Computer help for CS3?

[poco]

I upgraded to CS3 from PS6 last summer and it's always had an issue that I'd finally like to straighten out.

The problem is that CS3 is constantly writing to my hard disc during a photo editing session and it's driving me nuts. Every Single mouse click (like clicking the cloning tool while dust busting a scan) is followed by a short burst of write to disc. Even when I open a large scan with CS3 off an external drive (typically 500 megs or more), there's the normal delay as the image loads, but then even after coming up, the internal hard disc continues to whirl away for over 3 minutes ...writing something or other. If I open the same file with my old PS6 the same image will show up and the hard disc stays quiet and will stay that way even through an extensive editing session.

Here's the tech details: I'm running XP on a windows machine with (up until this morning) 2 gigs of ram. CS3 recognizes 1719 mb as available and has 70% allocated. I have my C drive as the scratch disc which has about 70 gig free space. All my files come from an external hard drive.

Thinking a move to 4 gigs of RAM might help, I upgraded this morning. After adding the memory, controlpanel/system/general shows 3.8 gigs of ram, but neither PS6 nor CS3 recognizes the additional ram -- so what's the deal with that? How do I get it to see the new RAM?

So does anyone have any ideas? The constant writing to disc of CS3 drives me friggin' nuts and makes it totally unusable to me.

[RPNugent]

http://www.largeformatphotography.in...ad.php?t=26946

check this thread for ways to get the PC to see 3 MB of ram

[Steven Barall]

You are right in that it is a RAM issue. The problem is that 32 bit operating systems can only see 3 gig of ram. That fourth gig is just sitting there doing nothing but that's life in a 32 bit world. The 64 bit operating systems can see much more ram so if you do want a bunch of ram you have to get a computer running 64 bit Vista or that Mac Pro desktop from Apple.

You have to consider that Photoshop needs at least four times your file size to work correctly. If you are using 500 meg files Photoshop wants 2 gig or memory. On top of that you need ram for the operating system, in your case Windows XP and that needs at least half a gig. On top of that you have other little things running on your computer at the same time like virus protection and ether net and maybe your email program is open etc...

Another big drain is Bridge so if you use Bridge to search for your photos you might want to close it after you open your image.

Pretty much all of HP's desktops these days are available with Vista 64 bit. They will take and actually use 8 gig of ram and you can drive one of those babies home for about a grand depending on the processor speed and warranty. The Mac Pro desktops units can take even much more ram than that but you pay the price.

[m332720]

You can also help things out by adding a second internal drive. Set it as your scratch disk. I have a 80 gig drive in my computer that is used only as a scratch disk. It helps things out a lot.
Your computer is using the C drive as its scratch disk that is why you are seeing so much disk activity.It is running the program off of it as well as writing to it

[poco]

Thanks, guys.

The weird thing is that if I go to Help/system in photoshop, it says:

Built in memory: 3455 mb
Free memory: 2750 mb
Memory available for photoshop: 1719 mb

So why is only 1719 available, if 2750 is free?

[Kuzano]

Thanks, guys.

The weird thing is that if I go to Help/system in photoshop, it says:

Built in memory: 3455 mb
Free memory: 2750 mb
Memory available for photoshop: 1719 mb

So why is only 1719 available, if 2750 is free?

Windows 32 bit only addresses 3 GB of RAM, even with more installed and more reported.

Photoshop may report all physical RAM, but the Windows OS cannot use it.

Constant hard drive write is a function of not enough RAM available to hold all the program files in RAM, so it is swapped back and forth to Virtual RAM Memory assigned on the hard drive, to use space on the hard drive as a substitute for the shortfall on real RAM.

IF YOU ARE MULTI-TASKING, OR HAVE SUBSTANTIAL MEMORY RESIDENT PROGRAMS, LIKE YOUR ANTIVIRUS, ETC... DETACH FROM THE INTERNET AND TURN OFF ALL PROGRAMS RUNNING, EITHER ON THE DESKTOP, OR IN THE BACKGROUND. THIS EFFECTIVELY TURNS YOUR COMPUTER INTO A DEDICATED PHOTOSHOP COMPUTER. THIS MEANS TURN OFF YOUR ANTIVIRUS AND ALL OTHER SCANNERS, BACKGROUND PROGRAMS LIKE DOWNLOADERS FOR PHOTOS THAT LOAD AUTOMATICALLY WHEN YOU HOOK UP A CAMERA OR OTHER USB DEVICE... THE LIST OF STARTUP ITEMS IS FAIRLY LARGE, BUT ALL OF THEM CAN BE TURNED OFF WITH ONE SWITCH IN MSCONFIG FOR A SESSION RUNNING ONLY PHOTOSHOP (REMEMBER TO UNPLUG THE INTERNET) AND THEN TURNED BACK ON AND REBOOT. YOUR RAM, WITH ALL BACKGROUND FUNCTIONS TURNED OFF WILL ONLY RUN THE OPERATING SYSTEM AND PHOTOSHOP IF YOU DON'T OPEN ANY OTHER PROGRAMS.

The only real fix for the RAM limit on a PC using Windows is the 64 bit Vista Edition, which introduces you to all the other shortcomings of going to 64 bit processing.

These are the short answers, and the technicalities are not addressed here. The workarounds are replete with their own issues.

The other real issue is that the vast array of hardware and software configurations for the PC platform make the solutions and workarounds inconsistent. One persons Windows PC may operate somewhat differently on any configuration, given the vast selection of hardware choices on the PC platform.

Don't read this wrong. I am not a strong advocate of Apple/Mac with the exception that until recently, the hardware choices were limited (the platform was never cloned like the PC), hence Software Programmers could more consistently write stable programs for that platform. They had only to provide hardware drivers for a limited table of hardware. Add to that a stronger committment to graphics programs over a longer period of time in the Apple camp.

Perhaps Windows 7, which Microsoft is forging ahead on, will resolve your problem. However, remember that it too will be buggy for the first year, because of the pressure to get it to consumers to replace Windows Vista, the Microsoft remake of Windows Millenia.

One should reflect on the fact that almost every widely used image editing and graphics program first started out on the Apple platform (Mac), and migrated to the PC platform as Software Publishers were finally given a GUI interface to 90% of the marketplace, instead of 8% as in the case of Apple/MAC

[Peter Mounier]

Thanks, guys.

The weird thing is that if I go to Help/system in photoshop, it says:

Built in memory: 3455 mb
Free memory: 2750 mb
Memory available for photoshop: 1719 mb

So why is only 1719 available, if 2750 is free?

Because you allocated only 70% to PS?

Peter

[poco]

Thanks for taking the time to reply in such detail, Kuzano.

But you'd think there must be thousands of people running CS3 on the XP OS without these problems. I just opened a tiny 3 mb file with no other programs open and every mouse click is still followed by a short micro-burst of writing to the hard disk. This can't possibly be right.

But let me ask you this, if speed isn't an issue and one is only concerned about wear and tear on the hard disc, how much abuse can it take? If every editing session results in hundreds of short write to discs, it wouldn't take a whole lot of that abuse to trash the thing, would it?

[poco]

Because you allocated only 70% to PS?

Peter

No, under edit/preference/performance, it says I only have 17195 mb available to allocate from -- be it 70% or whatever. The performance tab isn't even recognizing that I have over 2 gig of free memory.

[RJC]

Are you running with your Photoshop scatch disk as the C drive ?

As m332720 mentioned the best solution for your Windows virtual memory swap disk is to have it on a different physical drive, this not only solves problems relating to channel contention but also of fragmentation. A swap file on the C drive usually suffers from extensive fragmentation (i.e. Windows allocates small non-contiguous elements of the physical drive to hold the swap file as it grows which dramatically degrades performance).

Even if you don't have a separate physical drive, a separate partition for the swap file will address the fragmentation issue. This also applies to the Photoshop scratch disk. I run Photoshop on an XP system with 4Gb RAM with separate partitions for the Windows swap file and Photoshop scratch disk on a separate physical drive from that which holds my programs and also my data (image files) with very acceptable peformance.