| » Forum Index » Problems and solutions » Topic: scratch disks |
|
Posted on 24/10/05 6:04:22 PM |
|
ollie
* Posts: 12 Reply  |
scratch disks
I'm about to upgrade my PC purely with Photoshop in mind. I'm going to install CS2 (updating from my trusty copy of 7) and I was reading the paragraph on P.30 about "The Perfect Setup" in "How To Cheat..." & am curious, what would be the ideal modifications to make to my home PC? (Given that I want to be able to create & manipulate A4 300dpi images). With my current PC spec while I am manipulating documents this size I can walk off and make a cup of tea and come back and its STILL applying a fill or edit! Or its just frozen or crashed under the weight of information). I'm going to get a 180gb hard drive and make it the primary scratch disk, but... any other suggestions? Will this be sufficent for me to work fast on massive documents as described above? Am loving the book by the way, very rewarding tome! Any suggestions to the above would be wonderful, thankyou! |
Posted on 24/10/05 7:00:15 PM |
|
Lexus
Persistent Pixellator Posts: 623 Reply  |
Re: scratch disks
Get more memory, a better motherboard, and a BIG hard drive! _________________ Quote From Family Guy: Oh I Would Like Some Cake, Oh I Would Like Some Cake, Oh I Would Like Some Cake, Oh I Would Like Some Cake. |
Posted on 24/10/05 7:08:27 PM |
|
rufus
Destructive Demon Posts: 243 Reply  |
Re: scratch disks
You don't say what your PC spec is at the moment but judging by your comment on applying an edit it looks like it's very slow. Upgrading the processor speed is rarely viable due to the cost, it may be preferable to replace the PC. If this is not an option, Steve's advice in the book is spot on. The best upgrade that you can make is in RAM, add as much as your system will support and you will notice the difference. Installing a second hard drive is also worthwhile. If you don't know how much memory your computer has or what type to buy here is a link to a small utility (Everest) that you can download and it will give you the information (PC only). http://www.lavalys.com/products/overview.php?pid=1&lang=en Let us know how you get on. |
Posted on 24/10/05 10:03:36 PM |
|
ollie
* Posts: 12 Reply |
Re: scratch disks
Yeah, sorry, forgot the spec. i have 512mb ram & CPU Type:AMD Athlon XP, 1833 MHz (11 x 167) 2500+ When I open CS2 obviously the lions share of my physical memory gets eaten up, I then went on to open an 800 by 600 300dpi PSD, tempoary file of which used nearly all of it up according to the everest diagnostic. Which probably explains why the whole system crashed when i placed above mentioned PSD into a 3000 by 3000 300dpi PSD and attempted to incorporate it into the larger document! TOO MUCH INFORMATION!! The physical memory usage was already maxed out at 98-99%. Thankyou for your comments, I can see the way forward now, I'm chuffed I found this forum, I look forward to using it. If there are any links anyone feels like posting to some great upgrade items on Ebuyer, etc. then feel free to let me know. I'm off to have a browse there now.. Thanks again! |
Posted on 24/10/05 10:11:00 PM |
|
trinityofone
Guest Reply |
Re: scratch disks
I would certainly upgrade the RAM as much as you can. Scratch disks are a lot slower than physical memory. Try www.crucial.com/uk you can use their configuration program to select exactly the right specification for your PC/Motherboard. They're not the cheapest but you know you will be getting the right memory and it's guaranteed for life. _________________ A happy-go-lucky chap, always dressed in black |
Posted on 24/10/05 10:41:44 PM |
|
rufus
Destructive Demon Posts: 243 Reply |
Re: scratch disks
My PC is very similar, AMD Athlon XP, 1800 MHz. I upgraded my memory to 1 Gig when I got CS2. You can set the memory allocated to Photoshop in Edit/Preferences/Memory & Image Cache, I use 75% and it works fine. |
Posted on 25/10/05 09:04:39 AM |
|
Steve Caplin
Administrator Posts: 7047 Reply  |
Re: scratch disks
More RAM is certainly a good idea. It's always worth buying a second hard disk - they are very cheap these days - and partitioning it so that a portion is available purely as a PS scratch disk. This portion doesn't need to be huge: 5Gb is a reasonable size. But if PS doesn't have to slot its temporary files in amongst all the stuff on your main hard disk, it will go that much faster! |
Posted on 25/10/05 12:33:33 PM |
|
Lexus
Persistent Pixellator Posts: 623 Reply |
Re: scratch disks
Thats Weird, I have 512mb DDR Ram, and an AMD Athlon XP 1800MHz, and when i had CS2 it works fine, I have a 80GB hard drive, and i set a partition on it for just temp and scratch disk use, and my computer flies along!  _________________ Quote From Family Guy: 2 Plus 2 is Foourrr, 2 Plus 2 is Foourrr, 2 Plus 2 is Foourrr. |
Posted on 25/10/05 12:56:11 PM |
|
trinityofone
Guest Reply |
Re: scratch disks
Yes, but do you work on 200mb files? _________________ A happy-go-lucky chap, always dressed in black |
Posted on 25/10/05 1:08:42 PM |
|
Lexus
Persistent Pixellator Posts: 623 Reply |
Re: scratch disks
You can do that? Wow, i will be when i have to start on my magazine for Media Studies _________________ Quote From Family Guy: 2 Plus 2 is Foourrr, 2 Plus 2 is Foourrr, 2 Plus 2 is Foourrr. |
Posted on 25/10/05 1:16:24 PM |
|
ollie
* Posts: 12 Reply |
Re: scratch disks
When you say partition a section of the harddrive do you just mean assigning it to CS2 as the primary scratch disk or are you reffering to a more convoluted process that I need to be made aware of before proceeding? Also, going back to my previous questions, if i were to invest in a 300gb harddrive (as i intend to) and upgrade my memory to the tune of 1gb at least then I'm assuming that I can happily manipulate files such as 3000 by 3000 pixels @ 300dpi? Without my PC groaning under the strain? Sorry for being so disconcertingly vague about my hardware its never been my strongest point, a friend built my PC. p.s. thanx again for comments everyone, I had a brilliantly productive probelm solving session last night due to your collective input and am all set to implement a new PC spec  |
Posted on 25/10/05 1:34:48 PM |
|
Steve Caplin
Administrator Posts: 7047 Reply |
Re: scratch disks
On a Mac, you just reinitialize the hard disk and set how large you want the partition to be. On a PC, I don't know the procedure, but it must be just as straightforward. 3000 by 3000 pixels is not an unreasonable size - you should be able to work well within that. However, there is another issue on PCs, and that's graphics cards. Macs have cards built in that match their monitors, but as I understand it graphics cards are bought separately on a PC. It could be that your computer is fine, but the card simply isn't capable of throwing all the information on the screen fast enough. Anyone else know more about this? |
Posted on 25/10/05 2:24:36 PM |
|
trinityofone
Guest Reply |
Re: scratch disks
You're absolutely right, Steve. Although the speed of cards tends to be a measure of the 3D capability, more than anything else. Cards in the Power Macs are the same as can be bought for the PC. Currently, the are breeds of NVidia and Radeon but are probably at the higher end of the market, quality wise. As for partitioning, if you plan to reinstall from scratch, simply use FDISK and set the partition size. There are also utilities such as PartitionMagic which will resize on the fly - although I've never been brave enough to try it!! _________________ A happy-go-lucky chap, always dressed in black |
Posted on 25/10/05 3:25:11 PM |
|
ollie
* Posts: 12 Reply |
Re: scratch disks
I installed CS2 last night on my current spec (which is lacking!see above). I intend to hand over my machine to a small chap with a head the size of the mekon who builds and upgrades PCs to tight deadlines and to perfection. When i recieve my machine back with new harddrive/memory etc. I was just going to go to: edit>preferences>etc. to assign the massive new drive to CS2. I also intend to allow it 75% of the CPU usage when I'm working in Photoshop. Surely thats ample, it must be... since i have a large budget to upgrade I may as well get new graphics card as well as the rest. Hmm, although having said that... it'd be good to identify what the real factors affecting performance are, i really want to squeeze maximum productivity out of CS2 as I'm going into business for myself and once the rosy tint of anticipation is replaced by the realities of my tight start-up budget I expect I wont be casually throwing money at new graphics cards unless I'm sure its pertinent to what I wish to achieve. Any PC users reading this who feel like posting the optimum spec for a high end powerhouse of a PC solely for the purpose of manipulating and churning out information dense PSD's? (p.s what is FDISK?) |
Posted on 25/10/05 4:14:40 PM |
|
trinityofone
Guest Reply |
Re: scratch disks
FDISK is a DOS program, it basically reinitialises the hard drive or bits of it. If you don't know, it's probably best not to play! It's a weird one -I've read posts on forums from people with dual CPU Alienware PCs with GBs of RAM who still say CS2 runs slow, countered by others running Mini-macs that have no trouble at all! _________________ It must be Thursday, I never could get the hang of Thursdays |
Posted on 25/10/05 6:45:52 PM |
|
rufus
Destructive Demon Posts: 243 Reply |
Re: scratch disks
Here's another two penneth...... The size of the hard disk that you add to your system has no bearing on the performance of Photoshop, a larger drive will just be able to store more data. Steve is right about 3000 X 3000 pixels not being unreasonable, in a recent Friday Challenge I made a single model of Elvis in a box that came to 3775 X 3917 @ 150 P/I, giving a file size of 42.3M. Converting this to 3000 X 3000 @ 300 P/I gives 26.7M. I flattened the images in the composite to make them manageable. Using a second hard drive (usually D: ) as a scratch disk is a good idea, as Photoshop prefers this. The first scratch disk should be set as D:\ and the second should be set as C:\. If you have only one drive you can partition this into two virtual drives C: and D: to get the same effect. From memory, this is how to add a new drive. Use the Disk Management Console, found in Control Panel/Administerative Tools/Computer management/Disk Management. When you first install the disk you will probably see this as disk 1 and described as Unrecognised, right click on the name, select Initialize, this prepares the disk for formatting (like FDISK did in W98 etc). When this is complete right click on the description and select Format. Choose NTFS as the preferred option, then sit and wait for a (long) while. After this you will have a useable disk with it's own drive letter which you can juggle to D: if you wish. The help section in Disk Management isn't too bad if your stuck. I wouldn't worry about changing your graphics card, these only matter when a fast refresh rate is required such as when playing games. |
Posted on 26/10/05 09:24:41 AM |
|
Steve Caplin
Administrator Posts: 7047 Reply |
Re: scratch disks
Excellent advice, rufus |
Posted on 27/10/05 8:35:23 PM |
|
rufus
Destructive Demon Posts: 243 Reply |
Re: scratch disks
Apperently Photoshop needs about 3 to 5 times the image size of RAM per open image. So if you have a 20Meg image open you need up to 100Meg of RAM to process it. If you have 4 same size images open you need up to 400Meg. This is a useful guide figure for upgrade purposes. |
Posted on 02/11/05 11:56:15 PM |
|
uk2usadaz
Designer Dynamo Posts: 70 Reply  |
Re: scratch disks
My machine spec's are.........Don't have any trouble (at the moment) Desk Top Dell Dimension 8300 3.4 GHz Intel® Pentium® 4 Processor 800MHz w/ HT Technology Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional 2GB Dual Channel DDR SDRAM at 400MHz Wireless Keyboard and Optical Mouse 240G Hard Drive (2 x 120GB SATA HDDs) 3.5 in Floppy Drive Dual Drives: 16x DVD-ROM Drive + 8x DVD+RW Drive 128MB DDR ATI RADEON™ 9800 Pro Graphics Card with TV-Out and DVI Sound Blaster Audigy™2 (D) Card w/Dolby 5.1, and IEEE 1394 capability 5.1 Surround Sound Speaker System with Subwoofer Laptop Dell Inspiron 8600, Pentium M, 1.6GHz 15.4 in WUXGA Screen. 512MB, DDR, 333MHz, 2 Dimms. (Wished I'd got 1Gig) but I don't do alot of design work on it, its just to show customers work, I have the BIG Boy at home for that. 64MB NVIDIA GeForce FX Go5200 Go Card 60GB Ultra ATA Hard Drive (7200 rpm) Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional Integrated 10/100 Network Card and Modem 4x DVD+RW Dell Wireless 1450 DuelBand (802 11a/b/g) Internal Wireless 72Watt Primary Battery 48Watt Additional Battery _________________ Look upwards and share the wonders that I see. |