on dual monitor resolutions. Win 7 Ultimate, 12gb mem,  but intel i7 quad processor. My system was built to optimise speed for lightroom and uses triple channel 1600ghz memory and striped RAID disks(seperate for cataloque and cache). I get around 3 seconds per 1:1 preview for my Canon 5D mkII 21mb files.

You have plenty of processing power so look at the speed of your memory & hard disk performance - these are key to LR3 performance.

v. best regards, Jon

I've got 12gb fancy geil pants ram and raid 10 storage (which is pretty quick).  Image cache is on a 10 rpm raptor., and the system drive is SSD.  (A setup tailored to lightroom photoshop, too).  So you post is even more depressing !

I did a test and reset all the develop settings on a bunch of files and recreated the 1:1 previews and it came down to 2-3 secs per file.  When I then reset them again to the preset I'm using it went up to 7-8 seconds again.  The preset has agressive noise reduction and sharpening.  I'm assuming thats what is taking the time. (I wonder if anyone else sees this).

I have to say I think LR3 is awesome, it has the potential to change my workflow, and change my style.  I can squeeze so much out of my 7d files I can almost start exposing for the highlights and getting all the detail I need out of shadows without combining shots.

I suspect that it may not be possible to speed up much:

My guess is that viewing at fit or fill size the engineers decided to apply settings changes to all the raw data in an image and then display the scaled results.  I can see why - there would be huge overheads in producing a scaled proxy of an image to work on, then applying those settings to the original raw file on completion etc. They wanted to keep the ability to jump quickly from image to image without producing a queue of backgroud tasks.  I think they need to re-examine that one! If I'm spending 10 minutes working on a file then 20 seconds doing a proxy creation and copying those settings back is well worth it for the speed increase.

I'm assuming of course that working on a  3 MP raw file is quicker than a 18MP raw file.

ANyone tried working on sRAW files?  IS it quicker?

If so then may they could think about including the proxy in the DNG - so each DNG contained the raw data plus the 3 MP proxy for lightroom to crunch.

or maybe they should talk to/buy these guys http://www.oloneo.com/ and find out they are producing a screen refresh speed of 1/20th of a second.

Hey Getho,

Sounds like you have a well specced system for Lightroom so you should see performance as good as it gets for LR3! I tried

creating an agressive preset using high sharpening, noise reduction, HSL mods, and a bit of Adjustment Brush. This increases 1:1 preview (2048, High) render time to just over 4 seconds. So yes an increase but not huge..

What speed is your RAM?

I still believe it should not be necessary to have such a high spec to haul LR3 into the realms of acceptable performance though and it is clear there are some major performance issues for Adobe to addess. That much is clear from the comments here. There are however some that love LR3 and are prepared to put in the effort to make it workable in the interim..

Jon

[getho]

Hey Getho,

Sounds like you have a well specced system for Lightroom so you should see performance as good as it gets for LR3! I tried

creating an agressive preset using high sharpening, noise reduction, HSL mods, and a bit of Adjustment Brush. This increases 1:1 preview (2048, High) render time to just over 4 seconds. So yes an increase but not huge..

What speed is your RAM?

I still believe it should not be necessary to have such a high spec to haul LR3 into the realms of acceptable performance though and it is clear there are some major performance issues for Adobe to addess. That much is clear from the comments here. There are however some that love LR3 and are prepared to put in the effort to make it workable in the interim..

Jon

hi jon

its geil ultra 1600 c7. Cost an arm and a leg.  I havn't overclocked the system, but yes I agree - it should be quick enough.

Its not a problem with the database either as someone suggested - camera raw 6.1 is just as slow - I can move a slider more smoothly than LR, but the screen takes > half a second to update.

just did a quick test with LR2 - 1:1 previews around 1 second each. Same profile in LR3 - 4 seconds each.

[JayS_In_CT]

getho wrote:

Hey Getho,

Sounds like you have a well specced system for Lightroom so you should see performance as good as it gets for LR3! I tried

creating an agressive preset using high sharpening, noise reduction, HSL mods, and a bit of Adjustment Brush. This increases 1:1 preview (2048, High) render time to just over 4 seconds. So yes an increase but not huge..

What speed is your RAM?

I still believe it should not be necessary to have such a high spec to haul LR3 into the realms of acceptable performance though and it is clear there are some major performance issues for Adobe to addess. That much is clear from the comments here. There are however some that love LR3 and are prepared to put in the effort to make it workable in the interim..

Jon

hi jon

its geil ultra 1600 c7. Cost an arm and a leg.  I havn't overclocked the system, but yes I agree - it should be quick enough.

Its not a problem with the database either as someone suggested - camera raw 6.1 is just as slow - I can move a slider more smoothly than LR, but the screen takes > half a second to update.

just did a quick test with LR2 - 1:1 previews around 1 second each. Same profile in LR3 - 4 seconds each.

Getho,

I wonder still if any of the issues with hi res. displays has some effect here.  It's been said here before, but I assume you're on the most up to date video drivers for the system?  Anything different if you move LR to the smaller display?  Been known to make a difference..  Just looking for something to help...

Jay S.

[hwnoord]

I did improve the performance on my XP system by updating the driver on

the Radeon 9100 series video card. It is still slower, however, than my

Dell laptop with its on-board video. hwnoord

[camerahans]

you might not notice slowness with respect to the database

, but I do. Adding keywords to a pic has a delay in updating the right hand panel that is significant longer than it was in 2.7. I am using one database with 30k+ pics. There is something there. Why do you think Adobe removed the total pic count from a keyword with embedded keywords? Read the post by Adobe's Melissa on that!

[prairiedream]

I am also having problems with slowness on my new Mac with 12GB ram. Import seems to go okay for me, but when I Export it can take 15 minutes or more to process 75 jpgs. I usually Import into an existing blank folder on a second internal hard drive, and have checked "add to catalog" and rename the files, that's it. Each photo has about 6-10 keywords assigned to it.

Another very very slow area is keywording. Sometimes it works fine, but then, inexplicably, the little checkboxes next to the keywords suddenly disappear when I go to the right panel, and I have to wait for 2-3 minutes for the box to appear before I can check it. Then, I have to wait another 2-3 minutes for my check to appear in the box. This is extremely frustrating as keywords are an essential part of my workflow. I checked in Activity Monitor and it showed that I was only using .85 percent of CPU, something like that (sorry I'm not too techy so not sure what I'm supposed to be looking at in Activity Monitor).

I am not doing anything different than I did with LR 2.7, which worked like a charm and was quite fast on the same computer. I will not mention the many other minor problems I'm having with this software, all of which are adding up to a horrendous experience for me. I cannot believe this software was released like this. I am very disappointed to the point that I'm thinking of looking elsewhere for my photo cataloguing needs.

[malcolmmw]

There has been a lot of discussion lately about importing and exporting being so slow.  I certainly don't want to make anyone else's problems seem less important but I want point out that some things are slightly easier to live with in the short term because you can get up and have a cup of coffee (or 4) while a batch is running.

If you are doing keywording or spot removal or using the brush, or even moving from photo to photo, this is pretty painful in 3.0 compared to 2.7.

Has anyone had a chance to post a link to this thread on any of the major LR websites like NAPP?

[camerahans]

keywording... same problem here, albeit not that slow as you mention. As said before, database is having performance problems in my opinion.

[TRCML]

I too am experience slow import. Having upgraded to LR3, I'm tidying the source folders (3) for the catalogue (1) and checking that all files in the folders are in the catalogue. Using import new to current location, add to catalogue without moving the file, I've identified about 12 images in one folder. I've cancelled and quit LR once already just in case, but it's still taking a long time. I don't understand why it should take so long: from the other two folders, the same task was done quite quickly and involved approximately 30 files.

I think I'm going to give up and transfer them manually (copy and paste) and then use relink.

iMac OS Snow Leopard

2.8 GHz Intel Core i7

16GB RAM

1067 MHz DDR3

[TRCML]

I have found a solution, albeit not ideal.

Whenever things get too slow, having purged unused keywords, I export keywords to save them, then optimise the catalogue, then quit LR. I've set up LR to do a back-up on save, which it does. I then open LR and start.

[rlv52]

But mine is slow and I rarely use keywords.

[Guest]

I am also experiencing very slow performance in LR3.

Like you in the catalog mode.  I ran the beta version without any problems.

I'm running Windows Vista 64bit Home Premium Quad Core machine with 8gb ram, the GPU is up to snuff as well.

I have 2 days left before I have to buy LR3, not sure what to do.

[Mvox]

     Well I've given up and gone back to 2.7, (which still runs perfectly), no point in flogging an ailing horse. Since there are no refunds, (and anyway I really like the program itself, all my workflow is now based around it), I'll just have to wait for all this to be sorted out. And it looks like it might be a long wait, judging by the small amount of mystified Adobe staff comments and the fact that it feels like it's not much of a priority. Luckily I had only just started a new project using 3.0 before I discovered how bad it performs, so it's fairly easy for me to backtrack. I have a Dell workstation running XP Pro, with a generous spec. Doesn't seem any point in getting more detailed than that, it should work...!

     This is quite dissapointing, to say the least. I really thought the days had gone when one paid good money for an unfinished program that the programmers haven't bothered to test properly and it's pretty obvious by now it's the program not our hardware. I also resent having to help sort out a problem that isn't mine, after all this isn't the 80's and I don't see my name on Adobe's payroll either. This is a retail product with full sales support, why are we expected to help out? Anyway, I've done many of the things suggested, updated graphics drivers etc, no change, still so slow it's unusable and as this thread has continued to grow, it's become plain from the posts that this is a flawed release.     

     Adobe talk themselves up so much, investing so much time and money to give the impression of being a totally professional company, a bit like Apple do, but really, in this case, they have reverted to the status of a start-up company with an enthusiastic sales team supporting an inferior, untested product. I find it hard to believe that they should release something directly aimed for professional use without ironing out some pretty horrendous bugs first. Quite stunning, breathtaking in fact, when one compares the product to how they are selling it.

     Granted, not everyone is affected, but it looks like there's a fairly large proportion who are, just maybe not enough to make it go to the top of Adobe's to-do list, so maybe someone could wake me up when they've fixed it...

                            Ok, rant over,

                                                 a disgruntled Lightroom user.

[areohbee]

I must say - I don't mind helping out with the problem(s), as long as I feel like Adobe is reciprocating (or leading) ambitiously (and communicating same) - but I'm not feeling it...  At this point, I've thrown up my hands and said "Its all you Adobe (maybe with some continued help from users with more stamina than me) - I'm out" - if this is just how its gonna have to be, then oh well. If not, please consider a more present and active roll with the users in resolving these issues.

PS - If I had 2 Lightrooms to choose from:

1 - $300 + $100/version - buggy, slow, and still lacking a bit.

2 - $499 + $150/version - less buggy, faster, with a few more of the holes plugged.

I'd take #2 in a heartbeat.

i.e. I'm not presently willing to give much more time to providing information that might help solve these issues, but I would be willing to give more money - if that would help you hire more people to work on it, or pay overtime to the ones you've got... (plane fare to visit users having problems you can't reproduce in house? ... )

laurencec - could you ever have imagined this thread would go on like this?

Mvox - I'm in for the long haul / not looking back... - I'll wake you up when its working better...

Me - a psychotic Lightroom lover/hater.

Rob

[Guest]

areohbee wrote:

I must say - I don't mind helping out with the problem(s), as long as I feel like Adobe is reciprocating (or leading) ambitiously (and communicating same) - but I'm not feeling it...  At this point, I've thrown up my hands and said "Its all you Adobe (maybe with some continued help from users with more stamina than me) - I'm out" - if this is just how its gonna have to be, then oh well. If not, please consider a more present and active roll with the users in resolving these issues.

PS - If I had 2 Lightrooms to choose from:

1 - $300 + $100/version - buggy, slow, and still lacking a bit.

2 - $499 + $150/version - less buggy, faster, with a few more of the holes plugged.

I'd take #2 in a heartbeat.

i.e. I'm not presently willing to give much more time to providing information that might help solve these issues, but I would be willing to give more money - if that would help you hire more people to work on it, or pay overtime to the ones you've got... (plane fare to visit users having problems you can't reproduce in house? ... )

laurencec - could you ever have imagined this thread would go on like this?

Mvox - I'm in for the long haul / not looking back... - I'll wake you up when its working better...

Me - a psychotic Lightroom lover/hater.

Rob

Rob, this is nonsense, really. You can be sure that current problems some people face, have nothing to do with the price of the product or that Adobe had to release the software not properly tested because of the economic situation. I am convinced that whether the product would cost $300 or $499 it would be in the same situation as it is now. The product is now facing .0 version reality, which means it is confronted with real time situations, which are difficult to detect during testing, given the magnitude of possible user scenarios. Such situations cannot be solved with more people hiring. Rather, the developers, who understand the product and the environments in which it operates well, must carefully analyze the reported problems and try to solve the issues. This will take time. Not all problems might be in the responsibility of the Lightroom team - so they have to find workarounds. Fixes must be tested so that they do not have side effects. You, as a software developer, should know that.

This thread is probably beaten enough already. You and many others have already described the issues, that should be enough material for the developers to work on. Another guessing that this or that tweaking might help, does not solve the problems in general, and the developers probably know that.

We also have to face that not all performance problems will be solved in the next release, we can be sure that Adobe will do this on a prioritized schedule.

Kind regards

Thomas