Lightroom 3.3 Performance Feedback

[Tom Hogarty]

Please use this discussion topic for your feedback on Lightroom 3.3 RC and the final Lightroom 3.3 release when it becomes available.  The Lightroom team has tried very hard to extract useful feedback from the following discussion topic but due to the length and amount of chatter we need to start a new, more focused thread.  Please post specifics about your experience and be sure to include information about your hardware configuration.

Regards,

Tom Hogarty

Lightroom Product Manager

[JayS_In_CT]

thewhitedog wrote:

Macs switched to Intel processors five years ago. The first used, in 2006, was a Core Duo; the next year they began using the Intel Core 2 Duo. Any Mac with a capacity of 4GB of RAM likely uses the Core 2 Duo. Since Lightroom works just fine on most of these Macs, I doubt the CPU is the issue. But I agree we need to know more about Pic4's computer and the conditions under which Lightroom stalls out on him before we can offer anything more than guesses about what is causing Lightroom to stall out on him.

We do know though that the 2010 Process model added a CPU "hit" for lack of a better word.  Whether or not the C2D CPUs should be able to handle that would depend on how utlized they were in 2.7 vs. any of the V3 models.  I guess one way to find out would be to turn 2010 on and off with V3 and for those that still have 2.7 installed see what similar functions took as far as CPU.  That gives you three reads...  of course it's hard to compare V2 and V3 as we don't know what other functions are directly impact by CPU.. but comparing 2003 and 2010 in V3 might be worthwhile on a lower memory machine.

Jay S.

[thewhitedog]

@ Pic4: We need to know more about your Mac and the conditions under which Lightroom stall on you before we can offer anything besides a guess as to what the problem is.

In regard to the RAM issue, some iMacs specked by Apple at 4GB max can actually take more RAM because the capacity of available RAM cards has increased since the Mac was released. That said, I doubt your problem is RAM, unless you're running other resource intensive applications at the same time, like Photoshop and Bridge.

As discussed on this forum previously, one condition that can cause severe performance problems in Lightroom 3 is using Lens Corrections at the same time that local adjustments (spot removal, graduated filter, etc.) are in effect. In my experience this applies only to some of the Lens Corrections settings, i.e., those under the Transform header (in Manual mode). I've had no trouble using Chromatic Aberration (including Defringe) or Lens Vignetting. If you use the Auto setting to apply corrections for a specific lens this may also be an issue.

[Guest]

Hi All,

ok, my Mac is of the iMac 24 inch verson with 3.06ghz Intel Duo 2 Core, 4gb Ram & 1 Tb of H/D & a nVidia Graphics card with 512mb dedicated graphics memory.

At time of purchase in Jan 2009 it was the beefiest iMac you could get, and was bought to provide me with some "future proofing".

So, where do i get problems?

In Develop module, as i make changes to an image, i'm good for a little bit. But if i have a heavy session then it just dies.

Example:

Today i had 2 shoots to edit and ship out. The pics had been narrowed down to 136 to processed or deleted after careful checking, with a second shoot having been whittled down to 78 shots. These are all RAW fils imported from a Canon 5D2.

My workflow is as follows:

All pics have the Camera Profile setting activated, with any noise reuction applied at time of clicking the Profile check box

Back up i then move into carry out any cropping, and adjustment to the top panel of slider bars from W/B down to Saturation.

Now i start on the Gradient, Brush & Spot Removal Tools - before deciding whetehr to convert to mono or carry out further work in the middle panels of colour management.

Some of my images get well played with, i enjoy the occasional drop of dodging and burning etc but, like in LR3.1, LR3.3 just slows down to the point of grinding to  halt as the amount of processing increases. Sometimes, a single file with about 30 or 40 brush applications can bring the machine to a complete stand still, other times, it's just a steady accumulation.

Worse still, clicking on undo "action" leaves me time to go and make a cup of tea. Trying to swap back into Library mode when i've finshed editing a pic can sometimes leave me to go and make a sandwich as well.

It just gets easier to edit about 5 files and reboot the Mac. Without a doubt a newer iMac with 16gb Ram and 1Tb graphics memory would lessen the issue, and a Mac Pro Desktop just wouldn't even care! But i don't have the budget for either option. So i'm hoping that like before, when i was given the LR3.2 RC to install, that a similar solution will be forth coming.

I do have Aperture installed on my Mac (got it on the £44 App Store opening offer to see what it was like)  but really do not want to be forced into using it.

I hope all this helps, if you need any more, just let me know.

Andrew

[areohbee]

Pic4 wrote:

Without a doubt a newer iMac with 16gb Ram and 1Tb graphics memory would lessen the issue, and a Mac Pro Desktop just wouldn't even care!

Dont be so sure - when performance is really bad its generally due to bugs, not lack of hardware resources.

4GB is plenty for Lightroom, as long as you dont have any other ram intensive apps open, and its not leaking memory.

And a fast 4 core is better than a slow 2 core, to be sure, but not by an order of magnitude...

- Lightroom is not constrained by graphics memory...

Summary:

------------

Some people with souped up computers also have performance affecting bugs.

PS - If performance is severly degrading over time, it has nothing to do with your ram (although it may have to do with memory leakage) nor cpu nor graphics... - its due to one or more bugs!

You got a memory leak? or is it something else??

Rob

[web-weaver]

I wonder if the discussion about CPU and RAM is at all important to the performance (or lack thereof) of LR.

I am not a software developer, nor am I a computer engineer, nor do I know anything about the inner workings of LR.

But the fact that quite a few people have severe performance problems with LR running on machines that are far more powerful than mine, while my performance problems are more or less minor (clone brush is still slow, particularly when many spots are cloned; adj. brush is also slow) and the complete freeze-up that I experienced with previous versions of LR has not occurred since I installed 3.4 RC, points in my opinion into a different direction.

I am pasting here my system specs;

Lightroom version: 3.4 RC [733717]
Operating system: Microsoft Windows XP Professional Service Pack 3 (Build 2600)
Version: 5.1 [2600]
Application architecture: x86
System architecture: x86
Physical processor count: 2  (Intel Pentium D (dual core) (no Hyper-Threading)
Processor speed: 2.9 GHz
Built-in memory: 3582.0 MB @ 667 MHz (nominal 4 GB)
Real memory available to Lightroom: 716.8 MB
Real memory used by Lightroom: 99.8 MB (13.9%)
Virtual memory used by Lightroom: 165.3 MB
Memory cache size: 0.0 MB
System DPI setting: 96 DPI
Displays: 1) 1920x1200

So you see, by todays standards, a very modest system. Yet I don't experience the severe problems that many still encounter.

I am not qualified to give an opinion as to the reasons - but it seems to me there's more to a fine-tuned computer than sheer CPU and RAM.

There is lots of advice for the specifications and tuning of the computer hardware on Adobe's Hardware Forum. This is the link: http://forums.adobe.com/community/premiere/hardware_forum

WW

[areohbee]

web-weaver wrote:

... the fact that quite a few people have severe performance problems with LR running on machines that are far more powerful than mine, while my performance problems are more or less minor...points in my opinion into a different direction...

Well put.

[thewhitedog]

@ Pic4: First, according to Mactracker, the 2009 24" iMac with a 3.06GHz CPU can handle up to 8GB of RAM. Whether you can afford to upgrade is another matter, as those 4GB RAM boards are expensive. But your iMac should be, relatively speaking, fairly "future proof" if you can afford the RAM upgrade. The problem in using multiple resource intensive apps at the same time, besides RAM, is the number of CPU cores available over which the OS can distribute the load. If you are only running Lightroom, this should not be a problem. For those who need to run additional apps, like Photoshop and Bridge, the new quad core iMac is an excellent solution. Since your iMac is so new, though, (slightly less than 2 years old), a RAM upgrade would probably be a better investment.

Then we come to the issue of terminology: you are inaccurate and imprecise in your choice of words (Duo 2 Core = Core 2 Duo); and there simply is no Camera Profile setting in Lightroom. Which means we have to guess at what you mean. There is a Profile setting under Lens Corrections and a Profile setting under Camera Calibration. The Process setting is under Camera Calibration and the 2010 process does add considerable overhead to Lightroom 3, though it is one of the most useful improvements to the app, providing considerably more control in the Detail panel. It's a confusing bit of organization that the Process 2003/2010 setting and the adjustments it affects are in different panels. I haven't heard an explanation for this quirk, by the way.

As previously noted, using Transform or Profile Correction under Lens Correction can cause a serious hit to performance in conjunction with Local Adjustments. No reason for this has yet been disclosed, but it is a common experience reported by a number of users on this forum, under both Windows and Mac OS X. There is as yet no good workaround for the problem.

People have reported serious slow-downs in Lightroom 3 when they make a large number of spot corrections; what the threshold is has been pretty vague but it's something anyone can test for themselves. I usually use no more than a dozen or so spot corrections on an image and only occasionally experience a slowdown or freeze. The solution, by the way, is simply to restart Lightroom; you don't need to restart your computer to clear whatever it is in Lightroom that gets clogged (we don't yet know what that may be). If Lightroom is frozen so that you cannot shut it down in the normal manner, you can force it to quit by calling up the Force Quit Applications window with the Option-Command-Escape keyboard shortcut. This highlights one of the biggest advantages Lightroom has over almost every other app: you don't lose any data when it crashes or freezes. Adjustments are made in real time so that when you restart Lightroom you can pick up right where you left off, however the program was quit.

As you can see, there are a variety of conditions that can hobble Lightroom (and this is not a complete list by any means). The ones I've mentioned here affect both Macs and PCs so they are clearly not hardware related (though there have been some Windows specific problems reported). For the time being the solution is to modify your workflow to avoid these issues as much as possible. Which modifications anyone chooses depends on their own priorities - there is no one-size-fits-all answer. You'll have to use trial and error testing to figure out what works best for you.

[Guest]

You are right in correcting my terminology - it is the Profile Correction that i erroniously referred to.

As for CPU is the Core 2 Duo as pointed out.

LR is only ever used by itself or with MS Entourage. Never use Bridge - that's just doubling up on LR - and PS is still CS4 version because i just don't use it enough to warrant the cost of an upgrade.

I have now installed LR3.4 RC, and boy what a difference - soooooo much quicker. Really - new lease of life.

Short of the LR/ Mac equivelant of armegeddon happening, i do not see me removing it any time soon.

As for the upgrade - will be popping into the Apple store, or similar some time soon, because the cost of the upgrade will bring me to a maxed out system until such time as i win the lottery or am ready/ need to upgrade - and i hope that won't be for a few more years as yet, i'm liking my Mac and all aspects of it - except for when LR plays up 😞 Would rather put te dosh to a nice Macbook Pro for portability purposes, or even an iPad would suffice for tethered shooting etc...

[thewhitedog]

@ Pic4: Apple overcharges for memory. You can save a significant chunk of change by ordering online from Otherworld Computing (http://www.otherworldcomputing.com/), MemoryToGo (http://www.memorytogo.com/) or other such source. The two I mentioned both have good reputations and good warrantees for the Mac memory they sell. And, just checking on prices, they have come down dramatically. Memory To Go has several brands available for as low as $54 for a single 4GB board (http://www.memorytogo.com/Apple/iMac/Anodized3.06GHz24IntelCore2Duo(DDR3-1066)-MB418LL-A.htm). If you want to look around a little, Otherworld frequently has memory on sale. I assume you know how drop-dead easy it is to install RAM in an iMac.

[JayS_In_CT]

thewhitedog wrote:

@ Pic4: Apple overcharges for memory. You can save a significant chunk of change by ordering online from Otherworld Computing (http://www.otherworldcomputing.com/), MemoryToGo (http://www.memorytogo.com/) or other such source. The two I mentioned both have good reputations and good warrantees for the Mac memory they sell. And, just checking on prices, they have come down dramatically. Memory To Go has several brands available for as low as $54 for a single 4GB board (http://www.memorytogo.com/Apple/iMac/Anodized3.06GHz24IntelCore2Duo(DD R3-1066)-MB418LL-A.htm). If you want to look around a little, Otherworld frequently has memory on sale. I assume you know how drop-dead easy it is to install RAM in an iMac.

@pic4..  To add to what WhiteDog said about OtherWorldComputing.. Sign up for their Garage Sale notification.  I just picked up a matched pair of 2GB sticks (added 4GB to my Mac Pro) for $54 .. brand new, Apple OEM.  Was a pull from a Mac Pro that they upgraded.  They're outstanding to deal with.

Jay S.

[thewhitedog]

Lightroom 3.4 has just been released so I suppose this thread is near its end. Alas, they didn't fix the arrow key problem with the sliders in the Graduated Filter and the Adjustment Brush that they created in the 3.4 RC. So much for filing bug reports and discussing issues on these forums. Can you spell f-u-t-i-l-i-t-y?

[areohbee]

I have the feeling the bottom line is that Adobe just has way more on their plate than the small team can get to...

A $300/$100 program used by X people can only be so good...

I hope I'm wrong, and there is some key that will unlock the bug fixes and performance issues, but unfortunately in the absence of more info, the past is often the best indicator of the future...

IMO, Adobe is good about fixing bugs that prohibit its use by paying customers, and supporting new cameras..., but the other bugs and long-standing performance issues - not so much...

PS - Have you heard about the DxO/Nik/Bibble merger? - just joking... ;-}

Maybe Lr3.5..., or Lr4...

-R

[thewhitedog]

It's one thing for them to be able to fix only X number of problems. It's quite another for them to introduce a bug and then refuse to fix it. For comparison, Apple introduced a font rendering bug in the OS X 10.6.7 update that affected a relatively small number of users. Just over a month later they released a fix for it (yesterday). Though one can say this is because Apple is a bigger company than Adobe and has more resources at their disposal, it isn't really a matter of resources. It's a matter of resource allocation, which is a function of the priorities set by those in charge of product support.

I paid for Lightroom 1 and for every subsequent update. I think I am entitled to as much consideration as any paying customer. I should probably not do so, but I take their neglect of my concerns personally. Though they don't know me from Adam, what they do - or don't do - affects me just the same.

[Samoreen]

Hi,

areohbee wrote:

IMO, Adobe is good about fixing bugs that prohibit its use by paying customers, and supporting new cameras..., but the other bugs and long-standing performance issues - not so much...

I tend to consider that long-standing performance issues are also prohibiting the use of LR by paying customers when it becomes so slow that you have to give up. If I can achieve the very same editing task much faster in ACR (which is the case on my system), I will probably decide to switch to Bridge + PS. and lose the LR specific functionality as well as my investment (time and money) in the product. Another (possible - no guarantee) solution would be to upgrade my hardware but in both cases, I will lose money.

However, switching to Bridge could be jumping out of the frying pan into the fire. See a thread that I just started about Bridge and dual monitor setup.

--

Patrick

[PhilBurness]

For a modest amount I recently updated my graphics card. While I had no real issues with the installed graphics (built into motherboard), I was only experiencing issues when using LR3.x. Specifically I had:-

- Issue with the adjustment brush (becoming very slow to update after a few strokes)

- Issue with spot removal, anything more than a few minor changes caused slowdown of the operations

- Screen flickering (flashing off- then on very quickly) when switching between library - develop - print etc.

- Overshoot's when making manual adjustments with the lens correction

Since upgrading the graphics card, most of the issues have been removed, (with exception of the lens correction, which appears better than it was but still not brilliant), in LR3.4RC and LR3.4 so far.

Moving to a different package (DxO, Bibble, etc.) would cost probably more than a good graphics card (purchase, installation time, conversion from LR catalog to other formats, learning time etc.) so sticking with LR makes sense for me.

I'm not suggesting everybody rushes out and buys a new graphics card - but my rationale for upgrading the card was that ADOBE are clearly struggling to identify the cause of the performance issues on some machines / installations - hence the reason for this thread - so perhaps it is the performance of the machine and for me the simplest thing to change was the graphics card and see what happens.

My system info:

Lightroom version: 3.4 [742960]
Operating system: Windows 7 Ultimate Edition
Version: 6.1 [7600]
Application architecture: x64
System architecture: x64
Physical processor count: 2
Processor speed: 2.5 GHz
Built-in memory: 4094.4 MB
Real memory available to Lightroom: 4094.4 MB
Real memory used by Lightroom: 448.5 MB (10.9%)
Virtual memory used by Lightroom: 441.0 MB
Memory cache size: 0.0 MB
System DPI setting: 96 DPI
Desktop composition enabled: Yes
Displays: 1) 1920x1080
Serial Number:

Application folder: C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3.4
Library Path: C:\Users\...\Pictures\Lightroom3.2\LR3.2-20100903\LR3.2-20100903.lrcat
Settings Folder: C:\Users\...\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Lightroom

Phil

[thewhitedog]

That's interesting. What are the basic specs for your original video card and for the replacement card you installed? Many previous posts had discounted the role of the graphics card and other hardware elements, but your report suggests hardware might be a part of the problem after all. Not that that information makes things any easier to diagnose. I still suspect the biggest flaws are in the software - even the inability to effectively use the available GPU could be rooted in software inefficiencies.

[PhilBurness]

The original graphics chip was a ATI Radeon X1250, built into the motherboard, but max. supported (shared) memory was 256MB.

New card is a PCI Express - ATI Saphire HD5400 1GB DDR3 - available for about 40UK Pounds, so not excessive.

For me it was the cheapest option to try. Like I said in an earlier post - there was no 'hardware' issues with my previous setup - it worked well for everything including photoshop CS5 & ACR. I only saw issues with LR3.0 and above (even LR3.0 Beta was fine!) I'm using a Nikon D90, so raw image sizes are about 14MB.

Having run every test I could find on my hardware, with no errors; and waited for several 'maintenance' releases from Adobe to hopefully improve the situation (which they didn't); I decided the problem was potentially a bottleneck on the machine and the graphics card was the easiest to swap out and see if it helped.

In my case it has. Perhaps Adobe should change their minimum specs?

Phil

[thewhitedog]

So-called integrated graphics cards that use system RAM, until very recently have generally been inferior to discreet video cards with memory of their own. Your move to a 1GB card is a significant upgrade. Fortunately your computer has a PCI slot capable of handling a good video card. Presumably the card will also have one of the newer GPUs that are common now that can offload some processing chores from the main system CPU. Some apps, particularly games, rely heavily on these new GPUs. So does the latest version of the Adobe Flash Player, a fact that is supposed to improve Flash performance significantly (my four year old Mac Pro can't handle the new video cards, unfortunately). I don't know, though, if Lightroom can use the graphics GPU. In any case, the move away from using system memory for video should improve the overall performance of your computer, Lightroom included. In my opinion that was a good choice.

[web-weaver]

thewhitedog wrote:

"...Many previous posts had discounted the role of the graphics card..."

Yes, I remember the posts but recently had an experience that made me doubt that the graphics card has no impact on the performance of LR.

I had trouble with my graphics card and Windows advised me to decrease the acceleration of my card. So I did.

When back in LR I did a Impromptu Slideshow from the Library Module and noticed that the transition between slides was not going smoothly but in several steps making the transition somewhat jerky. I then increased the garphics card cceleration a notch and the transition was much smoother. So, at least for slideshows the performance of LR is dependant on the graphics card to a certain extent.

In Windows XP the graphics acceleration can be found in

Control Panel > Display > Settings Tab > Advanced > Troubleshoot Tab. There is a slider called "Hardware Acceleration".

WW

[areohbee]

To be clear: Its not the performance of the graphic card when everything is working correctly that is the deal, its the propensity for the graphics card/*driver* to not play nicely with Lightroom that carries the potential for trouble.

Summary:

------------

Its been proven that Lightroom performance is not significantly bottle-necked by graphics card performance (when playing nice).

Its been proven that Lightroom performance can be severly affected by graphics card (driver) - when anomalies surface.

[thewhitedog]

Frankly Rob, I'm not convinced those issues are as solid as you think they are. Some people have reported they did not begin to have problems with Lightroom till version 3 - on the same machine and with the same system that ran Lightroom 1 and 2 without a hitch, or at least with problems less severe. In which case, it was not the graphics card or driver that changed, it was Lightroom. This strongly suggests that it is Lightroom, not a graphics driver, that is not playing nice. For example, many have written that the same file that is processed without a hitch in ACR, has no end of trouble in Lightroom. If it's a driver issue, why doesn't it affect ACR as well?

[areohbee]

Neither I nor Adobe knows what the interactions are between Lightroom and graphics that creates the troubles.

All I'm saying is that Lightroom is not that demanding of the graphics card - relatively simple 2D stuff that doesn't tax the graphics subsystem that much.

But software bugs and interactions can have big impacts on performance, and both graphics and Lightroom are complicated softwares with bugs that are being exercised...

If I were having severe performance problems, I'd keep trying new hardware and system config changes until they stopped (actually, that's exactly what I did do: new motherboard - but I have no idea which aspects fixed my problems) - and graphics card would be near the top of the list. YMMV.

I mean, you know Lightroom works well on most systems, and on others - not so well - even on systems with the "exact" same hardware (e.g. Mac).

I'm not trying to let Adobe off the hook, nor stick it to them. I'm just saying: you have the power to fix the problem whether Adobe does or not.

PS - I realize you "shouldn't" have to keep "buying new computers until you find one that works" - I empathize with your frustration... - don't mean to downplay the problem y'all are having - I'm just sayin'...

R

[thewhitedog]

And there's the rub - not everyone has the technical expertise or financial resources necessary to rebuild their computer till it works with one particular piece of software. And, as I said, if ACR works with a given image, why doesn't Lightroom? No one's even tried to answer that question as far as I know (a question I was not the first one to raise by any means). Of course video drivers are notoriously problematic, particularly on Windows PCs where there are almost an infinite number of possible hardware and software configurations. I'm sure it's all but impossible to write graphics drivers that will work properly with every system on which it might be installed.

It's obvious as well that video card developers put more effort into the hardware they build than they do the software that enables that hardware to work. And video cards change faster than just about any other component built for computers, so it's a constant - and perhaps hopeless - chase to keep the drivers up to date.

No doubt there's only so much Adobe can be expected to do to insure their software is compatible with as many systems as possible. But until they can answer the question about the comparative reliability of ACR and Lightroom, I suggest they haven't done enough.

[PhilBurness]

I'm not sure but doesn't Lightroom save the modifications it makes to images into the database in an order of events list? I'm not sure ACR does this - so there is probably some additional overhead between LR and ACR for sure.

Performance is a relative thing - in LR1.1 to 2.7 my machine had no issues that I noticed, however, it may have been right on the edge of it's capabilities, upgrading to v3.0 and the new features may have tipped it over the edge leading to a visual degradation in performance. Upgrading the graphics card may have brought it back to some extent, additional RAM may improve it further, as I am sure a drive with faster throughput or bigger cache.

One thing is for sure - when developers keep adding features then performance will change, be it in terms of memory usage, CPU cycles or graphics requirements and eventually our machines will grind to a halt unless we upgrade. This is why I (personally) have always shyed away from Apple in favour of the more 'open' architecture of Windows based PC's. There is no doubt that the performance of a 'contained' system like Apples should be better (no driver mismatches for example), but the trade off comes in terms of upgrading.

Arthur C. Clarke produced the computing triangle I think.

     Fast - Reliable - Cheap, you can only ever have any two, i.e. if it's fast & reliable then it won't be cheap, if it's reliable and cheap then it won't be fast etc.

Phil

[thewhitedog]

I won't get into the Mac vs. PC debate much further than to quote a maxim that predates Arthur C. Clark: Mac or PC, you get what you pay for. On consumer Macs about the only thing you can easily upgrade is the RAM. With the newest generation of Mac Pros, however, the sky's the limit - or more precisely, your budget is the limit. About the only thing that's not feasible to upgrade on a Mac Pro is the motherboard, primarily because they're just too expensive. The new 6 core Intel Westmere processors aren't cheap either.

That said, most people don't upgrade their PCs, even so far as to add more RAM. Upgrades are primarily for power users, whatever platform they favor.

Phil points to an important issue that has probably troubled all of us at one time or another. There is a symbiotic relationship between computer hardware capabilities and software power and complexity. Continuous improvements in hardware mean programmers and engineers can add features to their software to take advantage of these improvements - and with high-end software they usually do so on a regular basis. One current example is in quality GPUs: they can now take some of the load off the system CPU(s) - if the software has been optimized to take advantage of this capability (Adobe Flash is probably the most salient example). This by itself doesn't disqualify conventional video cards from running with the new software, but it is indicative of the kind of incremental upgrades that, over time, combine to make our hardware seem inadequate, if not obsolete. Beyond a certain point, if we want to use the latest software - although there's no rule that we must do so - we will need to upgrade our hardware as well. To the average consumer this seems like a vicious cycle; those inclined to believe conspiracy theories think it's a malicious plot to separate us from our hard earned money.

Of course, it's not a plot. Most improvements in technology mean we can do more work more efficiently - or do new work unheard of a few years ago. Have you seen the new Toyota Prius park itself? This will obviously be a boon to anyone who has ever struggled with parallel parking. Is it an essential feature? Not yet. But a few years from now it will probably be standard equipment on most cars.

If you have an educated and/or intuitive understanding of technology then it's evolution is a natural process that you can choose to adapt to or ignore as you see fit. For instance, I've had not trouble avoiding Face Book and Twitter, though I like most of the new features in Lightroom 3 - and will like them better when the bugs have been ironed out. For those who don't understand it, changes in technology can be intimidating or even threatening. In reality, though, the problem is an atavistic fear of change itself. People are perfectly comfortable with technology they are accustomed to. There was a time when microwave ovens were viewed with suspicion by many people. Now they are ubiquitous. The same goes for digital cameras.

But to some people "new" is a four letter word. We may smile condescendingly at such supposed Luddites, but their fears are primal in nature and, under the right circumstances, all of us may fall pray to them. By learning to understand those who fear change, ultimately we learn to understand ourselves.