P: Multiple catalog syncing

I don't claim to be an expert on systems managing 60 million images, and there's a reason why not... Lightroom isn't targeted at that audience. And while you'd be happy to pay double, most Lightroom users wouldn't.  So if you can find a ready-built system that is targeted at that audience, go for it! Use what works for you.

The Lightroom groundwork was laid more than 12 years ago when Adobe was breaking new ground, so it is certainly possible they'd make different decisions based on the information that's now available. On1 clearly has a lot to thank Adobe for in that regard, as they've been able to base their decisions on concrete information, rather than guesswork. 

Let us know how you get on with the migration tools. In my experience, they rarely live up to the hype, but I live in hope that someday I'll be proven wrong. Maybe this is the year!

I hear you Victoira, and I respect your opinion—otherwise I wouldn't have bought your FAQ books year in and year out.

However, in the day job (pharmaceuticals and medical devices) that has supported my photography since I gave up on F1 back in 186, I routinely see programs able to handle tens of millions of images without a performance issue on Windoze boxes no where near as powerful as some of the computers I possess or the users on this forum possess.

The different explain this divergence in performance, you ask?  In the real world of medical and pharmaceutical science we do not use open source freebie crap such as SQLite.  Our systems are built on Oracle, DB2, or MS SQL.

I have used systems built on full referential database platforms with 4th- or 5th-level referential integrity (so as NOT to create duplicate or triplicate images as LR still does with 8.1) which handle upwards of 60 million images for a Phase III Clinical Trial oncology drug with instant response and no crashing.

How much would it cost...really!...for Adobe to build Lightroom on a firm foundation instead of some garbage they downloaded for free off of the internet?

I for one, would gladly pay at least double what Adobe lifts from my checkbook each month just ot have something which I could use.

This holiday week, in the quiet of the Okavango Delta, I am going to try ON1 Photo Raw 2019 migration facility.  If it works, good-bye Adobe.  (ON1 is using MS SQL...not SQLite.)

I can willingly confirm that LR works at a speedy pace even with 100K+ catalog on a standard resolution monitor. Some things get a bit slower on my 5K monitor, which is to be expected as it's processing a lot more pixels to service a high res monitor. I'm currently using a 2014 5K iMac as my primary machine, but even my old MacBook Pro is serviceable. My business partner is using a 2010 Mac Pro and equally has no complaints. Decent performance is possible.

Regarding Twitter, I should be telling you that Adobe Corporate has all the answers and the official support channels are all equally comparable but... there's a notable difference between the "support staff" that man the usual channels (like Twitter, phone/chat support, etc.) and the "real" people who hang out here. There's a reason I spend my time supporting this forum instead of the primary user to user forums... and guys like Rikk and some of the main LR engineers hanging out here are the primary reasons. This is where you get it "from the horses mouth", as it were.

Hi Rikk,

Thank you for confirming that LR is speedy for you in the develop module. Much appreciated. Can you also help me with the system config that you are using, so that I can compare with mine?

Ps: i May have mentioned it on my earlier response, but In case it helps anyone else, when I spoke about Twitter support, Adobe’s own support site has a banner on top saying that their regular support channel has long wait periods and users should DM them at the @AdobeCare handle. Once a person connects via DM they are taken through a menu and connected to an exec and there’s no character limit on that interaction.

Thanks

Confirming what Victoria said.  The information provided by support was inaccurate. 

Personal anecdote and FWIW my 380K image catalog performs similarly to my 300 image test catalog. Both are quite speedy.

Additionally, Twitter, while useful for some support interactions isn't the best place to go when you have a detailed performance-related question. Those things are better expressed and solved in more than a couple of hundred characters...

FWIW, millions is the exception when I'd start thinking about using a smaller working catalog for active photos and a big archive catalog for searching.

Most of the people I hear talking about splitting their catalog are thinking that 40k is big.

Hi Victoria,

Thanks for your response again - much appreciated. It seems like you get caught in the crossfire between dissatisfied adobe customers and Adobe’s product management. I do very much appreciate what you and Rikk are doing to help us out, and I feel sad and dismayed that no one from Adobe is chipping in here on these forums to provide “official” input. It seems like Adobe is no longer interested in hearing the voice of the customer.

Which brings me to Adobe on Twitter - they provide official support via Twitter DMs via @AdobeCare using a tweetbot menu which connects you to a support agent, and they loop in an “expert” if needed. It is practically a chat, with no character limits.

I have sent them at least a dozen videos of the performance issues at various times through these DMs and there is no character restriction. They have sent back the usual suggestions like enabling or disabling the GPU (depending on what the current state is) and then, trying a new catalog with fewer images, trying a new OS version, and finally installing a new LR version, deleting all previews, creating 1:1 previews, adding smart previews, hiding the histogram which I have done with no respite.

I have gone through many other forum complaints with the same theme as myself and a lot of them have been unresolved.

Your responses make me feel optimistic that maybe it is working well for you - please can you confirm that LR Develop does in fact work in a responsive manner for you, with a smallish catalog, after having made local adjustments to RAW photos ? If yes, then I would be happy to add a new thread about performance on the forum.

Thanks again!

Rikk, some of your "...very isolated areas..." are frankly more common than what you listed; e.g., importing, preview building, keywording, Smart Collection building, editing Smart Collections, etc.  In short, just about everything one does in Library is impacted by the size of the catalog.

Hardware is, of course, very important.  I started using LR with 3.0 on a Toshiba with 8GB, moved to a MacBook Pro with 16GB from LR 4 to LR 6, and then to a MacPro with 128GB.

As my catalog progressed from a couple MB to—as of this morning—3,919,530 images (a whopping 29.4GB catalog) I have seen performance degrade unless and until the hardware was upgraded.

Sometimes, the performance degraded after an upgrade of LR; LR 7.5 was a pig compared to LR 6; LR 8 was a marked improvement over 7.5.  Sometimes the OS improved the performance; Mojave was a Godsend for LR 7.5 and 8 (unless you owned an iMac).

I recently upgraded the 1TB SSD in the MacPro to a 2TB SSD from QWC—four times the read/write speed of the OEM drive.   Now my catalog loads in less than two minutes, down from over 20 minutes.  (My LR application is on the internal SSD, the catalog and all other files are on a dedicated external G-Tech 8TB RAID with Thunderbolt.  All images are on another dedicated external G-Tech 20TB Raid with Thunderbolt.)

Moving to multiple catalogs is simply a non-starter.  Presets, Smart Collections, Keyword Sets, keywords—no way to sync them easily across multiple catalogs.

As for syncing to the mobiles apps or the cloud—I never water down my whisky and I do not use LR on a bloody iphone (except for a synced collection to show clients as a portfolio).

However, I am still concerned and still hope that Adobe would change the underlying database to increase performance, referential integrity, and keyword accuracy.  I am also pretty much at the end of the line in available hardware upgrades at least until 2020 as Apple has indicated no next-gen MacPro in 2019.

I am in Botswana through the end of the first week of January.  The lions are tripping over themselves for a photo op; the cheetahs are sitting on the roof of the Land Rover.  My catalog will definitely be over 4 million images before December ends.

Then what?

Why they give misinformation, goodness knows. But trying to offer support in so few characters is a nightmare, so Twitter's generally a bad choice for support issues anyway. Start a separate thread here on your performance issues and we'll do our best to help figure out what's going wrong for you.

I'm not arguing against the request for syncing multiple catalogs for separating work and personal, but realistically, based on everything I've heard about Adobe's direction for Lightroom Classic sync, I don't think it'll happen. They've very clearly said that sync development is being focused on CC, with Classic focusing on its traditional desktop usage.

Adobe hasn't shared specific specs because there are so many variables and performance tolerance levels too (one person's fast will be another one's slow) but let's get down to specifics in your own thread. Even their most basic minimum spec should be able to handle 3000 photos, although some things will be slower at minimum spec.

Hi Victoria,

Thanks for your response but

(a) if the twitter support rep is repeatedly giving misinformation, why does Adobe even offer support on twitter and

(b) to second Frans’ opinion, the Multi-catalog sync request is as much being driven by absolutely poor LR Classic performance as it is by the genuine need to maintain syncable separate work and personal catalogs.

But if I were to pick one thing I desperately need, it surely is to see LR not using 600% of my CPU when I do the most basic stuff like selecting a different photo in the develop module or switching from the Library to the develop module.

(c) it’s good to hear that LR is tested on min 100,000 images. That being the case what is the min hardware spec for which LR’s Develop module won’t choke up the system and will work reasonably responsively with 100,000 RAW images each having some edits and / or adjustments ?

I’ve been discussing my LR performance issues for almost 18 months now with the twitter support at periodic intervals and the pattern is that they ask me to try with a small catalog .

The advice being offered to paying subscribers is not at all consistent.