Lightroom SLOW/Lagging/"Not Responding" on Windows 11 with AMD Ryzen/Radeon + nVidia GTX 1650

[RiaanRoux]

I have a fairly decent laptop which worked great until the latest release of Lightroom Classic and Updated nVidia Studio Drivers wer released.

System details:

HP Pavilion Gaming 15

AMD Ryzen 7 4800H with Radeon Graphics

nVidia GTX 1650

32Gb RAM

2TB SSD

Windows 11 

Lightroom became incredibly slow and would lag or become unresponsive for 5-10 seconds at a time in Library and just general browsing.

GPU settings were disabled, set to custom and auto and nothing would work.  Uninstalled and re-installed ALL Adobe products and updated every driver I could find.

Confirmed latest AMD Radeon Drivers

Confirmed latest Studio Drivers for nVidia GTX 1650

Confirmed all Windows Updates

RESOLUTION:

The problem was eventually solved by removing ALL GPU drivers and just doing a Windows Update and allowing Windows to install default Microsoft Drivers for AMD Radeon AND nVidia GTX1650 and all is suddenly running perfectly!  It would seem Lightroom is not compatible with the latest driver set!

I updated to latest drivers from AMD and nVidia and again system slowed down to a crawl when Lightroom was open.  I uninstalled ALL drivers from AMD and nVidia and re-installed default Microsoft drivers via Windows update and all works perfectly!

It would appear that in my case Lightroom does not like the latest drivers either from AMD or nVidia on a Windows 11 machine with my specs.  
Hope this helps someone.

[Sameer K]

Hey @RiaanRoux. Welcome to the Lightroom Classic community. You have already done the heavy lifting in finding the solution.

You can also use the steps mentioned here to make Lightroom only use the High-performance Nvidia GPU: https://community.adobe.com/t5/photoshop-ecosystem-discussions/set-up-gpu-for-high-performance-photo...

Only follow the steps according to Lightroom Classic; use Lightroom.exe in Lightroom Classic's installation folder. Sniffer would not be needed.

Thanks!
Sameer K

[RiaanRoux]

This was done and had no effect.  The GPU was set to use only nVidia GTX 1650 and still the system was VERY slow.  System on old version 512.78 is stable and runs very fast.  Lightroom does not like the new drivers on Windows 11.

[GoldingD]

One issue that I notice in your screenshot of your NVIDIA GeForce Experience app, GPU driver update.

You selected the default Express Installation as opposed to Custom. Selecting Custom will cause a clean installation. In the clean installation, old junk will be removed. Always recommend Custom.

And see: https://youtu.be/tELpPlkXlVE

[RiaanRoux]

Check again, I DOWNGRADED to 512.78 to resolve the issue as 531.41 renders Lightroom unstable and super slow.

[johnrellis]

It seems that recent drivers from Nvidia had bugs when used with Adobe applications.  Update to the latest Nvidia Studio driver, released last week:

https://www.nvidia.com/Download/driverResults.aspx/200284/en-us/

Note the first item in Fixed Bugs:

• Adobe application stability issues using 531.18 [4008751]

[RiaanRoux]

When I updated to 531.41 Lightroom becomes unstable and super slow.

[RiaanRoux]

After updating Lightroom Classic to the new 12.3 version I also tried the latest nVidia Studio Drivers version 531.61 (04/13/2023) and again Lightroom slowed down in ALL operations (even just starting up).  While Lightroom is open the entire PC even slows down and experiences serios lags.  

To resolve I downgraded the nVidia drivers to version 516.94 which is most stable and system is normal and fast.  Why would Lightroom Slow doen on the latest GPU drivers for nVidia (everything else runs normal, just Lightroom slows down and drag entire system with it.  Closing Lightroom returns system to normal.  

Lightroom does not like the latest nVidia Drivers.

[johnrellis]

"Why would Lightroom Slow doen on the latest GPU drivers for nVidia (everything else runs normal, just Lightroom slows down and drag entire system with it."

LR uses the graphics processor diffently from other apps, and it often trigger bugs in the graphics drivers, of which there are many. For example, version 531.41 explicitly mentions stability issues with Adobe apps, acknowledging that recent driver versions were causing problems for them:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-discussions/lightroom-slow-lagging-quot-not-respond...

Fixed Bugs

• Adobe application stability issues using 531.18 [4008751]
• Enscape crash at startup with 531.18 [4008190]
• Beamr - Issue with AV1 encoding in PTD=0 mode [3981172]
• Derivative TouchDesigner - NVAR: crash when using multi-person tracking [3808674]
• [Forza Horizon 5] Rainbow like artifacts in game after driver update [3839021]
• [Portal with RTX] "Background application max frame rate" setting is getting engaged while game is in focus [3897352]
• Disable Horizon Zero Dawn Resizable Bar profile on Intel platforms [3759681]

[RiaanRoux]

You did not read all the information.  I understand 531.18 had issues but updating to 531.41 and then again later to 531.61 did not solve the problem.  It would appear Adobe is incompatible with the 531.xx driver set in its entirety which is why I downgraded to version 516.94
How is it possible that the problem still exists and that Adobe keeps stating that you should upgrade to the latest GPU driver version when the latest driver version does not fix the problem (for 3 versions in a row)

[johnrellis]

I read all your information.  You asked "Why would Lightroom Slow doen on the latest GPU drivers for nVidia", and I provided some more information in response.   The evidence suggests that the latest releases of the Nvidia drivers have stability issues when used with LR.  While it could be bugs in LR's use of the graphics drivers, it's at least as likely bugs in the drivers, especially considering that Nvidia has acknowledged such bugs in recent releases.