[Video] MBA running photoshop CS4

[HelloMikee]

11.6" Macbook Air
2GB Ram
1.4 GHz
128 GB

Doing some sharpening in photoshop. It's actually not that bad. My 13" macbook pro (mid 2009) is faster but for simple on the go edits for blogging purposes, I think I found myself a winner.

Totally happy since I was really concerned about the limited ram... but I don't plan on having many apps open when using photoshop on here.

The more and more I use this little guy, the more impressed I am. Apple did it again despite all the naysayers regarding the under powered specs.

I remember trying to use an HP mini with 4GB ram and gimp. It was a sad experience.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkMR_BnIHYs

 

[picar]

It looks very smooth using photoshop in a 1.4ghz machine. I am wondering if the performance depends more on disk speed(SSD) than CPU clock?

 

[fuzzielitlpanda]

what did you use to record this video?

 

[henry72]

Thanks for share...
The SSD helps a lot!! MacBook Air rocks

 

[maflynn]

Thanks for the youtube. PS was operating a little better then I thought it would. You certainly can see the difference when its disk based, vs processor based. Loading is lightening, but applying a filter, you can see where the under powered CPU comes into play. Still for a small laptop that the MBA is, its really good

 

[rhinosrcool]

Thanks for the vid. That is surprising.

 

[GeekLawyer]

what did you use to record this video?

He used QuickTime.

That looks great! Quite usable. Nice and smooth!

 

[HelloMikee]

He used QuickTime.

That looks great! Quite usable. Nice and smooth!

Yep, under File --> New Screen Recording

 

[TheAllStar]

It looks very smooth using photoshop in a 1.4ghz machine. I am wondering if the performance depends more on disk speed(SSD) than CPU clock?

Wouldn't it depend the most on RAM? Between the SSD and CPU though, I'm too stupid to know which one would matter more.

 

[orpheus1120]

Wouldn't it depend the most on RAM? Between the SSD and CPU though, I'm too stupid to know which one would matter more.

Any number crunching depends on CPU. In this video it is adding filter etc. Photoshop uses your hard drive as temporary "swap" space (scratch disk), or virtual memory, when your system does not have enough RAM to perform an operation. Typically you would use a high rpm hard drive as a dedicated SD to counter any slowdown in system. But in the MBA's case, even when ram is low, scratching is done on a SSD which has excellent write speed. In short, CPU, RAM and scratch disk are important in this magnitude. As for choice of GPU, it is not as important.

 

[TheAllStar]

Any number crunching depends on CPU. In this video it is adding filter etc. Photoshop uses your hard drive as temporary "swap" space (scratch disk), or virtual memory, when your system does not have enough RAM to perform an operation. Typically you would use a high rpm hard drive as a dedicated SD to counter any slowdown in system. But in the MBA's case, even when ram is low, scratching is done on a SSD which has excellent write speed. In short, CPU, RAM and scratch disk are important in this magnitude. As for choice of GPU, it is not as important.

Thanks. Learning sequence complete.

 

[bb147]

thanks for posting this.. as this is the reason why I ordered a macbook air because my netbook was having problems using the adobe creative suite

 

[Jaro65]

Nice performance given the specs!

 

[WardC]

Looks pretty good, I don't own CS4, I own Photoshop CS3, and that should run even faster and take up less space on the SSD. I'll be running it on a 1.6GHz 11.6" with 4GB of RAM, still waiting for mine to ship out.

 

[ArcAngel66]

Yep, under File --> New Screen Recording

Given that you were using a screen recorder while using photoshop and got those results, I'm impressed.

Screen Capture software (even Quicktime) is very demanding!

 

[Fuchal]

I wonder if Pixelmator would yield better results as it uses Core Image to offload processing to the GPU.

 

[r2fa3l]

Cs5 works better.... using it at the moment deffo recommend upgrading

 

[Burnsey]

I've crippled my MBP to 1GHZ (to reduce heat) and it handles PS just fine (and I'm somewhat of a heavy user).

 

[hachre]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkMR_BnIHYs

Impressive, thanks!

 

[hachre]

I've crippled my MBP to 1GHZ (to reduce heat) and it handles PS just fine (and I'm somewhat of a heavy user).

What program do you use to do that?

 

[cosmicc]

Very impressive. I think you just pushed me over the edge. I will be buying one soon!

 

[hoobaman]

Cs5 works better.... using it at the moment deffo recommend upgrading

agreed. i can't be more amazed at how smooth cs5 master collection runs on the air.

 

[cheapa55]

agreed. i can't be more amazed at how smooth cs5 master collection runs on the air.

which air do you have? debating whether or not to upgrade CS3 to CS5. I have the 11" 1.4ghz, 2gb ram.

 

[dougan]

If that was real-time (I don't doubt), that seems quite speedy. Thanks for sharing.

 

[nidserz]

Thanks OP, looks pretty good.
Just wondering, would having 4GB ram help in this case? Or would 2GB be fine for running photoshop and adium? Probably won't be doing too much intensive stuff on it anyway.
Thanks.