Photoshop running VERY slow

[Glenda]

What used to take seconds now takes ages. If I use a plug in eg Nik it takes a minute or two to make the change after I click Ok and takes forever to save images. VERY frustrating. I have reset preferences as per Scott Kelby's book but this hasn't made any difference. Any suggestions?

[ricktas]

probably a memory or disk issue. How long since you checked your HDD for errors and did a disk deframentation? (do not perform a defrag if using an SSD). Or a memory issue. Do you know how to display memory usage? It can be worthwhile to have that on screen and monitor it when using PS to see if it max's out etc. Basically a process of elimination to determine the cause.

[Glenda]

Did a scan last night but didn't defrag - will do so now. Have no idea how to display memory usage.

[ameerat42]

Did it happen after yo changed the settings? Sounds like a scratch disk (or whatever your version calls it) issue.
Also, what happens with other programs, like do you use Lightroom?
What operating system. With WinXP and up to 7, Ctrl-Alt-Del will get you to the Task Manager for Rick's hint.
Am.

[Glenda]

Defrag seemed to improve it slightly but filters still taking much longer to apply than they used to. The only change I've made recently was adding a new Topaz plugin. Haven't used Lightroom for a while. Okay got to the memory display but not sure how to interpret it.
The CPU usage was fluctuating between 1-2%, the memory underneath said 3.28gb and Physical Memory 4058mb, cached 530, avail 713, free 177 - which I'm afraid is all double dutch to me.

[ricktas]

OK if you have 177mb free memory, that could be the issue. PS uses lots of memory and when you add filters in to the mix, it gets even more memory hungry. Perhaps upgrading to 8gb from your 3.28 could be good move.

[ameerat42]

Agree about those figures of Rick's, Llps, and, AFAIConcerned, that CPU usage is good. I take this is with the filters running? You can keep Task Manager as
a top or fornt window. I'm thinking you could tell Pshop prefs to increase the scratch disk size. Remember to re-start Photoshop after changing prefs. If you've got
a second (internal) drive not doing much, use that as a scratch disk. You can tell that if there's a lot of disk activity during a task then the program is struggling,
EVEN if the CPU is not doing much. After all, it just has to wait for the HDD to write.

About Lightroom, I just mentioned it as a similar sort of program for system requirements to check the performance against.

And finally, can you disable that Topaz filter and try it all again?
Am.

[Duane Pipe]

My desk top is starting to play up too. PS hangs up when playing with the liquify tool but that's not all:( when gaming I have to cool the case with a pedestal fan and If I don't the system go's into power saving mode and I have to re-boot.

That's not all either :eek:

Hopefully more ram dose work for you Lp :th3:

[Glenda]

Thanks for all the help guys - have to go out tonight but will try a couple of different things tomorrow and see if it helps.

[ricktas]

also. download the free version of glary utilities, install it, and run the one click check-up. It will give your computer a good check over and suggest a heap of adjustments, just let it do its job: http://www.glarysoft.com/

[MissionMan]

Could be a couple of things. If you start running low on disk space your machine slows down.

As someone else mentioned, it could also be the hard drive at the early points of failure. It's fairly common for machines to run slow when drives are about to fail.

Either way, I'd make sure you have an up to date back up to be safe.


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[Dazz1]

As someone else mentioned, it could also be the hard drive at the early points of failure. It's fairly common for machines to run slow when drives are about to fail.

Either way, I'd make sure you have an up to date back up to be safe.


This would be my bet. Continual retries on a failing hard drive will cause the system to slow down drastically at times. Most modern hard drives implement SMART. Either your BIOS may be able to read the status, and see if errors have been occurring, for you before you boot up, or grab a utility that can interrogate it.

[ameerat42]

Also, check for malware... (Just got rid of a pernicious home-page-wanting-to-change piece. Happliy, the SS wouldn't let it, and today
finally got rid of it.)

Its name was brwmngr.exe - obviously a cut-down of "browser manager".

Am.

[Lance B]

Has this happened since you started using Nik software, or have you been using Nik software previously and it has run ok? I know that Nik software does take a while to do it's actual adjustments but if you aren't actually using the Nik plug-in, then all other operations run normally. I think it is just a Nik thing. I am using a fast computer and Nik does take up to a minute to run through it's adjustment and once done all runs fine.

[Glenda]

Thanks for all the advice. Wish I was more tech savvy. Lucky for me the mother of one of my music students is a computer tech and has offered to check it all out and put more RAM in for me. Must be something there as everything was working fine up until Monday then it went into slow mo.

[Tommo1965]

Id say its the flux capacitor....nearly always the problem :)

[ameerat42]

Id say its the flux capacitor....nearly always the problem :)

Tommo, you'll have to destroy it when you get back to the [reserved for future use].

Alternatively, leave it intentionally blank. (http://www.this-page-intentionally-left-blank.org/)
:Dm.

[MissionMan]

Id say its the flux capacitor....nearly always the problem :)

@*%&# idiot! You know full well that Windows machines don't have a flux capacitor. Only Mac's have them, it's the magic that makes them more stable and immune to viruses. People need to refrain from commenting about technology they know nothing about.