Why does my Photoshop CS5 slow down to a crawl?

I have Widows 7 installed on C:. I have 4GB RAM on my laptop. I had installed Photoshop CS5 on D:. And I had set 5-8 GB for virtual memory on E:

Space on drives after above consideration:

12 GB is free on C:
16 GB is free on D:
11 GB is free on E:

Now when I am opening Photoshop CS5, surprisingly, system shows only 135 mb free on C:. Thats why I am not able to work for a minute in photoshop. Before this, when i was having Windows XP, Photoshop was occupying around 3-4 GB on C:. But, at least, I was able to work.

Please suggest me some setting I can configure to run photoshop on my laptop.

In addition, On my desktop machine(with 2GB RAM) where i have 4GB space free on C:, Photoshop is occupying only 2-3 GB.Even though, it is panic, but at least I can crawl with photoshop on desktop machine.

Amit Kumar Gupta

Posted 2011-09-11T11:52:57.153

Reputation: 337

Answers

To start, check how much RAM Photoshop is allowed to use.

Go to Edit > Preferences > Performance

Check the value for Let Photoshop Use

enter image description here

Here's are other things you can try:

Reduce the number of history states (a.k.a. the number of Undo's you can do).
Use a different scratch disk than the one where your base images are stored. Personally, I use my D: drive rather than C: (primary boot drive).
Turn Font Preview off under Edit > Preferences > Type.
Disable thumbnail previews in the Layers panel.

Ellesa

Posted 2011-09-11T11:52:57.153

Reputation: 9 729

My sister has decreased its loading time by setting some pallates, brushes, presets etc to default. Now at least it is being open and i can edit small files. I'll try your suggestion too. – Amit Kumar Gupta – 2011-09-13T03:55:56.107

Steps 1 & 2 can be found under Edit > Preferences > Performance. Step 4 can be done by right-clicking the Layers panel. – Ellesa – 2011-09-13T05:27:56.060

These steps may not account for the entire 12gb that goes missing from your drive, but this is sort of a recommended-steps-to-optimize-PS checklist. Normally, it includes the stuff your sister did, but I had assumed yours was a fresh install and didn't have any custom shapes, brushes, styles, patterns, swatches, etc. – Ellesa – 2011-09-13T05:30:28.803

On my laptop, having fresh installation, was occupying 12GB. While on my desktop, not a fresh installation, was occupyping only 3GB on C:. After resetting brushes,presets etc it reduces around 500-600 mbs. – Amit Kumar Gupta – 2011-09-13T08:17:54.493

What do you need 12 GB of memory for? Trim down the page file a lot if your usage isn't that high.

Thats why I am not able to work for a minute in photoshop.

Have you troubleshooted why you are not able to work?

Please suggest me some setting I can configure to run photoshop on my laptop.

If it is disk trashing, running out of space or your computer doesn't hit a requirement; there is no magic.

Tamara Wijsman

Posted 2011-09-11T11:52:57.153

Reputation: 54 163

Would love to see some constructive advice on that down vote... – Tamara Wijsman – 2011-09-11T12:03:26.967

can you suggest me how to troubleshoot? Moreover, I am not running any application in parallel. Then why photoshop is taking 12 GB space on C: – Amit Kumar Gupta – 2011-09-11T12:20:33.210

@articlestack: Have you checked the requirements at Adobe? Also see Kaze's suggestion, although that doesn't count up for 12 GB. Perhaps, try Space Sniffer...

– Tamara Wijsman – 2011-09-11T16:17:26.853

Thanks for the tool. I'll try it today itself. and'll let you know. – Amit Kumar Gupta – 2011-09-13T03:54:43.783