Should I give up?

[Katherine Mann]

Today I decided to work on my Lightroom skills, particularly with regard to the Adjustment Brush and the other terrific tools in the Develop module of 2.1.

I guess I should have known that it would be incredibly annoying. I was resolved to take my time and wait for screen updates - my purpose wasn't so much to actually do any useful work - I save that for Photoshop, which works beautifully, but to explore the possibilities.

So, I give up. Again.

My computer is well within the specs, despite not being so new. My drivers are up to date, and my hard drive isn't jammed to the gills. This should work. I bought software that doesn't work and have been patient for months waiting for the fix.

Does anyone know if Adobe is planning on releasing anything new on the Adjustment Brush? Or are those of us who have crippled software simply going to have to wait until version 3 or until we buy whatever computers the designers were using?

 

[DonRicklin]

Have heart, Katherine. Hang in there and there will be salvation (someday). Hopefully, soon.....

Don

 

[Victoria Bampton]

Aaaaw, Katherine! I'd expect that to continue to be improved over time, but realistically, the local adjustments are hugely processor intensive, so I don't think we can ever expect miracles. That said, I'd expect improvements, so just give up temporarily.... (this is where I admit I usually skip to PS for this kind of thing too, just because it feels 'right')

 

[Katherine Mann]

heh, you guys have your ears much closer to the ground than I have, obviously. I guess I should just let it be until whatever Adobe decides to do happens.

In the meantime, thank heavens for Ps.

I try to remind myself that at least I'm not in a darkroom.

 

[BanjoZeek]

Must be some reason why it runs on your system so slowly. I have nearly exactly same computer specs as yours... Dell P4 with 2Gb, SATA drives, Vista... and all the local adjustments operate in complete real time. No lags, no waiting. I just spent the entire afternoon in fact in the develop module and had no trouble at all. I'm sure you've been the road many times... but have you tried disabling your antivirus or other programs that might be running that could be slowing it down? If it were a design flaw in LR itself then most users would be having the same problem... and i don't think that's the case.

 

[Brad Snyder]

Zeek, welcome, and thanks for the input. Yeah, we've been trying to get to the bottom of Katherine's speed issues for a while. My machine has very similar specs, to both you guys, maybe 1 generation newer cpu, and I'm quite happy. I traced my problems to the nVidia setup.

I think that's what frustrates many folks, the completely (seemingly) random nature of the performance they experience in relation to the power of their hardware.

 

[Mark Sirota]

Anyone who knows Adobe's plans isn't at liberty to reveal those plans.

I can't comment on your computer, not being a Windows guy, but there are a lot of people who complain about Lightroom performance -- and a lot more who think it's perfectly fine. How much of that is a difference in computers and how much is a difference of expectations is hard to know.

 

[BanjoZeek]

Thanks, Brad... Those kind of issues can be difficult to track down especially when you can't have the machine sitting in front of you. I work on computers for a living and when things like that crop up i have the customer bring it in. I'm betting tho that in this case something else running on her computer is eating up memory and/or processor both of which LR needs bunches of. Wouldn't hurt to start with a memory upgrade... maybe even to 4Gb. It's cheap and might make a heck of a diff.

 

[Katherine Mann]

well anyway

Banjo, I don't have a problem with my computer. I have a problem with Lightroom. Photoshop runs great. So does every other application. Many people are having serious problems with Lr.

When you purchase software and your computer exceeds the specs required to run the thing you shouldn't have to reconfigure your hardware and disable your virus program. I use AVG. It is set to scan when I tell it to scan. It isn't some Norton monster set to scan every file you use.

I have an nVidia card with 256M. I expect that the problem lies therein - and I have tweaked, with some result, the driver. I'm not a software designer nor an expert on graphic card configuration, and there are limits to which I wish to go. My knowledge of my computer and how it works is probably very much above average ... but I don't think it should have to be a matter of totally designing your OS to suit one program. I bought Lr to work on my photographs, not my operating system.

You will see from my profile that my computer is absolutely mainstream. I don't have very many programs installed - just photoshop and firefox and WSFtp ... Ms Office .. nothing strange. I don't have 25 shareware gadgets running at startup ... I know better than to use up my memory with resident programs that I don't need. My drives are spacious and well organized, plenty of contiguous room on the root to use for a swap file.

This version of Lr was released on the 29th of July! It looks like Adobe has pulled together version 2.1, which offered no help for the development brush problem, and doesn't seem obliged to deal with the fact that they have released a crippled program for a large section of their user base. It's been four months! I purchased software that doesn't work!

So thanks for your suggestions Banjo. It is just possible that you and I have different expectations of Lr. My use of the development tools may be much more intensive than yours. I find that the rest of the program is sluggish but adequate.

Okay, rant mode off. Thanks for listening.

 

[BanjoZeek]

Hi Katherine... I understand how frustrating it is to have a new version of software that doesn't work correctly on a newer, well maintained computer. I would say that our expectations of Lightroom specifically, and our computers in general, are very much the same. Since i work with and on computers for a living i tend to be very demanding and expect peak performance from my own computers. I have to endure working with customer's old, slow or junked up systems every day and absolutely will not tolerate that on my own systems! I can see by your savvy comments that you do not either.

Besides photography my other passion is music. One of my computers is devoted soley to music recording, editing and production. The software i use to do this is, like LR, very large and complex and very demanding on computer resources. People buy this (very expensive) software, put it on their brand new, souped up, screaming fast computer, and expect it to work as advertised. Unfortunately, a certain percentage of these installations have problems. Then the cycle starts of software blaming hardware and hardware blaming software and this company blaming that one and on and on. I've seen it over and over again, year after year. Ugly part is that the poor end-user gets stuck right in the middle of all this.

So in the end whose burden is it to fix the problems? Given the complexity and nearly infinite number of variables involved within hardware and software configurations, it's very easy for either side to proclaim that their product (hardware or software) works perfectly on 9'% of all installations, the problem must be yours, and walk away from it. I see this all the time. If we're lucky, in this case with our software vendor, they will take it upon themselves to pinpoint the problem and fix it, even though many times the actual problem they find is not with their own software per se, but with a weakness or issue with (usually) a hardware driver that is pushed into failure by the demanding software.

So anyway... i've said all of that just to say that it is a very complex issue, which we already knew, and that i would hope that Adobe commits to nailing down the problem many LR users are having, regardless of who might be ultimately responsible in the end. It's important for those having problems to continue to be loud "squeaky wheels", as they say, and not let it get pushed under a rug.

Zeek

 

[MMarz]

Zeek, welcome, and thanks for the input. Yeah, we've been trying to get to the bottom of Katherine's speed issues for a while. My machine has very similar specs, to both you guys, maybe 1 generation newer cpu, and I'm quite happy. I traced my problems to the nVidia setup.

I think that's what frustrates many folks, the completely (seemingly) random nature of the performance they experience in relation to the power of their hardware.

Brad, I stumbled across a post a few days ago, detailing the setting changes for the nVidia graphics card, which resulted in the dramatic improvement in the Adjustment Brush and it's sliders (or all sliders..not sure).

I have the same kinds of problems with the Adjustment Brush as other describe, but don't have the same card. Are there similar settings for other cards that would result in the same improvement as those for the nVidia card????

 

[OldMan]

Brad, I stumbled across a post a few days ago, detailing the setting changes for the nVidia graphics card...

Could you please advice where to find that post. I have exactly the same problem with the brush as are described in this thread and have an nVidia Quadro NVS 11'm with a GeForce Go 73'' processor.

That card has caused me problem by hanging the machine and first when I disabled most of the magic stuff my machine was rock solid. Except fur the brush of course.

I have a strong feeling that the brush problem is related to nVidia.

Thanks.

/Bjorn

 

[MMarz]

Could you please advice where to find that post.

Check here...

 

[OldMan]

Check here...

Thanks. I also found this link on the same subject. I can't find the exact same settings on my card but I tried some similar settings and it is definitely improving performance. No doubt that the graphic card is the key to many of the problems discussed here if you ask me.

Thanks for your help.

 

[Brad Snyder]

Michael, all of the problems I've seen reported seem to be confined to older nVidia adapters. Are you saying you have a different model nVidia, or a different brand altogether?

 

[MMarz]

Michael, all of the problems I've seen reported seem to be confined to older nVidia adapters. Are you saying you have a different model nVidia, or a different brand altogether?

First let me say, I am quite weak when it comes to tweaking computers.. In the Device Manager, under Display Adapter, I see Intel (R) Q35 Express Chipset Family. When I was ordering this PC, I referred to folks here as to which video card I should get... My posts were along the lines of Weak Link in Performance...what are the key components. The feedback I got here was that the video card wasn't a key component, so I didn't order anything special.

I see the same kinds of slow performance with the brush tools as others. It is primarily when using Auto Mask or Erase.

 

[Brad Snyder]

Michael, that Intel part implies that you're using 'on-board' graphics. While not noted for barn-burning, high-frame rate video performance, it's likely perfectly acceptable for still images. The one down-side to this arrangement is that a portion of your main memory will be shared by the on-board video. With 4GB installed, I don't think this will present a problem either.

 

[Katherine Mann]

Wow, I sure was in a whiney mood yesterday! No? LOL!

I have one of those old nVidia cards. You would think that they were objects from Mars the way that they have become artifacts of a different age in four short years. Hey, it's a terrific graphics card and drives these two large monitors very well indeed. The various tweaks to the 3D settings have been applied, although the driver is not identical to any of the ones that have been successfully tweaked by others. Same idea though - disabled, they work better with Lr. Like that should happen? NO. *pout*

Swinneyway, there are many people in my position - the card was very popular - what is the percentage of graphics adapters out there that come from nVidia? Pretty high, eh? Too high to ignore by the largest and most important graphics software developer on the planet.

I hope.

In the meantime, I clasp Ps to my bosom and persevere with more or less patience.

Today:

 

[Mark Sirota]

Ever since the nvidia thing was discovered on September 2 by Flickr user MarkW and then passed to Adobe, Adobe has been trying to work with nvidia on understanding the problem. However, it's not exactly a high priority for nvidia, and as far as I know the problem is still not well understood.

 

[Katherine Mann]

Mark, that is interesting. Thanks for that bit of information.

 

[tgutgu]

Local Adjustments - is LR on the right path ?

Hi,

All these complaints about the performance of the new adjustment brushes ...
Answers that say, well, it is processor intensive, and probably will stay so, maybe with some improvements sometimes in the future?

Nobody questions, if Adobe is on the right paths here, perhaps has chosen the wrong way to implement the feature.

There is software out since a couple of years, which can do local adjustments on raw images non-descructively without the performance glitches Lightroom has from the beginning: LightZone. Instead of chosing a solution where the user needs to brush a kind of mask onto the screen with varying densities, they had chosen that local areas are definded by vector paths (curves, polygones) with a variable feathering area and other adjustment parameters similar to Photoshop layers. I found this concept better to use and more comprensible as Lightroom's approach, it is more flexible (you can copy the same adjustment area from one layer to another and thus using different effects with different intensities on the same object), and, yes, much more performant.

I do not want to advertise another product here, but it is not really acceptable that for so called "breakthrough" new features we all need to buy new hardware (my pc has better specs than Katherine's, but still the adjustment brush just works barely, not really fun to use, I try to avoid it as much as I can (which is a killer for a new "breakthrough" feature). LightZone shows that local, non-destructive adjustments are possible to implement without unacceptable performance penalties since years. I think Adobe is on the wrong path, unless they can prove the opposite with the next bugfix release, which should come out rather sooner than later.

Interestingly, the upcoming Bibble 5 uses the same vector approach to local adjustments as LightZone did.

Kind regards

Thomas

 

[petertang]

I had a similar issue with that too since upgrading to LR2.1. I read somewhere in this forum about the nVidia setting (dual display) could cause this issue. Changed the settings and it's normal since then.

 

[samdring]

but it is not really acceptable that for so called "breakthrough" new features we all need to buy new hardware (my pc has better specs than Katherine's, but still the adjustment brush just works barely, not really fun to use

Thomas

That's really interesting as I have exactly the same processor as yourself and the same amount of ram but my adjustment brush works, to all intents and purposes, instantly - have never seen it as an issue at all.

I have a Radeon x6'' graphics card and system and applications are on a RAID' with a separate RAID' for data but I would not have thought the hard drives would have had much impact on the distinct differences we are seeing.

 

[Katherine Mann]

I guess I'm the last person on the planet to hear that Lr will be updated to version 2.2 in December ...

Maybe, just perhaps, possibly, nVidia and Adobe have been talking.

I could be missing something, but it seems to me that most of the performance issues with the DB are related to the nVidia drivers for their various cards.

 

[BanjoZeek]

Instead of chosing a solution where the user needs to brush a kind of mask onto the screen with varying densities, they had chosen that local areas are definded by vector paths (curves, polygones) with a variable feathering area and other adjustment parameters

With all due respect to Lightzone... ugh! Mucking about with multi-segment vectors to mark off an editable area seems horridly more cumbersome to me personally than the ease of the brush.

I do not want to advertise another product here, but it is not really acceptable that for so called "breakthrough" new features we all need to buy new hardware

That's simply not the case. Folks with far less horsepower than Katherine are running the brush in real time with no glitches. It's not a hardware requirement issue, it's a video driver issue.

Interestingly, the upcoming Bibble 5 uses the same vector approach to local adjustments as LightZone did.

That's too bad!