P: Performance problems iMac Retina 5k

Report · Jan 26, 2015

I've been using the new imac retina, and i have enormous problems with the performance of Photoshop. If i for example use the selective color correction, this does not run smoothly. Other functions also work delayed. I noticed if i do not use Photoshop in full screen mode, everything goes back to normal. A friend used the predecessor model imac without 5k resolution, but has no problems. I suspect Photoshop has problems with the resolution of 5k. I hope Adobe fix this problems because Photoshop works slow and delayed, the performance is terrible. I bought the retina iMac 5k, since my previous mac is getting old and slow. But now is it so, that my new retina iMac, run equal slowly as my old iMac. Adobe please fix this problems, so i cannot work.

Report · Mar 11, 2016

Thanks for the tip, @Chris Cox... I will try with the original Apple 8GB of RAM and see if there is any difference

Report · Mar 18, 2016

i can't believe this hasn't been resolved yet. it's driving my photographers crazy.

Report · Mar 18, 2016

So are we still just waiting on this to get fixed?

Report · Mar 18, 2016

I dont think it can be fixed, I ordered a new pair of crucial ram certified for this iMac and had the same problem. It seams not to run well with different ram then the one it was shipped with, and there is no way to buy the original ram. That's really an issue here.

I would if they say it clearly before one buys a iMac to have the ability to choose one with enough ram, even if the ram from Apple is more than twice expensive then the one on the market. But this way the only option is to sell it (with bad feeling) and buy a new one with more ram. So a ram upgrade cost about 1K. That's the opposite of customer satisfaction.

Report · Mar 18, 2016

That really is amazingly unacceptable. the iMac 5k costs a lot of money. It's been months and I'm still sort of not accepting the reality that the computer is almost completely useless for what I got it for. Crazy.

Report · Mar 18, 2016

Problem solved. Cancelled my decision to buy an iMac 5K. Switching to Capture one. Goodbye Apple, goodbye Adobe.

Report · Mar 19, 2016

It's not the RAM's problem and it's not the MAC's problem. On my 64GB of RAM ALL other applications work amazingly fast, snappy, just as expected even exceeding expectations...The computer is amazing, the performance is stunning...until I open Lightroom and start working in it. It's Adobe/Lightroom's problem.

Report · Mar 19, 2016

What does happen then, do you have application freezes or is there something else. What does your console log look like at this moment, and is your RAM original or did you upgrade with a different RAM?

Report · Mar 19, 2016

Maciek Niemczyk, it's just that Lighroom's performance is the same as on my 2012 MacBook Pro with 16GB RAM, old graphics cars, 4x slower SSD, older processor. I bought a new supercharged computer thinking it was time to upgrade in order for Lightroom to have a better performance.

Here are more details from a previous post of mine. I need to mention that my 64GB RAM is NOT OEM, but someone suggested that I test performance with the original Apple RAM, which I did...16GB (that shipped with the iMAC). Same thing. And last, but not least, how come ALL other applications that I use perform well, excellently, and only Lightroom has sub-sub-par performance? And the forums and support pages are filled with complains of Lightroom performance?

Here are the details:
---------------------------
Hello everyone.

I need to share my experience with Lightroom CC 2015.4 on brand new and powerful iMac and see if other people experience similar performance issues. Is it my setup or is it indeed the application that needs refinements? Also I want to share a weird bug presented by Photoshop CC 2015.1.2 and see if anyone can reproduce this.

Until 2 weeks ago I was using a

MacBook Pro mid 2012, retina
16GB RAM
2,7 GHz Core i7 processor.
750GB SSD
NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M 1024 MB
OS X El Capitan 10.11.3
Adobe Creative Cloud - applications always up to date
Using mostly Lightroom and Photoshop (I'm a photographer, that's my job & passion)

Well, this is a pretty decent computer, but over the last couple of months or a year it has been running progressively slower and slower when running Lightroom. Photoshop was behaving more or less OK having in mind the specs and age of the MAC. But eventually Lightroom became so slow, I cant even describe the slowness. I as looking at the spinning wheel more time than working on an image. Lightroom was slow in all modules. Normally I also have Mail and Safari opened and some times Photoshop. Back in time, some 6 months ago, I first started closing one of those apps to slightly improve LR's performance. Then I had to start closing all applications and only leave LR running. My computer became a dedicated machine to Lightroom, only to try and have some work done at the end of the day.

Strangely enough, there was always free RAM (I use Bjango's iStat Menus to constantly monitor RAM and CPU in the OS's menu bar)...some times as much as 25%-40% free RAM. But Lightroom was behaving as if there was none.

So a few weeks ago I decided that my old pal the MacBook Pro has to be retired, although he was performing VERY WELL with all other applications...But I understand that Adobe applications are complex image editing power softwares and resource hungry. So I did a huge investment in the latest and greatest, fully loaded iMac...

Two weeks ago I received my iMac and I've been using it intensively ever since, doing my observations and taking notes. And after 2 weeks I had to reach out to the forums and cry out my frustrations. Because there are such...and as I see, I'm not alone...First the iMac's specs:

iMac 5k, late 2015 model, 27", fully tuned and loaded with
64GB RAM;
4,0 GHz Core i7;
1TB SSD (no fusion drive) by the way it's 4x faster in read & write times than my old MacBook Pro. Performance was measured with Blackmagic Disk Speed Test v. 2.2.2 and the iMac's SSD exceeds the scale with over 1200MB/s write and 1900MB/s read speeds;
AMD Radeon R9 M395X 4096 MB;
OS X El Capitan 10.11.3
Adobe Creative Cloud - applications always up to date (currently LR CC is 2015.4, CR is 9.4, PS is 2015.1.2)

Well, overall performance is better, indeed. But it's far from what I expected. Don't get me wrong -- the iMac is performing AMAZINGLY well with all other applications. But with Lightroom I still see the spinning wheel a lot of times. For the folders with images that I'm currently working on I render full resolution 1:1 previews + Smart Previews (so in fact I'm working on the internal iMac SSD). Rendering edits lags. The spot removal tool is so badly slow and lagging, that I prefer to export the file to Photoshop and clean it there. How is this possible?

Before I get asked let me answer: yes, I do use the graphics processor (the option is selected). I tried both options.

Report · Mar 19, 2016

It might be that it's a different problem, but as I mentioned- the guy at my apple retailer sad it accours with most 'creative tools'. I guess you did not try a blown up logic X project or a ablation live set with some plugs. Anyway - we would know if we are talking about the same thing if you would consider your logs. Any time I get a freeze the log is full of the following error message: WindowServer[...]: GPU Driver appears to be hung (over 5 continuous seconds of unreadiness)

Report · Mar 19, 2016

Hi again, Maciek Niemczyk and thanks for the follow up and feedback. Please, can you tell me how to see those logs? Where? Thanks in advance

Report · Mar 19, 2016

Hi and no problem, it's easy - just hit cmd + space and type console into spotlight, a console application pops up. Now all you need to do is to wait until the freeze happens and after it check what exceptions has been thrown while the freeze happend. The console app shows all relevant logs.

Report · Mar 19, 2016

Thanks, Maciek Niemczyk...I'll pay attention to the console. However I'm not experiencing crashes and freezes...I'm experiencing general slowdown and sluggishness within Lightroom. For example, switching between modules (Library to Develop)...some times I stare at the spinning wheel for severa seconds. Editing a photo...I wait seconds to see the applied adjustment...I feel pain in my eyes waiting concentrated for the preview of the adjustment (even my old 2012 MAC is sometimes faster at this). But still I must say, that some times Lightroom is SUPER FAST AND RESPONSIVE...just after application launch. But most of the time its a nightmare. I'm not sure, but I have the feeling that if I close Safari or/and Mail...Lightroom works OK. But I need time to see if there is a pattern here.

Report · Mar 19, 2016

As I sad, my clear pattern is using some DAW for a while, experiencing spinning wheel and frozen ui, mostly the freeze can be terminated provoking application switch (cmd + tab). After the iMac is responding again the console log is full of the mentioned entry like 100 times per second.

Report · Mar 19, 2016

Hi,

I'm reading this thread and I'm a bit shocked. I use iMac 5K late 2014, 32GB RAM, AMD Radeon R9 M295X 4096MB, 4 GHz Intel Core i7, SSD 256GB, and I don't experience any performance issues neither in Logic X nor in Lightrom 6.

To be honest I haven't experienced any issues even when I had only 8GB Ram provided originally with the iMac.

Did you guys try to setup a fresh instal of El Capitan?

Report · Mar 19, 2016

Yes, I did. A complete fresh clean install of El Capitan. Installing all libraries for live take like a day. Imagine haw disappointed I was when I recognized the problem is still there. I have the smaller grafphic option - I see you chosen the bigger one, maybe that's the clue..

Report · Mar 19, 2016

Maybe, I can't tell. But it's just late 2014 iMac 5K.... now the iMacs have different GPU options I think... and maybe the problem is simple - your GPU is broken. Maybe try to use some tools to diagnose the graphics as such... if that's the case, hope you have warranty coverage still 🙂 🙂

Report · Mar 20, 2016

Maciek Niemczyk, do you apply a "filter" in the console with a keyword like, lets say, "Lightroom" or a process name? Because in the console appears info from other apps too. Up until now (2-3hrs of work), all I've found in terms of messages related to Lighroom is shown in the screen shots below:

Report · Mar 20, 2016

@seba: I have also the late 2014 model (version 15.1) and i brought it to the Apple retail Store and they did run the test but the test obviously did tell that everything seams fine. Than I called the apple care and they told me to remove everything what is not from Apple - which was the additional ram - and then the problem was far less disturbing as with additional ram. But I bought a Mac with 16Gb and it's only running with a few short freezes with 8 original Gb of ram - so how can it be everything ok.

@Konstadin: it is obviously a different problem you and I have. Yours is a real application caused problem where the Lightroom tries to call a first responder of a chain of responders to a action but fails to achieve it - probably due to the context. That's something for Adobe to dig into.

Report · Mar 20, 2016

@maciej - so.... I have no idea hat's happening with your iMac. I wish I could help but... I use Kingston dedicated Apple equivalent RAM 4x8GB and it works fine.

Try some 3rd party GPU benchmarks and tests... Tests done by Apple support are just basic tests, seldom show something unless the GPU is dead or almost dead 😉

Report · Mar 20, 2016

Do you know some appropriate test you could recommend?

Report · Mar 20, 2016

This topic is about Photoshop. Please don't confuse it by adding your issues with Lightroom. If you have issues with Lightroom, please post a separate topic.

Report · Mar 30, 2016

I appreciate Mr. Cox providing comments here, but after several comments over the last month detailing issues with Photoshop on 5K iMacs it is very disappointing to have the only reply from an Adobe employee chastise the commenters for talking about Lightroom. The problems are obviously relevant to several Adobe products and we have yet to have a substantive or useful response from Adobe after well over a year of reporting problems. We don't know if the most recent Photoshop products fix anything; we don't know if El Capitan from Apple fixes anything. It's not Mr. Cox's fault, but that is not support. And I again point out that there is no official way to submit problem reports to Adobe. This is it. This is what they tell us to do and we have done it.

Because I am a long-time and heavy user of photography software, I'm often asked by friends for recommendations. I have stopped recommending Adobe products. They have great features, but this level of non-support is just not acceptable any more.

Report · Dec 08, 2016

Just coming across this thread and wondered if I could resurrect it. Any fix for these Photoshop issues on Retina iMac???

Thank you.

Report · Dec 12, 2016

problem still appears on my 5k iMac though someone said 2015.5 fixed the problem.

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P: Performance problems iMac Retina 5k