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Is it RAM or CPU

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photo_magnet

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Hello everyone

I have been playing with CS2 and in the info panel says I have 538.4 Meg of Ram free for CS2 and working at 100% efficiency and so I opened then closed a few Tiffs and it was opening them just fine in 1.6 seconds + - 0.1 seconds

So tried opening 4 tiffs at once and it took ages over 10 seconds the computer froze and now the CS2 is running so much slowly.

Opening 1 tiff from a blank CS2 is now taking a WHOLE 16 seconds.

CS2 still says it has 538.4 Meg of ram to use and I have got bridge open is the reason for it going slowly now is the CPU not up to it (AMD 1600+ XP) or the RAM too small (3/4 gig Ebuyer Value)?

I would like to find a way to use this computer without it clogging-up and slowing-down.

Thanks
Paul

--
My bits and bobs are in my profile
 
My guess; both RAM & CPU. PS uses a lot of both and now adding large folders like a TIFF. I always suggest at least two gigs of RAM and a CPU 2.8. for any photo processing with the big software packages and PS is the hungriest.
 
Sorry typing (or brain) error it is a 'AMD Athlon 2600+XP'

And yes the files are 50 Meg each so maybe they are no good on this computer.

Paul

--
My bits and bobs are in my profile
 
Its most likely the RAM and the hard drive due to the page file. The fact that it starts out fast and slows down most likley means it the hard drive.

Hard drives are much slower than memory so if you open up those five files and close them, you may be using 700MB on the page file. By the time you open up the new files, the hard drive must delete rewrite all new data.

The Page File is a portion of the hard drive that stores data that otherwise would be loaded on the system memory. The purpose of the page file is to store memory that is not currently in use or to allow more memory to be used if the system memory runs out.
 
I have 768 Meg of RAM (3/4 of a Gig) and Two harddrives

1- 37.2 Gig FAT32 (can't change it to NTFS using the Setup disk) almost half full.

2- a 189 Gig NTFS with my RAW files on and set to be my scratch disk with 117 Gig FREE space

Does having FAT32 on the main disk slow things down as I will be formating it soon?

Thanks
Paul

--
My bits and bobs are in my profile
 
Hi,

Pardon my suggesting common here. There's no need to guess as so many of these posts say. Assuming Windows or a UNIX flavor you have utilities built in to your operating system that will show your bottlenecks.

My own guessing is that you have Windows. All the versions since NT have basic performance counters with task manager, and extensive counters and logging with performance monitor (perfmon.exe). Microsoft also has their resource kit books on line and many KB (Knowledge Base) articles if you don't have or want to buy a book. Your help files also touch on this.

I've been flamed for suggesting using these tools in the past, but they work.

Make sure you look at all processes from all users when you're doing performance analysis too.

With some time and a bit of homework you'll know if it's RAM, CPU, disk or a host of other reasons, and what will help most.

Good luck!
 
I would replace the hard drive. Its sound like an older 40GB drive. The new drives are much faster and will increase performance.

You can pick up a 250GB Seagate w/ 16MB cache for $70 OEM.

After you add that in, then you should upgrade the RAM.
 
I have had a look at Performance and the Page/sec is at the top and the Processor and disk queue runs up at 100% too.

Maybe it's time for a new computer but when one is spneding £124,000 ($235,500) on a first house money is tight, then again another £600 ($1100) is not much in the big picture.

Paul

--
My bits and bobs are in my profile
 
With 768 mb ram, the maximum image file(s) size for editing is 768/6 = 128 mb. With 4 gig of ram you can work on 350 mb files without memory problems.

Opening 4 x 50 mb files kills the machine, you need double amount of RAM for managing that.

If it is processor related, the speed reduction is linear. When it is RAM related, the speed reduction is exponential when you pass the limit.
 
But the strange thing is after I closed the 4 files and went to open another Tiff or do anything on the computer it was just so slow, as if I still have these file open (which were closed) why is that please.

Paul

--
My bits and bobs are in my profile
 
it's the RAM. if you're working normally with several 50MB tif files, you should invest in 2GB RAM.
 
While the Athlon CPU isnt cutting edge anymore...it isnt bad either...I suggest extra RAM as an option...

And it is cheaper than upgrading the whole pc...get one in 2 years when the quad cores are so cheap!

Someone else suggest upgrading the HDD...that would def help a tad too...
--

 
photo_magnet said:
But the strange thing is after I closed the 4 files and went to
open another Tiff or do anything on the computer it was just so
slow, as if I still have these file open (which were closed) why is
that please.
Click to expand...
My First post: (the page file on the hard drive)
turtile1 said:
Hard drives are much slower than memory so if you open up those five files > and close them, you may be using 700MB on the page file. By the time > you open up the new files, the hard drive must delete rewrite all new data.
Click to expand...
 
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