Huge Photoshop problems

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Huge Photoshop problems

Postby y2kwizard » Sat Dec 07, 2002 3:44 pm

Hello all. I've been having a Photoshop problem that has persisted ever since I've owned the program. I'm really not sure why it occurs, but maybe one of you can shed light on this dillemma.

On the most basic level, Photoshop 6 crashes my computer. Often. Every time I use Photoshop for a fair amount of time (say...15 minutes or more) the program simply causes my computer to randomly restart itself. It's almost as if someone has cut the power to the computer then immediately restores power.

This problem als sometimes occurs with certain types of video. It's happened to me with a DDR video that I was watching.

Is it possible that the problem is that I don't have enough RAM? I thought I read something about that somewhere...I have 256 MB of RAM so far, but I am upgrading this Christmas.

I've uninstalled/reinstalled Windows, uninstalled/reinstalled Photoshop, downloaded the patches, but nothing works. My specs are: Windows XP, AMD Athlon XP 1600+, 256 MB RAM, 40-gig IDE HD, 20-gig external Firewire HD.

Does anyone have any idea what hte problem is?

Thanks a whole lot! Your help would be greatly appreciated!
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Postby klinky » Sat Dec 07, 2002 8:06 pm

This sounds more like you have a hardware conflict or crappy drivers.
Err or your computer is unstable.

So well you've re-installed windows. I would make sure you have the latest drivers for everything. If that fails, maybe you can underclock your cpu down to a 100Mhz bus? That would slow the memory down and cpu. Maybe it's overheating ? Maybe it's just not stable?

You can also try Prime95, which is a bench mark test.

http://www.mersenne.org/freesoft.htm

If it fails or has problems, then there is probably something wrong, with your cpu/ram or motherboard. Which one is :roll: the question. But it lets you know that there is something wrong :p

This doesn't sound like you're running out of ram, if that was the case, photoshop would just get really slow and give you a soft crash back to window or a Out of Memory error.

~klinky
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Postby FurryCurry » Sun Dec 08, 2002 12:23 am

I used to have a problem like that, and it tended to be worse during usage of memory-intesive programs like Photoshop.

Know what it finally turned out to be?

Bad RAM.

I suggest giving Memtest86 a try.

It's a free download, and helped me find which stick of ram was going out.

heh, the other one I bought at the same time went bad 3 months later, damn cheapo memory! :evil:
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Postby CArnesen » Sun Dec 08, 2002 2:25 am

I will place my bet on one of the following (in order of preference):

RAM
CPU
or Motherboard

I had a computer that this same thing happened on and it ended up being the CPU. I sure hope that it's the RAM though (it's cheaper...)

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Postby y2kwizard » Sun Dec 08, 2002 7:07 am

All right, guys, thanks a lot for your input. I guess I'll try a RAM upgrade (I'm getting some anyway for Christmas), and if that doesn't work....well...I guess I'll have to work REAL quickly in Premiere :)
"When I got fat, I decided to grow a beard" -- The Great Andy
"Is it a DARTH visor?" and "It's funny cuz it's pants" -- The Master of on-the-spot Funniness
"You're too young for your age" and "I'm sorry for apologizing so much" -- The Master of on-the-spot Randomness
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Postby y2kwizard » Sun Dec 08, 2002 7:08 am

Durn no edit button rule. I mean I'll have to work in PHOTOSHOP reeeal quickly
"When I got fat, I decided to grow a beard" -- The Great Andy
"Is it a DARTH visor?" and "It's funny cuz it's pants" -- The Master of on-the-spot Funniness
"You're too young for your age" and "I'm sorry for apologizing so much" -- The Master of on-the-spot Randomness
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Postby Aetherfukz » Sun Dec 08, 2002 12:16 pm

Have you tried putting the RAM that PhotoShop uses up? It's under Edit -> Preferences -> Memory & Image Cache. I have it at 75% and it works well for me on my 900 Athlon / 256MB RAM.
Also be sure to check out that the scratch disk PS uses for every temp file and the like, is not your primary drive where Windows is installed. Tis is under Preferences -> Plugins & Scratch Disks. This really helps making PhotoShop faster and more stable (well, it certainly did for me...)

Peace out,
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Postby y2kwizard » Sun Dec 08, 2002 4:45 pm

Aetherfukz wrote:Have you tried putting the RAM that PhotoShop uses up? It's under Edit -> Preferences -> Memory & Image Cache. I have it at 75% and it works well for me on my 900 Athlon / 256MB RAM.
Also be sure to check out that the scratch disk PS uses for every temp file and the like, is not your primary drive where Windows is installed. Tis is under Preferences -> Plugins & Scratch Disks. This really helps making PhotoShop faster and more stable (well, it certainly did for me...)


Hey, thanks for this advice. I'll go check that right now and see if it helps any!
"When I got fat, I decided to grow a beard" -- The Great Andy
"Is it a DARTH visor?" and "It's funny cuz it's pants" -- The Master of on-the-spot Funniness
"You're too young for your age" and "I'm sorry for apologizing so much" -- The Master of on-the-spot Randomness
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Postby VicBond007 » Mon Dec 09, 2002 10:57 am

It sounds like a RAM quality issue, not quantity. My old P3-500 was running some really crappy no-name PC133 'cuz at the time I thought all chips were created equal. However if that's the case, some are more equal than others ;) The machine would do the same thing as yours. Just shut itself down and come back up again. I finally traced it down to crap RAM because when I'd boot into linux and opened windows, the windows would pop up and then go away again. What I'm trying to say, take the old RAM out and put new RAM in. And make sure it's the right speed for the motherboard. Furthermore, to increase stability, keep as few chips in there as possible. If you just have 1 stick of 512MB RAM then your system will be happier than having 1-256 and 2-128's. This is because there's less banks for it to flash in sequence and less of a chance for it to screw up.

You may also want to get a new power supply. If you've got a 230W nothing then that's grounds for an upgrade. It's possible that under stress you can't supply sufficient power to all your devices, however you can test this theory by loading up and 3d first person shooter and playing for a while. If you don't crash, then it's not your PS.

Finally, you "may" want to look into re-acquiring the installation disc from photoshop because it's possible that certain files may have been fragmented or damaged, though that's unlikely in this case 'cuz if that were so, it'd just give one of those "photoshop.exe has caused an error and will now close." errors.
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