Playback play/stop lag ever since 2020 update

Report · Jan 09, 2021

Playback commands have been super laggy ever since I updated to the 2020 version. Playback continues to play for about 3-4 seconds after stopping it. It happens about a 4th of the time, but it's enough to slow my editing way down. Starting playback is the same way. It doesn't matter whether I'm on my 2019 MacBook Pro or my 2017 iMac, it still struggles. I'm on a super fast system with my footage, app, and media cache all on separate thunderbolt SSD drives, so I shouldn't be having this problem. I can't figure it out. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Report · Jan 09, 2021

FAQ: Clearing Cache Method Premiere Pro v14 « DAV's TechTable

FAQ: How to reset (trash) preferences.

Report · Jan 17, 2021

I've actually tried both of those already, and it didn't fixed anything for me. But I really appreciate the reply! Thank you! Hopefully I can find a solution to this super frustrating problem.

Report · May 18, 2021

Is your footage VFR by any chance?

Report · May 18, 2021

For audio hardware you can select no input. If you edit H.264 you shoud check to see if Quick Sync is encoding and decoding. I think iStats can do that.

Report · May 18, 2021

Yes, I have this problem too. And I'm on a Mac Pro 2019 tower, with proxy footage on NVMe RAID drives, so it's not hardware. Premiere seems to just be fickle like that. A new version will come out and a new problem will present itself. All you can do is hope Adobe fixes it in the next update.

Report · May 18, 2021

editing software is a complicated beast and all sorts of things can cause problems many of which are not adobe's fault. There are many troubleshooting steps to take which may help you solve your problem. If you want to pursue this, start a new thread and provide the usual info and we can try and figure out what's going on. I worked in Premiere 2020 without any serious issues on both an ancient macbookpro (2012) besides the fact that the lumetri scopes no longer appeared and a relatively new windows custom build. I'm now working in Premiere 2021 without any serious issues on both systems.

Report · May 18, 2021

I compiled a list of things I've tried here. These are all the tips I've found after many hours of reading these forums. If there is anything else I should try and then add to the list, please let me know. Some of these tips are workarounds for bugs in the software, such as the Essential Graphics panel and the audio waveforms slowing down the interface. After many years of using Premiere one realizes that it will never be perfect software and it is best to find workarounds to the caveats that persist.

Report · May 18, 2021

a few things come to mind.

Are you using multiple monitors? Try disconnecting all but one.

Are you using multiple graphics cards? If so, disable all but one and make sure the one left active is on the approved list for premiere.

https://helpx.adobe.com/nl/premiere-pro/system-requirements.html

Trying to remember if you can update graphic card drivers on the mac... if you can, check to see if that could be an issue. Many people report issues when they've loaded drivers optimized for games...

Create a new user account for your mac with administrative privileges and log in as the new user.

Try disconnecting from network/internet by turning off wifi and/or pulling the ethernet cable. Might be something happening in the background.

Which reminds me, if you have any antivirus/security software running, try disabling it.

Try disconnecting any peripherals besides keyboard and mouse. If possible try using wired keyboard and mouse rather than wireless.

And of course, try running premiere without any other apps running at the same time.

did you try Andy1968's suggestions in his post in this thread?

These are troubleshooting steps to see if we can locate the source of the problem. If any of this helps, we can see if there are less drastics steps to improve the situation.

Report · May 19, 2021

I've tried all these things—and more, believe me. They do nothing to solve the quality of life issues of Premiere just being a slightly unresponsive program. I have to wait a second every time I want to do certain things—this is just something I've come to accept about the program. I've used it for many years, this has always been the case. Some updates are worse than others. It's just not as snappy as other programs like FCP or Resolve. I believe the base coding of the program is built on a house of cards. It's not like other users of FCP or Resolve have to play these tricks to get their software working again (deleting preferences and resetting permissions and the like)

I edited with Ppro on the same machine for 10 years and thought everything would change once I bought my 2019 Mac Pro tower. Imagine my disappointment after spending that money to discover that the performance of the interface was just as laggy and slow. Try editing on FCP with a new Mac; the difference from Premiere is like night and day. I would switch in an instant if it had the same functionality and features as Premiere.

Report · May 19, 2021

I am sorry to hear your Mac Pro is having problems but to be fair the 2019 Mac Pro is kind of an oddity (proprietary parts) but Apple will not manufacture a generic ATX computer. That is Apple's fault not Adobe's. Keep in mind 3rd party hardware from AVID and other manufactures have been problematic on the 2019 Mac Pro. If the product is not Apple certified it might not work making me ask why offer the PCIE slots if they might be problematic? I will admit Premiere Pro does need to be tweaked out more than most other NLE but once it is tweaked out the performance is awesome. As I stated other people had problems with the 2019 Mac Pro and they don't even use the Adobe Products. I doubt the M.2 SATA adapter in the video below would work in the 2019 Mac Pro. If third party hardware works in my PC but not in the Mac Pro do you blame Apple or do you blame the 3rd party manufacture? Do you kind of see my point? I feel bad for you and can sympathize with you but I also hope to put things into perspective. Keep in mind it is much harder to troubleshoot a rare product like the 2019 Mac Pro than an iMac for a multitude of reasons. That being said have you contacted Apple?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfT9ivfbJ98

Report · May 19, 2021

The Mac Pro is a professional workstation built for media applications like video editing. Adobe builds its software for exactly this kind of hardware, it is not an "oddity." ATX is a form factor, not a hardware architecture. It sounds like you are saying it's Apple's fault for not building PCs? Alright then...

Report · May 19, 2021

Apple optimizes its hardware to run Apple software... not adobe's.

Report · May 19, 2021

Are you saying Apple should design its hardware architecture around Adobe's software?

What PC hardware manufacturer does that?

Report · May 19, 2021

PC manufacturers do not make and market competing editing software. Apple
does.

Report · May 19, 2021

Then isn't it in Adobe's best interest and responsibility to make their product run better?

Or are you suggesting there is some hardware or software secret that deliberately hampers Adobe's performance on Apple machines?

I can't figure out what your point is here.

In any case, I've used Premiere for well over 10 years on Mac machines and my experience has never been "excellent." There were a few years of consistent crashing and freezing. Poor playback, etc. I was hoping a new machine would be the end of it. Now it's clear that Premiere just isn't very well-optimized software. It's always felt a bit "bolted together."

Report · May 19, 2021

And wouldn'y you say it was equally Apple's responsibility to make sure their hardware can handle Adobe and Avid software? I trust Neil's perspective on this situation. His level of expertise (at least in some areas) dwarfs mine.

Back in the day, Avids were a turnkey system. You bought the software and originally a mac computer customized to run Avid software. And even then, there were often problems with software updates that avid just had to test on a very limited number of kinds of computers.

And as to whether apple is doing this on purpose... wouldn't surprise me. And they also make mistakes, just think of those lousy keyboards on a lot of macbookpros.

Report · May 19, 2021

And I've been working with Premiere on macs and windows machines for at least 5 years after starting with avid, moving to fcp1-7 and spending some time with Resolve. Gotta say the experience in Premiere is at least equal to those other systems and in some ways better. Every piece of software this complicated and working on a vast variety of hardware is gonna have bugs...

Report · May 19, 2021

sorry if I over-reacted but spent 4 hrs today trying to fix a very complicated resolve project that keeps displaying problems that were fixed a few years ago... We all can get too invested in our computers...

Report · May 19, 2021

When I display a 3-minute song in the Source Monitor, the Premiere Pro interface slows to a crawl. You can watch a video I made demonstrating the problem.

As I shrink the Source Monitor, the problem goes away. So it's obvious what's happening here. Premiere is sucking up resources displaying the waveform and so the larger I make it, the slower the program performs. So quite clearly this is an optimization problem that Adobe programmers have declined to solve. Or maybe they haven't gotten to it yet. Regardless, this is just one of many examples of issues I've encountered with Premiere that makes me feel like the program is a bit rough around the edges. And after a decade of use, I have tired of these rough edges.

Apple's job is to make computers. Adobe's job is to make software that runs on those computers. It's really that simple.

Report · May 19, 2021

Benwinter,

The product below will work with any AMD or Intel motherboard with a Thunderbolt header. I doubt it will work with the 2019 Mac Pro because the 2019 Mac Pro lacks a Tunderbolt header. No wires dangling please! Who do you blame Gigabyte or Apple? Apple does have a proprietarty Tunderbolt 3 PCIE card that might not work in my PC. Do you see my point? Could Apple's proprietry Thnderbolt 3 card be to blame for the stuttery playback in Premiere Pro? I doubt it but generic ATX motherboard can be swapped out with one another and accept generic PC parts (video cards, audio cards, Thunderbolt cards etc). You cannot swap out the 2019 Mac Pro motherboard with mine nor can you swappout the power supply of the Mac Pro with my Gigabyte Motherboard. Is that Gigabyte's fualt or Apple's fualt? Generic ATX motherboards use generic PCIE slots, chipsets and power supplies. The Mac Pro does not. The Mac Pro also has the T2 security chip. Could the T2 chip cause problems? Who knows but I hope you can now see my point. Things can sound good in theory but reality is not the same thing. Apple might know what the problem is.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nuVsXl70Xk

Report · May 19, 2021

Apple's job is to make computers. Adobe's job is to make software that runs on those computers.

I really don't see how PCI cards and swapping motherboards is relevant to the conversation.

After Effects runs brilliantly on my Mac Pro. It's just Premiere.

Report · May 19, 2021

so the obvious solution for you is to move to FCPX an apple product that was designed to work soley on apple computers. Does away with all this cross platforum tsuris.

Report · May 19, 2021

Premiere was originally designed solely for Apple computers, in 1991, you know that right? Heck, Illustrator was designed for the Macintosh in the 80's. Why is it suddenly ridiculous to expect Adobe software to run well on Apple computers?

So I can't help but chuckle when you seem to be stupified that one would expect Adobe products to perform well on a Mac, because their motherboards aren't swappable (?) or they have special chips (??), when Adobe literally got their start writing programs for Apple hardware. Sounds a bit silly, doesn't it? Especially considering Apple commands a major market share of creative professionals, Adobe's primary customer base?

I come here looking for help improving my experience, reporting bugs in the hopes that they might get fixed, and sharing my experience with others so they don't go down rabbit holes as I did these many years. Maybe you're a PC guy, good for you; lots of professionals use Macs, and it would be Adobe's best interest and indeed responsibility to make sure their software runs equally well on both. And I'm sure they're giving it their best shot. It doesn't change my assessment.

Report · May 19, 2021

Benwinter

It is 2021 not 1991. When Apple bought Key Grip from Macromedia and changed the name to FCP did you tell Apple they must make FCP run on Windows PCs? To add insult to injury Adobe abandoned Premiere Pro on the Mac for several years.

Don't get me wrong Adobe probably does want Premiere Pro to work on the Mac Pro and M1 chips but Adobe could opt not to support either one just like Apple does not make FCXP for the PC. If my Gigabyte Thunderbolt PCIE card does not work in the 2019 Mac Pro do you place the blame on Gigabyte or Apple? As I stated other people are having issues with the 2019 Mac Pro and they are not even using the Adobe Products. Have you contacted Apple? Who knows they might tell you to dissable the T2 chip.