Hi All
Post on behalf of my more technologically advanced missus (well, as far as photoshop CS 2 goes).
We have an Asus T2, p4 (HT ready but not enabled) 1Gb ram 250Gb HDD windows xp pro, plus and Nvidia GeoForce N62000 card in the agp slot.
Photoshop will do the basics OK (always working with RAWs) but get to using the brush tool and the pc will freeze after a few commands. There are 2 ways to help cure the freeze, 1 start a m$cro$lop program (outlook/word) or connect to the adsl line or 2,end task with the task manager. 1 doesn't always work so 2 gets to be the usual option - losing all the edits made, grrr .
At the point of seizure Task manager reports almost no activity on the cpu and a heaps of space of memory/VM/pf. The graphics card was introduced after the probelms occurred with the ATI on board kit but hasn't made any difference, really.
I've tried various diagnostic tools (system mechanic for one) but don't seem to be able to pin down what is causing the freezes. What's really annoying is the fact that my old dell latitude l400 p3 256 ram can cope with the program, although a bit slower and the pc's at work can do the do with photoshop and they're half the spec of my own desktop.
Any advice/things to check would be greatfully appreciated.

Cheers
Andy.

Hi ErrorMessage.
If you have not updated PS CS2 to version 9.0.2 yet, then please do so.
It addresses multiple hanging\freezing issues, including brush and paint tools.
You can download it directly from here.

Check the scratch disk settings, sometimes that will cause problems especially if you're running out of space on the primary scratch disk. I'm doubting this is the culprit, but it can't hurt to look.

In addition to the very good advices from hitsquad and venek, sometimes a lot of problems in Photoshop can be solved by trashing the preferences folder and then resetting things as you want them.

Thanks for the advice.
(This is the missus speaking by the way).
Already have photoshop CS 9.0.2 and still have the problem.
Watch what is happening with the scratch disk and the cursor freezes/sticks when it's not anywhere near needing to use stratch disk. Have also tried farting around with putting stratch disk on different drive.
Have allocated 75% of RAM to photoshop too.
Remember sticking the pref file on the desktop. Nothing has worked. Even a 2 month email conversation with Adobe came to nothing.
Still thoroughly peed off with this bloody computer.

ErrorMessage Wiff

Oooooooh dear, this is a bit of a mess.

Have you added any third party plug-ins, especially new brushes?
Have you disabled or accidently junked the tools pre-sets file ?

Difficult to give any sensible guesses as we do not know the sum and substance of your dialogue with Adobe.
Have these problems always been in force since you installed PS, or is it a recent happening ?

Is you copy of PS legal, properly activated and registered ?

When you installed, did you do a clean install having previously wiped all traces of an earlier version, or was it an upgrade from an older version ?

Adobe will have issues with a scratch disk if it's got to share it with the OS (Windows). I've seen machines completely refuse to run photoshop becuase one couldn't seperate the scratch disk. On the flipside, I've seen computers run completely fine even though Windows and photoshop were sharing the disk. Try setting your primary scratch and secondary scratch disk to C drive. Be sure to restart your computer.

How much ram do you have installed? If you've got 512 or less, and you're dealing with large files, that might cause a problem too. You can try to up the amount of ram used by photoshop to 85%. If you've got more than a GB, you shouldn't notice anything different as far as system performance.

Be sure not to multi-task while using photoshop...just a bad idea in general. Which reminds me...what kind of processor do you have? If you've got a P4 with HT (Hyper Threading), then you might want to try disabling HT in the BIOS, as I've seen that fix photoshop too.

Let us know how you fare with this.

Hi folks
Thanks for the tips. Scratch disks are set; first 2 to c: second to h: (HDD partition for data, VM file enabled).
1Gb ram (2 512 stix) 75% of Ram assigned. All updates etc installed.

On an unrelated topic in the hardware forum I've been asking about HT. As a result of some very useful advice I (verrrrry carefully ) ugraded by BIOS and chip settings. There's no setting in the BIOS setup to enable HT but I'm guessing it's working (task manager gives 2 screens for CPU performance, so I appears to be enabled).

Seems to have done the trick - photoshop is flying (for the moment) - missus is very pleased.

That's it for now.

Cheers
Andy.

Morning, errormessage.
Glad something has worked ok for you, long may it last, and happy photoshopping.