Moving to a new computer

[Semaphoric]

I am building a new computer, and will be moving all my Creative Cloud apps over. Will the CC desktop app install everything in chronological order, earliest version to latest? Bridge can get file associations mixed up a lot if one app is installed out of order.

[Trevor.Dennis]

New computer time John.  🙂  What sort of spec?

I can't say that I have had issues with Bridge and file associations, but I don't install of the CC apps, and I typically install Photoshop first, then Bridge, then Prem Pro, Audition, Illustrator.  Are you trying to avoid having to trawl through Bridge > Preferences > File Type Associations for the dozens of formats it lists?  Would installing Bridge last cause it to keep its defaults?  Or can we save and move the settings from old to new computer?

[D Fosse]

Not sure what you mean - are you going to install multiple versions of each application? In that case I would definitely start with the earliest. I do that as a matter of routine.

If you later decide you don't need the earlier version and just want the latest - uninstall them all in reverse order, starting with the newest. Then reinstall the one you want.

[Semaphoric]

If I open a Raw file from Bridge, it will open in different versions of Photoshop, depending on how I opened it (double-click, vs right-click). Thinking about it, though, I don't really need to keep all those previous versions, except for CC 2013 32-bit, for legacy plugins. Adobe is by far the largest sub-folder in Program Files, and it can be pared down a lot.

My current system has been showing its age for a few years, but it's getting more unstable week by week. My new one will be the first bare-metal build I've done in years. It will be an Intel Core-9, with an NVME drive for scratch and apps. I'm planning on biting the bullet on an Nvidia RTX 4090; boy, the prices on those are sure eye-popping! All will be running under a new Windows 10 license.

It will be nice to have an up-to-date machine. I haven't even tried any of the new AI stuff in Photoshop, since I figure my current box would just frustrate me. Heck, it frustrates me just opening and saving files theses days.

[D Fosse]

I'm planning on biting the bullet on an Nvidia RTX 4090; boy, the prices on those are sure eye-popping!

By @Semaphoric

Are you sure you really need that? If it's just for Photohop, you don't. 4060 or 4070 will be plenty good enough. I'm not even sure an i9 will be necessary - I've never seen any reason to go beyond i7, and I don't think I have ever seen that CPU really work out with Photoshop.

Lightroom is a little more CPU-intensive, but even there an i7 is comfortable.

I'm sure @davescm  will come along, he has an RTX 3090 for 3D rendering, he can tell us what impact, if any, it will have for Photoshop.

I'd put some money into as many 2 or 4 TB NVMe drives as the motherboard supports, and PCIe 4.0 speced if possible. Most motherboards will have three M.2 ports these days, but maybe with PCIe 4.0 support only on one, PCIe 3.0 on the others. The speed difference here is quite substantial.

[Semaphoric]

Good question on if I really need the 4090. So many reviews tout it as the bee's knees, and most also say the 4080 is less price/performance. I will look deeper into the 4070.

Until recently my i7 has handled Photoshop without [much] problem for the past ten years, and my goal is to get the same out of my new box. My concern is less with software I'm running now, but what I may be running in the future, and will it want the exra horsepower. That, of course, remains to be seen.

[freed_4569]

You’re right that for Photoshop, a high-end GPU like a 4080 or 4090 might be overkill. A 4060 or 4070 should handle most Photoshop tasks with ease. As for the CPU, an i7 is often more than sufficient for photo editing; Photoshop doesn't always utilize the full power of an i9, especially if you're not doing extremely demanding tasks like large batch processing or working with massive files. If budget is a concern or if you're not planning to do more intensive tasks, sticking with an i7 and a 4060 or 4070 could be a very balanced choice.

[davescm]

Thanks for the tag @D Fosse 

I would agree that the RTX4090 is overkill for Photoshop. I installed my RTX3090 for 3D rendering where it is fully used and really does speed up the rendering process and the 24GB VRAM allows for larger scenes and material info to be loaded . Photoshop hardly touches it.

I understand the view of future proofing but, at a third of the price of an RTX4090, an RTX4070 will certainly meet the of Photoshop and allow you to replace it with a five, six or seven series when it comes along and leave spare for additional NVMe drives or SSD drives for storage.

You mention a Windows 10 license, on a new build I would use Windows 11 unless you have the need to connect unsupported hardware/drivers. I use Windows 11 Pro here (on a PC with i9-10920X, RTX3090 24GBVRAM, 256GB RAM and storage across two NVMe drives (system, scratch and user data) plus several internal SSD SATA drives for storage) and have no issues with it. With a bit of tweaking it even looks like Windows 10 that I was used to.
Note that 256GB RAM was installed to run fast 3D simulations - not for Photoshop where it would be wasted.

Dave

[D Fosse]

With a bit of tweaking it even looks like Windows 10 that I was used to.

By @davescm

Anything in particular I should be aware of - just off the top of your head?

I keep getting nag screens to upgrade my Win 10 pro to 11 - it's free - but I've been holding off. I like Windows 10 and I can't think of anything I'd like to change about it. I see absolutely no reason to upgrade - except of course to stay compatible with anything that might come up. At some point I suppose I have to give in and surrender ... 😉

[davescm]

No issues Dag, I had to re-install a printer driver after upgrading but that was it. I did a full back up (using Macrium) before hand but did not need to step back.
Software transferred across and I made the taskbar look similar to Windows 10 with the search box at the left rather than in the middle. The start screen looks slightly different - but once I dropped everything I regularly use into groups, and turned of the 'recommended' apps it was just like using Windows 10.

During her summer break from uni, I updated my daughters laptop, on which the Windows 11 update failed twice. I just went onto the Gigabyte website and downloaded all their system drivers including the BIOS (not the GPU though - I got that from NVidia). After installing those, the update sailed through and she has had no problems with it since.

Dave 

[D Fosse]

OK, thanks. I'll hit the button one of these days then...

[shahzad_4791]

It sounds like your experience with upgrading to Windows 11 went smoothly, especially with transferring software and customizing the taskbar to resemble Windows 10. Good call on using Macrium for a full backup, just in case. The minor changes, like adjusting the taskbar and Start screen, seem to be working out well for you. As for your daughter’s laptop, it's great that downloading the latest system drivers from Gigabyte and NVidia resolved the update issues. Driver compatibility is often a key factor in successful upgrades, and it's good to hear that the Windows 11 update worked flawlessly afterward!

[Trevor.Dennis]

John, I compromised and went with the RTX4080 which saved me about NZ$1000

Current NVMe drives are even faster than the 512Gb 960PRO drives I had in my last system.  I have two 2Tb 980 PRO drives one for Boot and the shared for Photoshop Scratch space.  These drives are FAST. From the time I see the Asus splash screen to the Windows 11 log on page is a handful of seconds.

Speccy doesn't show the CPU in the summary page

It's a bit overkill for Photoshop, but it's nice to have everything work more or less instantly.  Even things like changing and resetting a workspace — that used to take two or three seconds on my previous i9-3930K system  — is now instant.  Apps like Handbrake, that use all system resources available to it, is way faster.

Dag, I love Windows 11.  I like its window handling, which is important when moving multiple windows around three large screens.  I don't like its Performance Monitor though, but it might be not doing it right.  I have Googled and watched some videos, but I can't make it give me the same information I could get with Win10.  Win11 File Explorer has a killer new feature: Tabs.  Making for a tidier, easier to manage, workspace.

The Win 11 Start menu is different, and 'probably' better, but I am not entirely sure about that.  One thing that is much

better and faster is Search.  Very useful when you have a bunch of drives and a lot of files.

John, I don't keep earlier versions, but I have had issues with some files wanting to open in Photoshop beta, and others the full release.  I also had an issue with Logitech Options app specific feature wanting to target the beta version.  I had to delete it, and manually select the full release version using the Browse feature and selecting the Photoshop.exe file. That is working well for me now, and I have discovered some useful functionality with my MX Master 3 after responding to a thread on this forum.

I don't use Lightroom — I have tried it several times, and even paid for an earlier version and bought a couple of books, thinking that the commitment would force me to get used to it, but I prefer Bridge and ACR, and the options to use Photoshop actions to process a lot of image files.  It just never clicked for me.  I love Bridge, and I couldn't bare to be without the power of Photoshop.  (Yes I know LR can move files to Photoshop at the press of a button, except we've seen a ton of threads complaining that it doesn't!)  So bottom line is that while it could be slow on my old system, Bridge has always worked well for me.  

John, I had 64Gb RAM on my 3930K system, and never got close to maxing out the full Photoshop allocation, so I stayed with 60Gb on the new system.  I think Dave has a crazy 256Gb memory and OTT GPU for his 3D renders.  I've heard a rumour that he rents out computer time to Adobe for when their servers are struggling with Generative Fill demand.

[Semaphoric]

Saving all previous was a reaction to the time they made the CC app automatically remove one I wanted to keep. I can't even remember what or why that was 😞  so it's a good time for a reset. This actually obviates my original question.

I was looking some more at the RTX 4070 Ti. It's less than half the price of the 4090, and should be more than capable for my needs. I have read some on Win11, but found it only slightly compelling. That bottom task bar is far too Mac-like 😉

I don't use Lightroom myself, but I may likely give it a spin. There is a plugin for LR to convert color film negatives to positives I would like to try. The author told me [IIRC] it wouldn't work with PS's plugin architecture. I do find I spend more effort searching for specific files in Bridge than I'd like, so LR would help there. From what I read, I would probably still be doing my edits in PS, though.

Do I want to go crazy with the RAM? Just because my mobo supports 128GB doesn't mean I'll find that much usable. If I find I don't have enough, memory is the easiest hardware to upgrade. I'm wondering now about the size of the NVME drive I ordered, 1TB. Should it be larger? I was planning on OS and apps plus PS scratch on one drive. Would 1TB cut it? I do have another slot available.

Thanks for all of your views on this undertaking. I know all three of you know what you're talking about, so it's well appreciated.

[David32504672r6w2]

When you install Adobe Creative Cloud (CC) apps on a new computer, the CC Desktop app typically installs the latest versions of the applications by default. It doesn't necessarily install them in chronological order from earliest to latest.

If you have specific preferences for which versions of the applications you want to install (for example, if you prefer an older version for compatibility reasons), you can customize the installation preferences through the CC Desktop app.

Here's how you can do it:

Open Creative Cloud Desktop App:

Launch the Creative Cloud Desktop app on your new computer.
Go to Apps:

Navigate to the "Apps" section.
Find the Application:

Locate the specific application you want to install.
Install from Previous Versions:

Click on the ellipsis (...) next to the app and select "Other Versions."
Select Version:

You'll see a list of available versions. Choose the version you want to install.
Install:

Click "Install" to install the selected version.
Regarding Adobe Bridge and file associations, it's generally recommended to have the latest version of Adobe Bridge installed alongside the other Adobe CC apps for the best compatibility. If you do need to install a specific version, you can use the steps outlined above to choose the version that works best for your workflow.

Remember to check system requirements and compatibility before installing any software to ensure optimal performance.

[shahzad_4791]

When moving Creative Cloud apps to a new computer, it's essential to manually control the installation order to avoid file association issues, particularly with Adobe Bridge. Start by installing Photoshop first, followed by Bridge, and then other apps like Premiere Pro and Illustrator. After installation, check and set file type associations in Bridge > Preferences > File Type Associations to ensure each format opens with the correct app. You can also export your Bridge preferences from your old computer and import them to the new system to save time.