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TICKET ARCHIVE -> Ref: Slow Performance
amcliz - Sep 7, 2005 - 8:20 am
Hi there...
I recetly installed CS 2 and ever since my system has experienced a serious slow down in performance. I have a G5 Dual Processor 2.0GHz with 4GB Ram. Before the CS install all was fine... Beachball is back with avengence.... and this is usually influenced when I use the new Photoshop CS2. In CS 1 I had give over 100% memory usage to Photoshop.... I did the same after the install of Photoshop CS2.... but due to my system performance I have dropped back to 75% as I can see that CS2 allows for more memory usage of my installed RAM. But still even after dropping back to 75%... still my whole system seems soo sluggish. I have repaired permissions... used Tiger Cache Cleaner to do many maintenance cleanups... but still teh same old sluggishness...
I checked on Apple forums and did find one thread where a guy threw out all his lib and plist files... created a new "Keychain" and now his system is perfect. I don't know much about all the keychain stuff... all I do know is that years of computer usage and music files, documents and work files are on my computer and I don't want to risk losing any of this information while playing around with Keychain issues.
Is anyone out there having similar slow performance issues. I'm running 10.4.2 and all the latest version of all my software. I run a very tight ship with my system and it's very frustrating feeling it respond to sluggishly to my commands.
Yours help and advice would be much apprecaited.
Yours sincerely,
Anthony (MacAddict from Ireland)
P.S. I was thinking of purchasing more RAM.... would this solve the situation.. I currently have all 8 slots full of 512MB.... can this be traded in anywhere towrards the purchase of new 1GB RAM?
I recetly installed CS 2 and ever since my system has experienced a serious slow down in performance. I have a G5 Dual Processor 2.0GHz with 4GB Ram. Before the CS install all was fine... Beachball is back with avengence.... and this is usually influenced when I use the new Photoshop CS2. In CS 1 I had give over 100% memory usage to Photoshop.... I did the same after the install of Photoshop CS2.... but due to my system performance I have dropped back to 75% as I can see that CS2 allows for more memory usage of my installed RAM. But still even after dropping back to 75%... still my whole system seems soo sluggish. I have repaired permissions... used Tiger Cache Cleaner to do many maintenance cleanups... but still teh same old sluggishness...
I checked on Apple forums and did find one thread where a guy threw out all his lib and plist files... created a new "Keychain" and now his system is perfect. I don't know much about all the keychain stuff... all I do know is that years of computer usage and music files, documents and work files are on my computer and I don't want to risk losing any of this information while playing around with Keychain issues.
Is anyone out there having similar slow performance issues. I'm running 10.4.2 and all the latest version of all my software. I run a very tight ship with my system and it's very frustrating feeling it respond to sluggishly to my commands.
Yours help and advice would be much apprecaited.
Yours sincerely,
Anthony (MacAddict from Ireland)
P.S. I was thinking of purchasing more RAM.... would this solve the situation.. I currently have all 8 slots full of 512MB.... can this be traded in anywhere towrards the purchase of new 1GB RAM?
bobw - Sep 7, 2005 - 12:43 pm
Hi Amcliz
The foloowing is from MacFixIt;
Do you have a Troubleshooting Late-Breaker? Email us.
Updated Wednesday, September 07 2005 @ 10:08 AM PDT
Today's Featured Article
Late-Breakers
Adobe CS2 application performance problems, other issues (#4)
We continue to report on sluggish performance exhibited by virtually all of Adobe's Creative Suite 2 (CS2) applications, including Illustrator, Photoshop, GoLive and InDesign. As previously noted, most affected tool in the bunch appears to be Photoshop 9.0, which exhibits significant slow-down for some users when working with routine (not particularly large or complex) images and when opening or saving documents.
Turning off Spotlight can increase speed A handful of users report that turning off Spotlight -- either via a utility like Spotless or through these instructions -- provides a significant boost in Adobe CS2 application speed.
===================================================
Spotless;
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/26842
===================================================
Instructions;
Spotlight processor usage and performance problems We continue to cover an issue where Mac OS X 10.4's Spotlight function consumes inordinate amounts of processor time, resulting in slower overall system performance or seemingly complete systems stalls.
Note that the issue covered here is separate from performance problems within Spotlight itself, such as the normal function where Spotlight begins a search during the string typing process, resulting in system unresponsiveness for a few seconds.
Solutions
Giving Spotlight processes less priority via "renice" For some users, giving Spotlight processes less system priority via the "renice" command results in better overall system performance, though performance from Spotlight itself may suffer.
The easiest way to perform this process is to enter the following command in the Terminal:
renice -n (new renice setting number) -p (process ID number)
The higher the renice setting number (up to 20), the lower the process priority. The process ID number for various Spotlight operations can be found using Activity Monitor (located in Applications/Utilities). The most implicated process is "mds" -- launch Activity Monitor, and note the process number next to "mds."
renice -n 19 -p NNN
(where NNN is the process number received from Activity Monitor. You can also get the process ID for "mds" with the Terminal command "ps -acx | grep mds")
This can also be accomplished with the freeware utility BeNicer. After downloading an launching this application, enter "root" as the user and select the "mds" process, then change its renice setting to a higher number (18 or 19).
Temporarily disabling Spotlight and re-launching Another workaround that has proved successful for some users is simply turning off the Spotlight indexing process for installed volumes then turning it back on.
MacFixIt reader Jeff Hirsch has instructions for doing so in the Terminal:
1) Using the mdutil command-line utility in Terminal, turn off indexing for each of your drives. Example:
$ sudo mdutil -i off /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_1
$ sudo mdutil -i off /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_2
2) Then use mdutil to remove the indexes from each drive
$ sudo mdutil -E /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_1
$ sudo mdutil -E /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_2
3) Physically remove the .Spotlight directories from the root of each drive.
$ cd /
$ sudo rm -fr .Spotlight-V100
(do the same for your second or third drive)
Make sure to carefully type the "rm" command -- a typo could result in deletion of critical files.
4) Use mdutil again to turn indexing back on for each drive
$ sudo mdutil -i on /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_1
$ sudo mdutil -i on /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_2
5) Spotlight will now re-index all drives and should behave in a normal fashion. (No longer uses 60%-80% of your CPU)
Turning Spotlight off completely Simply killing the mds process or other Spotlight-related processes in Activity Viewer, or using the above disabling process, will not keep Spotlight components from continuing use of excessive system resources for some affected users.
In this case, you can turn Spotlight off completely by editing Mac OS X's hostconfig file, which determines the system components that are loaded at startup.
First, enter the Terminal and use the command:
sudo pico /etc/hostconfig
to open the hostconfig file in the "pico" text editor. (For more information about using pico, type the command "man pico" in the Terminal).
Scroll down the hostconfig file and file the line that says "SPOTLIGHT=-YES-" and change it to: "SPOTLIGHT=-NO-" (without quotes).
Exit pico, saving the file, and restart Mac OS X. Spotlight will no longer launch at startup.
To go one step further and remove Spotlight from the menu bar, remove the file "Search.bundle" from the folder /System/Library/CoreServices (move it to the Desktop or another external location) and again restart.
Disabling indexing for certain folders For some users, simply turning off Spotlight indexing for particular problem folders will resolve performance issues.
For instance, the mailbox folders used by some e-mail applications will be re-indexed every time a small change is made, resulting in spikes in processor usage.
MacFixIt reader Johan Solve writes:
"I'm also experiencing high processor usage and much hard disk grinding in Tiger, and I think it's Spotlight-related. It got a bit better when I excluded my Eudora folder from Spotlight indexing, where large mailbox files would get reindexed every time a mailbox was modified by new messages."
Folders can be excluded in the "Spotlight" pane of System Preferences in the "Privacy" tab. Simply click the "+" button in the lower left corner and select the folder to be excluded, or drag the desired folder to the list.
Possible causes for Spotlight problems Meanwhile, one MacFixIt reader offers some possible explanations for why Spotlight is problematic on some systems and not others:
"My initial indexing process after installing Tiger was interrupted by a couple of reboots I had to do while installing third-party apps. This may have left me with a funky index when Spotlight tried to pick up where it had left off. I suggest letting it fully index your drives before rebooting the machine at all.
"A few users in the Discussions over at Apple noticed that they had files on their hard drive with modification dates after the current date. i.e. days/months/weeks into the future. These files may have been causing Spotlight to choke as it tried to make sense of a date that hadn't happened yet."
===================================================
One MacFixIt reader writes:
"We have discovered that turning off Spotlight has made our CS2 behave more like CS1. We have a variety of workstations, ranging from Dual G5 2.5's to Powerbook G4 500's--14 in all that had varying degrees of slowdowns after installing CS2. We also had a lot of random crashes in the first few days. We did all the normal things--plist deletions, defrags, etc. One of our students noticed that his workstation was really balky, and decided to use Spotlight to search for 'potential problems' (his words...). The workstation immediately froze as soon as he started typing 'P.' Several students had previously noted that CS2 seems to be making more noise--disk access-- than CS1, even though we set the preferences the same. More experimentation on several other workstations led us to disabling Spotlight. Works for us, so far. We did try to turn of Spotlight searches of specific folders of images and other scratch drives, but that didn't help. When the students need Spotlight, they all know how to start it up again. We use mainly InDesign and PShop, and not too much Illustrator and GoLive."
Retrospect a culprit? Meanwhile, MacFixIt reader Scott Rose reports that he experiences CS2 application slow-down after Dantz' Retrospect performs an automatic backup.
Scott writes:
"We have discovered that all of our Adobe applications slowdown after Retrospect runs an automated backup in Tiger. Quitting out of the Adobe applications and relaunching them brings them back to full speed, but we have narrowed down the culprit to Retrospect."
Some users not experiencing slow-down It is important to note that not all users are experiencing the aforementioned slow-down from CS2 applications.
One reader writes:
"Just wanted to weigh in and report I'm not having any significant problems (performance or otherwise) with CS2 (after about 3 weeks of all-day use for complex, mostly print design projects). I kept CS1 on my system in case I ever needed it, but after a couple of days I moved on permanently to the new versions.
"Bridge runs a bit slow at times, but I have a ton of heavy-duty, large, high-res resources to wade through any time I open it, so I was used to that in the old File Browser in Photoshop (although I could do without the added time to open Bridge the first time). It does add another level of functionality I'll have to get used to, and once I do, it won't seem so different or foreign.
"I'm running a Dual 2.5 GHz G5 with 3GB RAM, and OS 10.4.2 (all Apple updates applied). I'm also running Font Agent Pro to auto-activate fonts, and it's working well so far with InDesign, Illustrator, and Photoshop.
MacFixIt reader Luther adds:
"I haven't found any speed issues with the CS2 suite - if anything, they seem to load faster (Photoshop and Acrobat especially). I'm not sure if I've used Photoshop extensively enough yet to see the slowdown experienced by other users.
"I did, however, make a special point of removing Version Cue. It's nothing but trouble."
--------
Bobw - Macosx.com Tech Support
The foloowing is from MacFixIt;
Do you have a Troubleshooting Late-Breaker? Email us.
Updated Wednesday, September 07 2005 @ 10:08 AM PDT
Today's Featured Article
Late-Breakers
Adobe CS2 application performance problems, other issues (#4)
We continue to report on sluggish performance exhibited by virtually all of Adobe's Creative Suite 2 (CS2) applications, including Illustrator, Photoshop, GoLive and InDesign. As previously noted, most affected tool in the bunch appears to be Photoshop 9.0, which exhibits significant slow-down for some users when working with routine (not particularly large or complex) images and when opening or saving documents.
Turning off Spotlight can increase speed A handful of users report that turning off Spotlight -- either via a utility like Spotless or through these instructions -- provides a significant boost in Adobe CS2 application speed.
===================================================
Spotless;
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/26842
===================================================
Instructions;
Spotlight processor usage and performance problems We continue to cover an issue where Mac OS X 10.4's Spotlight function consumes inordinate amounts of processor time, resulting in slower overall system performance or seemingly complete systems stalls.
Note that the issue covered here is separate from performance problems within Spotlight itself, such as the normal function where Spotlight begins a search during the string typing process, resulting in system unresponsiveness for a few seconds.
Solutions
Giving Spotlight processes less priority via "renice" For some users, giving Spotlight processes less system priority via the "renice" command results in better overall system performance, though performance from Spotlight itself may suffer.
The easiest way to perform this process is to enter the following command in the Terminal:
renice -n (new renice setting number) -p (process ID number)
The higher the renice setting number (up to 20), the lower the process priority. The process ID number for various Spotlight operations can be found using Activity Monitor (located in Applications/Utilities). The most implicated process is "mds" -- launch Activity Monitor, and note the process number next to "mds."
renice -n 19 -p NNN
(where NNN is the process number received from Activity Monitor. You can also get the process ID for "mds" with the Terminal command "ps -acx | grep mds")
This can also be accomplished with the freeware utility BeNicer. After downloading an launching this application, enter "root" as the user and select the "mds" process, then change its renice setting to a higher number (18 or 19).
Temporarily disabling Spotlight and re-launching Another workaround that has proved successful for some users is simply turning off the Spotlight indexing process for installed volumes then turning it back on.
MacFixIt reader Jeff Hirsch has instructions for doing so in the Terminal:
1) Using the mdutil command-line utility in Terminal, turn off indexing for each of your drives. Example:
$ sudo mdutil -i off /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_1
$ sudo mdutil -i off /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_2
2) Then use mdutil to remove the indexes from each drive
$ sudo mdutil -E /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_1
$ sudo mdutil -E /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_2
3) Physically remove the .Spotlight directories from the root of each drive.
$ cd /
$ sudo rm -fr .Spotlight-V100
(do the same for your second or third drive)
Make sure to carefully type the "rm" command -- a typo could result in deletion of critical files.
4) Use mdutil again to turn indexing back on for each drive
$ sudo mdutil -i on /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_1
$ sudo mdutil -i on /Volumes/your_hard_drive_name_2
5) Spotlight will now re-index all drives and should behave in a normal fashion. (No longer uses 60%-80% of your CPU)
Turning Spotlight off completely Simply killing the mds process or other Spotlight-related processes in Activity Viewer, or using the above disabling process, will not keep Spotlight components from continuing use of excessive system resources for some affected users.
In this case, you can turn Spotlight off completely by editing Mac OS X's hostconfig file, which determines the system components that are loaded at startup.
First, enter the Terminal and use the command:
sudo pico /etc/hostconfig
to open the hostconfig file in the "pico" text editor. (For more information about using pico, type the command "man pico" in the Terminal).
Scroll down the hostconfig file and file the line that says "SPOTLIGHT=-YES-" and change it to: "SPOTLIGHT=-NO-" (without quotes).
Exit pico, saving the file, and restart Mac OS X. Spotlight will no longer launch at startup.
To go one step further and remove Spotlight from the menu bar, remove the file "Search.bundle" from the folder /System/Library/CoreServices (move it to the Desktop or another external location) and again restart.
Disabling indexing for certain folders For some users, simply turning off Spotlight indexing for particular problem folders will resolve performance issues.
For instance, the mailbox folders used by some e-mail applications will be re-indexed every time a small change is made, resulting in spikes in processor usage.
MacFixIt reader Johan Solve writes:
"I'm also experiencing high processor usage and much hard disk grinding in Tiger, and I think it's Spotlight-related. It got a bit better when I excluded my Eudora folder from Spotlight indexing, where large mailbox files would get reindexed every time a mailbox was modified by new messages."
Folders can be excluded in the "Spotlight" pane of System Preferences in the "Privacy" tab. Simply click the "+" button in the lower left corner and select the folder to be excluded, or drag the desired folder to the list.
Possible causes for Spotlight problems Meanwhile, one MacFixIt reader offers some possible explanations for why Spotlight is problematic on some systems and not others:
"My initial indexing process after installing Tiger was interrupted by a couple of reboots I had to do while installing third-party apps. This may have left me with a funky index when Spotlight tried to pick up where it had left off. I suggest letting it fully index your drives before rebooting the machine at all.
"A few users in the Discussions over at Apple noticed that they had files on their hard drive with modification dates after the current date. i.e. days/months/weeks into the future. These files may have been causing Spotlight to choke as it tried to make sense of a date that hadn't happened yet."
===================================================
One MacFixIt reader writes:
"We have discovered that turning off Spotlight has made our CS2 behave more like CS1. We have a variety of workstations, ranging from Dual G5 2.5's to Powerbook G4 500's--14 in all that had varying degrees of slowdowns after installing CS2. We also had a lot of random crashes in the first few days. We did all the normal things--plist deletions, defrags, etc. One of our students noticed that his workstation was really balky, and decided to use Spotlight to search for 'potential problems' (his words...). The workstation immediately froze as soon as he started typing 'P.' Several students had previously noted that CS2 seems to be making more noise--disk access-- than CS1, even though we set the preferences the same. More experimentation on several other workstations led us to disabling Spotlight. Works for us, so far. We did try to turn of Spotlight searches of specific folders of images and other scratch drives, but that didn't help. When the students need Spotlight, they all know how to start it up again. We use mainly InDesign and PShop, and not too much Illustrator and GoLive."
Retrospect a culprit? Meanwhile, MacFixIt reader Scott Rose reports that he experiences CS2 application slow-down after Dantz' Retrospect performs an automatic backup.
Scott writes:
"We have discovered that all of our Adobe applications slowdown after Retrospect runs an automated backup in Tiger. Quitting out of the Adobe applications and relaunching them brings them back to full speed, but we have narrowed down the culprit to Retrospect."
Some users not experiencing slow-down It is important to note that not all users are experiencing the aforementioned slow-down from CS2 applications.
One reader writes:
"Just wanted to weigh in and report I'm not having any significant problems (performance or otherwise) with CS2 (after about 3 weeks of all-day use for complex, mostly print design projects). I kept CS1 on my system in case I ever needed it, but after a couple of days I moved on permanently to the new versions.
"Bridge runs a bit slow at times, but I have a ton of heavy-duty, large, high-res resources to wade through any time I open it, so I was used to that in the old File Browser in Photoshop (although I could do without the added time to open Bridge the first time). It does add another level of functionality I'll have to get used to, and once I do, it won't seem so different or foreign.
"I'm running a Dual 2.5 GHz G5 with 3GB RAM, and OS 10.4.2 (all Apple updates applied). I'm also running Font Agent Pro to auto-activate fonts, and it's working well so far with InDesign, Illustrator, and Photoshop.
MacFixIt reader Luther adds:
"I haven't found any speed issues with the CS2 suite - if anything, they seem to load faster (Photoshop and Acrobat especially). I'm not sure if I've used Photoshop extensively enough yet to see the slowdown experienced by other users.
"I did, however, make a special point of removing Version Cue. It's nothing but trouble."
--------
Bobw - Macosx.com Tech Support
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