Shutterstock Photographer Forum :: View topic

thomasamby · Posted: Thu May 10, 2012 3:14 am

I'm asking because I might be looking to buy a new one. Since I've started doing EPS10 illustrations I've realized that my computer is way too insufficient in terms of handling multiple blends, transparencies etc. It's really annoying because simple tasks like zooming in and out and moving around elements become so time consuming. I need to restart my computer several times while working on "heavy" files, and I save the document very often as occasionally my computer crashes.

It's keeping me from getting too much into detail with my illustrations, because doing small adjustments on heavy files takes ages.

I find it weird because I have 6 gb of RAM installed on my Acer, and an AMD Phenom 9600 Quad-Core Processor 2,3 GHz.. Shouldn't this be sufficient? I'm not even doing 3D illustrations or anything, just simple vector illustrations.

So, this brings me to my question(s): What specs are needed to handle heavy EPS files smoothly? What computer are you using yourself, and would you recommend it?

Also general tips for speeding up computers or getting them to work faster are very welcome

mmanderson · Joined: 10 Jul 2010 Posts: 527

I have a Gateway with only 4 GB RAM and an Intel i5 core processor. Normally I don't have any difficulty working with vectors, except if I try to export them to PNG at a large size. Sometimes then I'll have a problem. I don't run many programs at one time though.

thomasamby · Posted: Thu May 10, 2012 9:41 am

How large previews are you able to save (how many megapixels) ?. I'm able to save only one 4900 x 4900 px preview - after that it runs out of memory and I have to restart if I need more previews. It won't even let me save a 5000 x 5000 px preview, but I'm hearing other people don't have these kind of problems :\

apotterdd · Posted: Thu May 10, 2012 11:34 am

I too have 6gigs of ram and run into the same issues but nothing ever that requires a restart. If your on a PC have you done an error check? What I've noticed is that the size of the large jog is dependent on the size of the artboard too.

A computer check might be in order.

mjak · Joined: 12 Mar 2010 Posts: 180 Location: Potatoland

Hi,
my comp has 1,6 GHz Sempron with RAM 1,1 Gb and I can export JPG 5000x5000 and bigger (if you mean this) without any problems. I make my pics in Corel, yes, sometimes I have problems with too complex effects. But same pics in Illustrator I can zoom OK...sadly I can make only simple operations with Ill, I am old Corel maniac))
I think you have some problems with hardware or software... your comp must be OK for such job. Did you try to reinstall operation system or just Illustrator, can be bug?

mmanderson · Joined: 10 Jul 2010 Posts: 527

I haven't worked on many eps files lately. I checked back and many of my preview images are 5000 x 5000 and I don't recall having a problem with them. I have a few larger gradients that I exported from ai into jpg files for use in Zazzle backgroundnds that are 6000 x 4800. I also have been working on some fairly large png files in PaintShop Pro that are up to 5037 x 6682 and 55 MB. Have you tried doing some standard maintenance on your computer, like disk cleanup, scandisk and defrag? That might help. And also check to see how many programs are running at startup.

evaners · Posted: Thu May 10, 2012 1:20 pm

27" iMac, but I'm still running CS2. I did use CS5 when they had the 30-day trial, and had no problems at all.

2.7GHz quadcore Intel i5 processor
4 GB RAM (with space for 4 more)
1 TB hard drive

cthoman · Joined: 06 Dec 2006 Posts: 304 Location: Austin, TX

daemys · Posted: Fri May 11, 2012 10:12 am

Intel Atom CPU N450 1.66 GHz, 0.99 GB RAM, 10.5" Screen. It is even capable for Computational Fluid Dynamics Analysis. I'm patient enough to wait for the process to complete.

thomasamby · Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 6:44 am

Thanks for all the suggestions. I found out that "scratch memory" somehow uses the hard drive as memory - I'm not very technical. So I deleted 100gb of unused files and I think it has helped a bit, but it's still not as fast as I would like it to be.

I want to share what I found out and some steps you can take to maybe speed up your computer a bit if you're having the same problems as me (thanks mmanderson, mjak and apotterdd):

1. Disk cleanup (cleans up temporary files and much more)

2. Disk defragmentation (allocates bits of information in more logical ways so the computer will work faster)

3. Scan disk (I don't know if this helped any, but perhaps it did)

4. Get rid of unused files that take up space on your hard drive - Illustrator, Photoshop and such software uses scratch memory which makes use of the free hard disk space.

5. msconfig - let's you decide which programs to run on startup.

6. Maybe the ultimate way to speed up the computer.. Formatting the hard disk and reinstalling the whole system.. I'm going to do this very soon

I'm also thinking of getting some more RAM into my computer, upgrading from 6 gb to 8 gb. Does anyone know if you can just buy whatever brand or type and put into your computer, or will it have to be a very specific type dependant on your computer? Will there be a noticable difference in performance from 6 gb to 8 gb ?

thomasamby · Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 6:45 am

That's the weird thing about Mac computers. When I look at the specifications they don't look very impressing. But I know by experience that they are extremely fast and reliable. But they are also very expensive ;)

mjak · Joined: 12 Mar 2010 Posts: 180 Location: Potatoland

100Gb...it's great.All my hard drive is 80Gb)))
You've made good job but some tips can be. Defragmentation and cleaning of trash - definitely, but results may depend on software. I've got the best with Raxco perfectDisc 11 for defragmentation and with Wise Disc Cleaner 5 of Total Commander 7.55. Try if you want, in my case I've got much better speed.
To upgrade your RAM you must know your type (DDR1, 2, 3, 400 or other, these first are rather old types)and you must find if your motherboard's characteristics allow to have 8Gb. This info you can find in papers of your comp. If you've lost - well, open comp and watch...

helix7 · Joined: 24 Apr 2007 Posts: 1789 Location: New Jersey

mnsanthoshkumar · Joined: 25 Oct 2010 Posts: 459

I too had this problem of my system getting slower when using transparencies. I was earlier opening a 4900x4900 pixels document. Now I just start with 500x500px and after the artwork, I save it as eps10 file. Only after this, I scale up the artwork to 4900 or whatever bigger dimension I want. But when I try to export, it sometimes complains memory problems. When this happens, I save it as a new eps10 file and open this new file in photoshop and save it as JPG and then delete the new eps10 file.

I dont know if there are better ways to handle memory issues.. Also I dont know if my workflow is ideal.. I would love to know better ways..

One thing which might help speed up your PC would be typing %temp% in the "Run" command. This would open a folder with temp files and just try deleting what all you can from this. Also try uninstalling unused programs, this will help to some extent.

thomasamby · Posted: Tue May 15, 2012 3:50 pm