Melissa,  this definitely is NOT a "you" thing. I, and I hope everyone else in here, believe the developers want this product to work - I know from personal experience, NO ONE with any personal pride wants to create software that doesn't perform as advertised/needed/desired. >Remember -  Adobe employees don't make public statements about what is being >released  without specific direction. This one is the one that I believe may be causing some of the frustration and angst and users going out in search of puppies to kick..... I KNOW you and the other people doing the work can't make statements (we never were allowed to either).  BUT, in this case, as in any case where a product engenders such a response for such an extended period, having SOMEONE (as I said earlier, someone from a room with a door on it that CAN make a statement) stand up and say "WE'RE FIXING IT, AND IT'S NOT GOING TO TAKE THREE MONTHS" would help some....... >Not everyone, in fact not even a  majority of users, are running into the slowness - but if you do,  its very annoying. Do you (Adobe) have empirical evidence of this, or is it simply that only a minority of users are using this forum or the bug system to report problems?  If there IS evidence from a majority of people (and by people I mean actual, real users that are doing real work with the tool, not just staring at rows of thumbnails in their 500 image catalog) that there is no problem we need to know what they're doing differently.  Or how their configuration differs from those in here. In my case, I dumped an ADDITIONAL $300 in an already over-spec'd system to go to 12GB of memory and an ATI 5770 video card. I always figure one person reporting a problem exemplifies hundreds or thousands that are HAVING the problem and don't report it.  They just badmouth the product, stop using it, or don't use the product to do those things that don't work. >Silence  from Adobe here does not mean we don't care. It may be that our hands  are tied from saying much publicly. Understood, and there shouldn't be anybody chewing on you or your folks for that.....  The chewing should be reserved for the corporate mouthpieces that COULD provide updates so we aren't sitting out here in the dark. ... View more

Jim, I think you have to tell the truth.......  The same as I've been to all the photographers that have asked me......  "Based on the perceived quality of Beta 2, I purchased Lightroom 3 and transitioned all my catalogues.  Unfortunately, the released version has NOT lived up to the promise of earlier releases.  I recommend you to NOT purchase this program."  In a couple weeks the photography clubs I belong to will start their new year.  And I'll get asked by a lot more people about CS5 and LR3.  How I answer will depend on whether or not the problems I've seen are fixed. So far, 100% of the people I've talked to - all current LR users - have decided not to upgrade. This is the problem of having a significant minority of users encounter a set of problems of this magnitude.  An old sales axiom went something like "A happy customer will tell 3 others. An unhappy one will tell 10."  That was in the pre-Internet days.  Now, the word gets out to tens of thousands instead of just a few. We're now FIFTY-SIX days into this (since the topic was opened on 6/9).  Looking at the last week's posts, it seems like the onus has now been pushed from the vendor to the users - "do a survey", "give us specs", "we're a small group", etc....  There are a ton of system specs in here.  There are many posts stating specific operations that are slow.  There's no need for a survey to know there's a problem. If Adobe wants to quantify speeds and problems, and honestly aren't ALREADY aware of where the problem areas are, they should provide a version of LR with the timing instrumentation.  AND a script to follow.  I"m sure a LOT of responders would take the time to run the script and get the timings. ... View more

Well, we're now THIRTEEN PAGES and more than a FORTY-FIVE days into this problem since the thread was started on June 9... A while ago, I suggested it might be useful for SOMEONE at Adobe that lives in a room with a door on it, perhaps even someone that's HIGH up in charge of the Lightroom project, to STAND UP and say "WE GIVE A DAMN ABOUT THE PROBLEM AND WE'RE BUSTING OUR COLLECTIVE BEHINDS TO FIX IT"... And of course, I got the typical response from the fanboys, questioning my reading comprehension.  It'd STILL be nice to have someone with the clout to make this a very high priority tell us SOMEONE IS ACTUALLY TRYING TO FIX THIS...... ... View more

> Amen, brudda'! The near total lack of responses from Adobe about this  problem is deafening. Nope.  Lee Jay pointed out the error of my ways........  Clearly Adobe is on it, despite not getting anything official from management, and I'm confident we'll be getting (unofficial) word on progress any day now.  I'm sure an updated version that'll address the performance issues encountered by the many "complainers" in here will be shortly forthcoming. I'd still love to know what real-world PC configurations the testers at Adobe were using. ... View more

OK, then I'm wrong, and Adobe is actively involved in here, is aware of the situation, and is taking steps to fix the problems..... ... View more

I think my reading comprehension is pretty good... So, go for it..  Point me to the entry in this topic from ADOBE MANAGEMENT that officially answers the questions I asked. And I don't think Melissa counts.  As far as I know she's a developer.  She doesn't make policy, allocate resources, or make timelines for when we'll see a fix. If there ARE other pertinent employees who ARE participating, point them out, especially where they've STATED that they're EMPLOYEES, and that they have something more official than individual ramblings... I await the pointer... ... View more

I was going to say "Not to blame Adobe, but...", but I AM blaming Adobe. I've been following this topic for the last week or so, and I keep seeing statements from people to the effect: "I believe Adobe will take the right course of actions to get LR3 in  line." or "I'm confident the next update will address these performance issues" etc., etc..... Have ANY of you who are making these statements seen ANY OFFICIAL (or even unofficial) indication from Adobe that a:  they're aware of the problem? b:  they've ADMITTED this is a serious, widespread problem that requires immediate addressing? c:  they've assigned a team/group or some SIGNIFICANT set of resources to solving the problem? d:  they've provided some form of timeline for a correction to become available? 'cause I haven't...  And yeah, I know the mantra, "this is a user-to-user forum".  With this many angry, frustrated users perhaps SOMEBODY that lives in a room with a door on it at Adobe MIGHT want to start paying attention... I STILL absolutely believe that what Adobe needs is a STRONG competitor to feed them their lunch. ... View more

The former iView Media Pro was a very good software set for doing catalog management.  It got eaten by Microsoft and became Expressions Media if I recall correctly.  I believe they've come out with a new version, but I don't think it has any massively delicious new capabilities.  It doesn't integrate as closely with Bridge and Photoshop as Lightroom, but it was fsat and had some very useful capabilities LR doesn't. ... View more

>A lot of my positive experiences with LR3 could well be down to 'good  practice' in my workflow, wide awareness of how to optimise performance,  etc. >Without that, I can see how easy it would be to become one of the  30%. Sounds like we've got some things to learn from you.  Can you specifically detail your "good practice" and "awareness of how to optimise performance" so that some of the 30% can take advantage of your knowledge and skills to improve their experience? I agree that forums attract the people that are having problems, but I suspect there may be a higher percentage of people reqally USING the product in the forum, which is why they're having problems.  I also figure EVERY entry in a forum is at least 1000 people with the problem that didn't make an entry, or stopped using the product, or are just badmouthing it elsewhere.  In the case of Adobe, probably more like 10,000 people so that 30% starts looking like a WHOLE LOT of angry, frustrated users. ... View more

Hi Melissa. I know the response was sort of tongue-in-cheek.  What you're seeing in here (and in pretty much every other forum) is the subset of people that are frustrated, angry, and massively out-of-pocket because they bought a product to improve their productivity, and often bought OR BUILT a special-purpose system at massive expense to optimally use that product.  The other thousands of customers are out there happily doing whatever they do.......  I think there are a couple reasons: 1.  The software should have been tested using "real world" systems and the problems found.  This SOUNDS good but in reality there is so much variability in configurations you can't test every one.  A am puzzled by the Macs having problems though - with a single manufacturer, and very restrictive configurations, I would think there'd be maybe a half dozen different systems in wide use.  Those, it seems like, could have been tested and pummeled so it would be rare for a significant bug to show up there. 2.  Adobe could be up-front and make periodic statements somewhere - perhaps in HERE would be good since this is their forum - that SAYS "We are aware of problem X.  We have assigned resources to find it, reproduce it, and come up with an update that will FIX IT by <pick a reasonable date>.  That would go a long way toward quieting the frustration.  Most folks are aware software has bugs.  And that it can take time to reproduce and fix those bugs.  So if they/we are aware someone gives a damn about fixing the problems, not just extracting the periodic payments to the Adobe annuity, there'd be less frustration... 3.  Publish REAL-WORLD specifications for systems. If you want to keep putting out the "here's the absolute bare-bones it'll run on.  you won't be happy but it'll mostly run most of the time", fine, but give us specifications on the systems it's going to run OPTIMALLY on.  What are the developers and testers actually USING.  If it NEEDS an i7-920, 9GB of memory, 7200 rpm drives on at LEAST three spindles, and an nVidia <whatever the flavor of the week is> with at least 1GB of video memeory, and W7-64bit, TELL US. So far, I've been pretty lucky with V3.  Other than the intermittent popup that "Lightroom has stopped working" at which point you have kill it and restart, and the total hang when importing an image that's already in the catalog (which the catalog appears to have lost track of and wants to import again) which requires killing LR, going to every directory where such an image exists and removing it from the catalog before importing again, I'm not finding performance too wretched.  Yes, develop operations can lag perceptibly and so on, but it's not as bad as some in here are experiencing.  And, boy, does it like memory!  LR on my system always uses at least 3GB of memory, and since I run CS5 with it, my usage rarely drops below 5.5-6GB for these two products.  It'll go up a lot more depending on what I'm doing... ... View more

Nah, you're not looking silly, I am!  I was already IN Develop when I was trying to find the "Render" command, and about 10 seconds after I hit post I realized to get a Library menu I have to be IN the Library.  So, I jumped back in and fixed it.......  You just happened to hit it while I was still asking where the Render had gone! My bad! ... View more

Remember that if you're going to "Render standard-sized previews" you have to be in the Library... Otherwise, you'll have no Library menu.... It works pretty well if you're not doing a lot of images - typically I'll re-render for 1 - 200 and it only takes a minute or so. ... View more

Hi Mellissa....... I can fault Adobe for not having someone detailed to participate in discussions in various forums, but they're CERTAINLY not unique. IMO, the world has changed drastically in the last few years.  MANY of us now rely on forums and other Internet-based support sources FAR MORE than the traditional "manufacturer tech support".  It may be because so many manufacturers have outsourced their support, which can lead to immense frustration when trying to get a solution from someone not directly connected to the development process, often with limited knowledge and resources, and frequently unable to do much more than quote the manual or fall back on rote diagnostic processes that have already been performed.  It's also because there is SOMETIMES a huge group of knowledgeable users that can offer advice, recommendations, and solutions - YES, you may have to wade through some foolishness, repetitive noise, and get past the folks that are apparently poor at reading comprehension, but I've had FAR BETTER success getting solutions in various forums than I EVER get from manufacturer technical support. It takes VERY few experiences like this one to ensure you don't bother with Adobe support again: My laptop went up in flames - LITERALLY, smoke and flames.  Dead.  Clearly, I WAS NOT going to be able to "deactivate Photoshop." Replaced the laptop in 24 hours.  Installed CS4, and of course, was told that "you can't activate because you've already got two licenses." Called "support".  EXPLAINED CLEARLY THAT THE LAPTOP BURNED UP AND I COULDN'T DEACTIVATE.  And needed him to deactivate the software so I could reactivate.......  And was told (I'm not kidding) "Well, you should have deactivated Photoshop before installing it on the new computer." Oh........ Unfortunately, at this point I'm homicidally frustrated, convinced I'm dealing with a complete idiot, and resort to speaking very slowly and clearly, requesting that he deactivate the software...  Again.  Eventually, after sufficient hoop jumping, it gets done, but I'm once again left with the feeling that what Adobe needs MOST is a MAJOR COMPETITOR TO FEED THEM THEIR LUNCH. As far as I'm concerned ANY manufacturer that charges for technical support to address problems with their product is making a clear statement that they DO NOT want to hear about the problems the majority of their users are having, and do NOT want to be bothered addressing them.  It may be tolerable for a $20 product, but for a tool that sells thousands of licenses and costs hundreds or thousands of dollars, it's attrocious. ... View more