Why Photoshop and Illustrator CS6 are so slow on my MacBook Pro early 2011?

RAM is critical - we all know that. Less obvious is that the amount of contiguous hard drive space is important as well. See the section on scratch disks on this page:

http://help.adobe.com/en_US/photoshop/cs/using/WSfd1234e1c4b69f30ea53e41001031ab 64-748aa.html

(p.s. I personally do not use CS5 or CS6, being more than content with the performance of CS3 in Mountain Lion.)

Running CS6 here on an iMac 2.7 Intel Core i5 with OS X 10.8.2 and 16GB RAM.

Both Photoshop and Illustrator keep showing spinning beachballs around every 30 secs, they last for 10 secs, even when opening or editing a 5 kb JPG file or dragging a window around the screen.

RAM may be critical but I cannot say that Adobe's software is particularly well programmed. (It's mostly Windows / Java applications converted to run on the Mac).

User Sig may have 3 million points but simply blaming anything else but the software is a bit simplistic.

I've no problem running any CS6 applications - often six at one time. I don't know where you get the idea that CS6 applications are Windows/javascript based 'converted' to run on a Mac.

I've had Photoshop files as large as 112GB open with very little to no 'lag'... and never any problems with Illustrator, etc.

So it's not the software...

Clinton

Well at least Illustrator demands that Java (not javascript) is installed on the Mac. And it is a well known fact that all Adobe software has is roots on the Windows platform. Adobe software has many many technical difficulties, just have a look at http://dearadobe.com/top_rated.php

I've also used CS3 to CS6 with huuugee files, all open at the same time no problem, but currently it just stalls in every possible way on a 2012 Mac, which is very strange to say the least.

Illustrator does not use Java. Photoshop was a Mac application, written originally by the Knoll brothers when both were working at ILM and it was a Mac-only application. It has no Windows 'roots'.

I don't know why you're having problems with Photoshop and Illustrator CS6 but they are not software related. You may have little space on your startup disk, not enough RAM on your GPU, a slow startup drive, etc. But I can guarantee you that it is not an issue with the software.

Clinton

Sorry I meant InDesign requires Java.

I have plenty space and RAM, it is a brand new iMac (the thin one), If you can guarantee it is not an issue with the software, then I'd like my money back from you, because Adobe themselves will NEVER guarantee anything like that.

Amount of RAM is critical, but at the same time, speed of your hard drive and how clean it is, is another factor. With 28GB of RAM, you'd think that would be enough to not have any Page Outs on VM swap utilization, but check anyway. If any portion of your drive is being used for VM and swapped out constantly, it's going to slow things down. Your only solution may be to do an SSD to speed things along. What people forget is that SSDs can also fix system speed issues related to low amount of RAM. For some users, upgrading the HD to an SSD and forgoing the RAM upgrade made a bigger differce than just RAM alone. This is because while the VM swap is still being used and constatly paged in/out, the SSD is much faster than a traditional HD and hence, the user has no perception of slowness due to that.

You may be having problems with other software that you have installed. Open Terminal and copy and paste...

kextstat -kl | awk '!/com\.apple/{printf "%s %s\n", $6, $7}'

...and post the output in a reply here.

Clinton

I also disagree with the simplistic answer... It is NOT possible that such huge brand as Apple, known as the bestest option for designers, work soooooo slow with such a good characteristics (ram, etc) because really,,, even zooming is a headache!!! even typing for god sake!... I understand that is not enough, but really, with windows works perfect... this is my first mac and im SOOOO disapointed....

There has to be a 'glich' in your system somewhere - ALL CS6 apps are fast and furious on my late 2011 MacBook Pro, with 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. I also run CS6 apps under Windows 7 and there is aboslutely no difference in the speed on comprable machines.

I would look at possible software conflicts before blaming either you Mac hardware or CS6 software. You may have some third-party extensions, etc., that are causing the slowness.

Clinton

Have you seen this discussion?

http://forums.adobe.com/message/4508577

Oh, yes, I follow the Adobe forums almost as much as I do the Apple forums.

I think that Chris has done a pretty good job of offering solutions to people who are having problems with Photoshop - most of the 'lagging', from what I've seen, can be attributed to third-party software, not-so-hefty video cards, etc. As I've said time and time again, I simply don't have 'slowness' issues with any CS6 app except when I'm working on an unusually large file, containing many layers, and then I expect some 'lag' as my MBP is not the most powerful out there. I'll be taking a serious look at the 2013 Mac Pro (whenever it may come out) because I am working on larger and larger files, using 3D rendering more than in the past, etc.

Nonetheless, I have no 'lagging' or slowness issues. And, from what I've read, few do.

Clinton

Bonfis wrote:

I also disagree with the simplistic answer... It is NOT possible that such huge brand as Apple, known as the bestest option for designers, work soooooo slow with such a good characteristics (ram, etc) because really,,, even zooming is a headache!!! even typing for god sake!... I understand that is not enough, but really, with windows works perfect... this is my first mac and im SOOOO disapointed....

The more you use Mac the more you'll come to the realization that it is not without its own problems. The la la land that you thought you were coming into is way overhyped by the Mac users of the world. Bottom line fact is, if you properly spec your system, it can run whatever OS you want and it'll behave properly. Cheap out on it and just because it comes from a manufacturer that's supposed to be far superior (no, Apple isn't all that superior believe it or not) does not mean it's going to work better purely on that fact alone. The same principals of resources and speed of those resources still govern the Mac world just like they do the PC world.

Since moving to Mac a few months ago, I cannot tell you how many different issues I've stumbled across that are OS or hardware issues that I've had to report to Apple to hopefully one day fix. Trust me when I tell you, Macs are no different than any other PC out there. They're just a different platform... that's all... nothing special. The thing is, "most" novice PC users that have moved from cheap *** PCs riddled with problems to the controlled Mac environment that Apple has set up for them are sometimes fooled into thinking they now have no more issues because they no longer see those issues. However, if you take an experienced PC user and put them in the Mac world, they'll soon realize that the same issues reside here as well. Maybe not all of them, but Mac is not without its own problems. Sure, the platform being closed off resolves some inherent baseline issues that PCs have, but for an advanced user being on a PC or a Mac it should make no difference. I view the platform change as just a difference canvas to do work on. I fully expect the same due diligence to apply to one platform as it does to another. You need to spec your hardware out properly for your workload and you need to make sure your OS is in pristine working condition. It's not going to magically maintain itself and be trouble-free.

What exactly can be the glich??? I have the same spec that u have in your mac, the only difference is that ive bought it on januaryyyy... im so frustrateddd

Let's look at any third-party extensions that you may have first.

Download and run EtreCheck (free and from one of our contributors here) - http://www.etresoft.com/etrecheck - and post the entire text file.

Next, open Terminal (Applications>Utilities folder) and copy and paste the following...

kextstat -kl | awk '!/com\.apple/{printf "%s %s\n", $6, $7}'

...hit Return and copy and paste the output in a reply here.

We're just going to go through a process of elimination to see if your may have some software or hardware issues. This is just the first step so don't worry if we can't solve your problem straight-away.

Clinton