Fastest image viewer!

The operating system is caching files in memory.

So, if you don't start out with a clean boot before you start testing each viewer, you may give one an unfair advantage versus another.

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JimC
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http://www.pbase.com/jcockfield

ACDSee is definitely faster than Irfanview. I have Irfanview installed and the only thing I use it for is to display images from e-mails since it opens quicker than ACDSee. But, once ACDSee is open, going from pic to pic is extremely fast. Irfanview can't keep up.

Member said:

The operating system is caching files in memory.

So, if you don't start out with a clean boot before you start
testing each viewer, you may give one an unfair advantage versus
another.

Click to expand...

ok, good theory, but when I switch back and forth, ACDSee is still fast while others are slow.

and here's why: reading a 2 MB JPEG is not the problem, rendering it on-screen is. each JPEG has to be rendered separately. JPEG is like a packed file, which has to be unpacked for each viewing. the 2 MB file itself may be cached and in memory, but the unpacked final picture is NOT, it has to go through the JPEG rendering engine of each viewer, it has to be "unpacked" and be recreated each time.

and this is where the speeds of various viewers differ. ACDSee seems to have the fastest JPEG unpacking engine and whether the original (packed) JPEG is read from hard drive or system memory matters very little in comparison. all other viewers take a lot more time unpacking the JPEG for on-screen viewing.

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my amateur nightclub photo gallery: http://antonipildid.net

pdefeo said:

ACDSee is definitely faster than Irfanview. I have Irfanview
installed and the only thing I use it for is to display images from
e-mails since it opens quicker than ACDSee. But, once ACDSee is
open, going from pic to pic is extremely fast. Irfanview can't
keep up.

Click to expand...

yes, I think people mistake the "speed" of opening IrfanView for the speed of the viewer itself. these are two very different things.

IrfanView may come up instantly, but takes a longer time to actually render a single JPEG for on-screen viewing. in comparison, ACDSee (and many other viewers I'm sure) may start up slower, but once ACDSee is up and running, it seems to have the fastest JPEG rendering engine and thus moves from one full-screen JPEG to another the fastest I've seen.

for viewing an occiasional JPEG here and there, IrfanView may be better thanks to its faster startup time. but for viewing hundreds of JPEGs, (especially larger ones), ACDSee is the viewer to beat thanks to its lightning fast JPEG rendering engine.

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my amateur nightclub photo gallery: http://antonipildid.net

tonyx said:

what software are you talking about? seems awfully complicated. I
just press right arrow, page down or scroll wheel down to see next
picture, that's it. I think that's how most picture viewers do it,
I'm just talking about which of these is able to display pictures
in full screen and made to "fit to screen" the fastest.

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my amateur nightclub photo gallery: http://antonipildid.net

Click to expand...

SAR Image Processor, free demo available at my website at bottom of this page.

The only complication is changing the the settings from default so that the images display rapidly. The default settings are for higher quality viewing, which is most apparent when fit to screen involves magnification rather than reduction. The settings are saved when SAR closes so they do not have to be made the next time SAR is opened.

Pressing F9 is no more complicated than pressing right arrow, page down or scroll wheel down. Incidentally, Shift+F9 to reverse.
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Author of SAR Image Processor and anomic sociopath
http://www.general-cathexis.com

I don't know about it's other functions, but the fastest program I've ever seen (and I've been through many) for simply viewing many full screen images is Microsoft Office Picture Manager. There is almost no delay between images. I was floored as I really expected nothing from this software - heck, I didn't even know I had it until stumbling across it recently. I haven't used ACDsee in a while but I'd be surprised if it is faster.

Thanks. Can you also try ACDSee Classic and let us know if ACDSee 7 is faster or slower?

I've been trying to find a nice fast new viewer, and I was hoping to find a free one to share with others, but I don't think that will happen. I've tried a few, but all are slow compared to ACDSee Classic.

ACDSee Classic is the fastest photo viewer I've used, and I've been using ACDSee viewers for over 10 years (and haven't yet needed to upgrade from Classic). It's the only one I can manually "animate" sequence shots with by just hitting the left and right arrows, and that even worked on my old Celeron/633.Mhz.

Your mention of DOS viewers brings back memories of all the cool DOS image viewers I used on my 286 way back when.
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• Eric, http://www.InvisibleRobot.com/

ACDSee Classic is very fast to load and display an image. If I double-click on an image in Windows Explorer (not IE) , ACDSee Classic opens instantly, and the image is completely rendered a fraction of a second later. And my computer is an old Celeron 1.3Ghz. Of course, the 7,200 RPM 8.Meg cache 160.Gig hard drive helps the file access speed, compared to slower hard drives.
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• Eric, http://www.InvisibleRobot.com/

Which versions of MS Office include Picture Manager? I only have Office 2000 and I don't see it, but Heidi has Office 2003, so maybe she has it. I'll have to have her try it.
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• Eric, http://www.InvisibleRobot.com/

I'll have to try ACDSee again, I know it is supposed to be very fast. If you do have access to MSPM, please let me know how it compares. Note that I'm not promoting MSPM, only mentioning the fact that it seems to be quite fast from picture to picture at full screen.

ACDSee Classic is faster than IrfanView on initial open and on viewing and switching among images.

Here are the apps I use for preparing web albums:

1. Windows Explorer, in Explore mode, to make a copy of my photo directories to use for the web albums.

2. ACDSee Classic for reviewing, deleting, and lossless rotating the images that will go in my web albums.

3. Paint Shop Pro for tweaking the images (No final sharpening though).

4. IrfanView for simultaneous batch resizing/final sharpening.

5. ImageWalker to build the albums.

6. HomeSite to update the album index page.

7. WinSCP to upload the albums.

FYI: I am also the moderator for the Yahoo IrfanView Users Group.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/irfanviewusers/

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• Eric, http://www.InvisibleRobot.com/

Thanks. I'll have to ask Heidi to give it a try. So far, all the viewers she's tried on her P4/3.Ghz computer have been slower than IrfanView Classic is on my Celeron/1.3Ghz computer. It would be nice to not have to buy another copy of IrfanView Classic considering her computer already has multiple image viewers included, and that there are so many free viewers available.
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• Eric, http://www.InvisibleRobot.com/