CS3 and Intel Macs?

On 8/3/07 6:53 AM, "Marilyn Matty" <mmattynyc.rr.com> wrote:

> We're considering upgrading the Adobe Suite from CS to CS3, but I'm
> hesitating because on a designer's list I belong to I've heard a few
> (but not many) complaints about CS3 apps crashing and slowing down on
> Intel Macs. Someone recommended not installing Version Cue, which I
> think would be a very handy feature to use.

Zero problems here. Not one crash in 3 months. It does seem a little slower
on PPC macs, but has definitely increased speed on Intel macs (I have it on
multiple machines). Sounds to me like the complaints may arise from poor
machine maintenance and not the software. I am a little surprised you are
still at CS1!

Cheers

D A V I D E M E R I C K

> We're considering upgrading the Adobe Suite from CS to CS3...
>
> It's a mighty pricey upgrade, so any advice or insights would be
> appreciated.

We also skipped CS2, and our whole studio went from CS to CS3 in May.

Generally, there have been very few problems. We have a single Intel
machine so far, on which it works fine, but one of our G5 (dual 1.8)
towers was very slow. This machine has been in use with the same
system for about 3 years, so I did a complete reinstall of the OS,
going as far as moving all data off and actually creating a new user,
rather than migrating the previous user.

The new install seemed to remove whatever was slowing CS3 down.
Interesting thing is that the machine was running fine before, so it
wasn't necessarily a matter that 'too many old installs' were slowing
it down, it seemed to be something specific to CS3 that I wasn't able
to locate.

In any case, the transition has been good - we publish magazines, as
well as all general design house jobs, and use ID, PS, AI and Acrobat
heavily.

I've not bothered with Version Cue, as it doesn't apply to our
workflow. I did notice Bridge to be _very_ flaky on the PPC machines.

>From: Darren Woolley
>I've not bothered with Version Cue, as it doesn't apply to our
>workflow. I did notice Bridge to be _very_ flaky on the PPC machines.

I have just installed CS3 Design Standard on my 2Ghz dual G5 and have been
playing with it today. Is there some way to bring back the old Browser
system (circa CS)? I don't think the Bridge system is all that wonderful.

Any advice gratefully received!

Paul

I've also upgraded to CS3 on my Intel (2.16 Core 2 Duo imac 20", 1 Gig ram) and have been very happy with the speed increase over CS2 and many of the new features. There is the occasional crash and also slows down once I have PS, Acrobat, Mail, Skyp open all at the same time, but I should really get more ram. Never lost or had a corrupted document from a crash. I have heard of slow downs, but one college reinstalled his fonts and life was back to normal.

Version cue and Bridge don't really fit into my workflow (book and magazine design and typesetting). I find that the finder icons are big enough and using spotlight to find errant files is more than adequate. Now, if bridge could tell me to what document an image is used in, that would really help!

For me the upgrade has been a huge step in productivity and enjoyment, viz speed and functionality

Cheers Damian - Orchard Publishing Cape Town, South Africa www.op.co.za

On 8/3/07, Marilyn Matty <mmattynyc.rr.com> wrote:
> We're considering upgrading the Adobe Suite from CS to CS3, but I'm
> hesitating because on a designer's list I belong to I've heard a few
> (but not many) complaints about CS3 apps crashing and slowing down on
> Intel Macs. Someone recommended not installing Version Cue, which I
> think would be a very handy feature to use.
>
> We've got Core 2 Duo as well as a dual processor G5 (and yes, it does
> sound like a jet engine quite often, usually when using Photoshop,
> Dreamweaver, InDesign, etc.
>
> It's a mighty pricey upgrade, so any advice or insights would be
> appreciated.

I upgraded to CS3 a while back and have had no complaints, until
today. Today, I got out the trusty Canoscan N1240U and went to scan a
document. Realized I had not re-installed the driver for the scanner
since migrating to CS3. Thought I should probably get the most recent
from the web anyway, download, install, no joy. None.

I am now relegated to scanning in the Canon utliity and then
(re)opening the files in PS for retouching. Ugh. If I had to do more
scans I suppose I'd seriously consider buying a new scanner that was
supported by CS3...

Anyone else having these problems ?

Cordially,

Christopher Appell

One problem that Adobe supplied a workaround for was Photoshop Extended locking up my G5  and the only recourse was
turning of the power and restarting. This happened when using the eraser tool. The fix was to turn on the Caps Lock. I was
told that if I had a problem with any of the tools that this was a likely cure...it works.

Regards
Robert Hudnall

On 08.08.2007, at 11:20, Christophe Appell wrote:
> I upgraded to CS3 a while back and have had no complaints, until
> today. Today, I got out the trusty Canoscan N1240U and went to scan a
> document. Realized I had not re-installed the driver for the scanner
> since migrating to CS3. Thought I should probably get the most recent
> from the web anyway, download, install, no joy. None.
>
> I am now relegated to scanning in the Canon utliity and then
> (re)opening the files in PS for retouching. Ugh. If I had to do more
> scans I suppose I'd seriously consider buying a new scanner that was
> supported by CS3...
>
> Anyone else having these problems ?

Since no one has answered so far, I give it a shot... :-)

Could it be that you have an Intel Mac (don't use CS3 which might be
Intel only...)?

If yes, then the problem could be that the driver is for the PowerPC,
which does not work with Intel application.

I have checked the latest scanner driver on the Canon web site
("N1240U Scanner Driver Ver. 7.0.1.1X (Mac OS X)"), and though it
says "This software can be used with Macintosh with Intel CPU and
Macintosh with Power PC", the driver itself is PowerPC only,
which means you cannot use it directly with an Universal application.

So your choices are:
- Use the Canon utility
- Use an PowerPC application (I use the PPC version of GraphicConverter
   to scan with my Epson scanner (same problem: Driver is PPC only)

- By a new scanner, BUT check in advance that it has and an Universal
   driver (which does NOT equal to "can be used with Intel Macs"!!)

Cheers, Kei.

On 10/08/2007, at 10:39, Kei Ishii wrote:

> [...cut...]

> So your choices are:
> - Use the Canon utility
> - Use an PowerPC application (I use the PPC version of
> GraphicConverter
> to scan with my Epson scanner (same problem: Driver is PPC only)
>
> - By a new scanner, BUT check in advance that it has and an Universal
> driver (which does NOT equal to "can be used with Intel Macs"!!)
>
You can also install SANE with the TWAIN-SANE bridge (http://
www.ellert.se/twain-sane/).

> Could it be that you have an Intel Mac (don't use CS3 which might be
> Intel only...)?
>
> If yes, then the problem could be that the driver is for the PowerPC,
> which does not work with Intel application.

Ah ha ! I didn't even think of that. Since it had worked on this Mac
(bought the Intel iMac before upgrading to CS3) with an older version
of Photoshop, I didn't put two and two together... Now it makes sense,
thanks for that.

Cordially,

Christopher Appell

On Aug 10, 2007, at 11:39 AM, Kei Ishii wrote:

> Could it be that you have an Intel Mac (don't use CS3 which might be
> Intel only...)?

Adobe's CS3 apps are not Intel only, they're Universal binaries . The
Creative Suite Design editions require "PowerPC G4 or G5 or multicore
Intel processor" and Mac OS X 10.4.8.

> If yes, then the problem could be that the driver is for the PowerPC,
> which does not work with Intel application.
>
> I have checked the latest scanner driver on the Canon web site
> ("N1240U Scanner Driver Ver. 7.0.1.1X (Mac OS X)"), and though it
> says "This software can be used with Macintosh with Intel CPU and
> Macintosh with Power PC", the driver itself is PowerPC only,
> which means you cannot use it directly with an Universal application.

Wait, *why* would a driver being written for PPC mean you cannot use
it with a Universal application? Why should an Intel coded app care
which chip a driver is written for?

And if there really is some problem with using an Intel coded app
with a PPC only driver, shouldn't you be able to work around it by
forcing a Universal app to run its PPC code with Rosetta rather than
its "native" Intel code?

On 11.08.2007, at 10:47, Curtis Wilcox wrote:

> On Aug 10, 2007, at 11:39 AM, Kei Ishii wrote:
>
>> Could it be that you have an Intel Mac (don't use CS3 which might be
>> Intel only...)?
>
> Adobe's CS3 apps are not Intel only, they're Universal binaries . The
> Creative Suite Design editions require "PowerPC G4 or G5 or multicore
> Intel processor" and Mac OS X 10.4.8.

Sorry, that was what I meant (Universal, not "intel only"), so you're
entirely right of course...

>> If yes, then the problem could be that the driver is for the PowerPC,
>> which does not work with Intel application.
>
> Wait, *why* would a driver being written for PPC mean you cannot use
> it with a Universal application? Why should an Intel coded app care
> which chip a driver is written for?

Wish I knew, and I would be a happy camper if you'd prove me right.

The problem appears to be with the TWAIN driver: In applications
running natively on my MBP, the Epson scanner does not show up.
Activity Monitor also shows the TWAIN driver as "PPC".

This is also confirmed in the FAQ of GraphicConverter
(<http://www.lemkesoft.com/content/168/faq.html>) which incidently
makes the same suggestion as you do (running unter Rosetta):

> And if there really is some problem with using an Intel coded app
> with a PPC only driver, shouldn't you be able to work around it by
> forcing a Universal app to run its PPC code with Rosetta rather than
> its "native" Intel code?

Unfortunately, and this has been my main problem so far, not all
universal applications have this option available, namely Acrobat
Professional 8 which is an "Application (Universal)", but does not
have the "Open using Rosetta" option.

Also I am not sure if this is very desirable, to run CS3 apps under
Rosetta, or having to switch every time you want to scan something...
But then, I am not an CS3 user here, so no first-hand experience...

As for the other mail which suggested SANE: I have tried it, but
have yet to get it running... The SANE driver is seen, but I cannot
get a connection to the scanner. There must be some voodoo to be done
with the sane daemon preferences file, but no luck (and the
documentation isn't a big help either here...). If someone knows the right magic
words to be written into the setting files, I'd be more than happy
to hear them :-)

Cheers, Kei.

This is the way all my apps that require plugins function. If the app is univseral that just means that there are two code sets in the app and on an intel machine, the intel code is running. Rosetta will not translate a PPC plugin so that it functions with intel code. I have 20-30 plugins for various apps and waited to get my 8 core mac pro until I knew all my plugins would be intel as well.

--On 8/11/07 1:47 AM -0700 Curtis Wilcox wrote:

> Wait, *why* would a driver being written for PPC mean you cannot use
> it with a Universal application? Why should an Intel coded app care
> which chip a driver is written for?

The issue is the plug-in, not the driver.

Rosetta, the PPC "emulation" layer, is implemented on a per-process level. On
an Intel Mac, either an application process runs PPC code (entirely within
Rosetta) or it runs Intel code (and Rosetta is unavailable). An app running
outside Rosetta cannot "turn on" the capability for select blocks of code.
This is a stated primary reason why Office 2008 will not support VBA scripting:
some of the core VBA code is PPC-only and the Intel portion of a Universal
application cannot load and run that code.

If the scanner software were an entirely separate application it would not
matter if it were PPC or Intel/Universal, but because it's implemented as a
plug-in it has to have the same native language as the application that calls
it.

This is a different kind of implementation than the original 68K/PPC
transition; in that case 68K code could be run in emulation at all times, and
applications could (and did) have mixed code bases.

Dave

Curtis Wilcox wrote:
> Wait, *why* would a driver being written for PPC mean you cannot use
> it with a Universal application? Why should an Intel coded app care
> which chip a driver is written for?
>
> And if there really is some problem with using an Intel coded app
> with a PPC only driver, shouldn't you be able to work around it by
> forcing a Universal app to run its PPC code with Rosetta rather than
> its "native" Intel code?

Rosetta works by translating PPC executable code to Intel executable code. The closer to the hardware the less likely it is to work for many many reasons. Possible bugs or design decisions in Rosetta being the two biggest. And many scanner drivers seem to have a long history of design that skips much of the OS to talk as closely as possible to the hardware. I think much of this is left over from the days of SCSI and parallel scanners in the 80s when the OS did very little. And the folks writing the drivers are likely just moving forward with each new version being done as quickly as possible.

I've seen these groups in action many times over the years and this seems to be the way much of this is done.

David Ross