Roqoco

The main function of a gpu is to accelerate the rendering of the frames in the frame buffer (vram) so as well as VRAM anything that helps games in that respect (cuda cores...) is likely to accelerate AP too when it needs to rapidly redraw. I suspect you can't go far wrong with any decent gaming card with at least 4gb vram, more if you are running 1440p or 4k. That said, you are hardly going  to benefit much from a very high end gaming card, because much of the functionality in Affinity is likely CPU bound any way and so can't be handed off to the GPU. I have a nvidia GTX 1080 with 8gb of VRAM, two generations old but still a decently fast card. I can't say that it has made a very noticeable difference having acceleration in 1.9, but then I have been using designer almost exclusively and that is less likely to benefit than photo, because manipulating vectors is more of a CPU intensive thing. Maybe someone who uses photo more could comment on any benefits they have seen?

"Save failed due to an internal error. This should be reported to the development team."
In case anyone might be having a similar problem: It seems that my project had become corrupted probably by a glitch/crash in 1.9.0. To fix it I created a new project and copy pasted the shapes from my old file into it. Since doing that the new file has worked reliably (on 1.9.1 that has some fixes) for several days and I'm reasonably sure this was the right diagnosis.   

I think MEB is from serif.

"Save failed due to an internal error. This should be reported to the development team."
In case anyone might be having a similar problem: It seems that my project had become corrupted probably by a glitch/crash in 1.9.0. To fix it I created a new project and copy pasted the shapes from my old file into it. Since doing that the new file has worked reliably (on 1.9.1 that has some fixes) for several days and I'm reasonably sure this was the right diagnosis.   

I think this method needs a little experimentation and fine tuning and getting used to it. At least it's already there and you don't have to wait for it to be incorporated. I'm not saying it's not worth to ask for this as a feature request. I just find your way of input interesting and tried to find a way on how I would do it right away.
Cheers,
d.

Yes - Thanks for the input, you made some interesting points and got me to clarify, which is all good. And it is nice not to feel one is firing one's posts into a vacuum especially during lockdown, when I sometimes think I'm living in a sensory deprivation tank.  

I did not install the beta of 1.9.1, even though I had problems with 1.9.0, because of possible registry mix up, which still sometimes happens with windows. It might be a good idea then to completely remove all serif applications, then take a checkpoint on your registry and run a registry cleaner such as the one in CCleaner to improve the chances of removing registry traces. Also check that no file/directory traces remain. Then do a clean reinstall from scratch. But, maybe you tried this already.      

Clip studio is fine software...and simple illustration is affordable at $49.  However, if as you say, she is an aspiring GA, she will need the more robust software...which is over $200.  The reason that I mention this is that Clip Studio is not necessarily, the best choice for a budding GA...  I am not aware of how it will transition into the workplace.  If she's to remain a hobbyist/illustrator, the basic will be fine.  Though, honestly, there are indeed, other options out there.  
 
I'm traditional art transitioning to digital.  It's going to be a learning curve.  That is the simple truth.  But, it is worth learning if it advances goals.  Photo bashing and the ability to do so, is an important skill for today's GA...traditional illustration is a finite niche.  Talent needs balance with knowledge and skill.
Just my two cents.
 
Best of luck to you and your daughter, Desperate Dad

That’s the major version’s life, not yours! I hope no one expects any version 1.x updates after version 2.0 has been released.

I am a relative new-comer (a few months) to affinity photo.  I was slow to get going on it as some of the tutorials and the workbook (I have now) , and the interface were a bit beyond me.  I stuck w/ some of the more basic photo editors, like pixlr (old editor, liked for quite some time but defunct now), and painting sofware such as Paint 3D (doesn't save document well or at all anymore).  So I moved into Affinity Photo as a necessity as my other (less quality options) no longer worked.
Don't give up on Affinity, it's really great and more than worth the few dollars paid for it, trust me.  You or especially your daughter can slowly get into it with time.  The more time you put in the more you get back in skill and comfort w/ the interface.  As others have said even though affinity is different and your dtr. may not like it at first, doesn't mean it's not great.  It takes time to learn.
I was pretty frustrated at first, but as I am learning more and more I am extremely happy so far.  And I probably only know 5% so far, if that.  This after 4-6 months of brief and casual use and frustration, then the last 2-3 weeks of Affinity only consistent use. 
So once you put in 2-3 weeks of consistent use/work/practice w/ Affinity Photo, it gets easier, and you become excited of its' potential.  Tell her to keep it, get into it when she can.  She will not regret.  Also free Affinity on-line updates for life, with your purchase!
In meantime, as others have said, have her look into a number of free painting software out there.  She will likely find something she likes, and maybe similar to what she had before.  When she does that, and when she has more time she maybe gets into affinity a bit more, she will have a familiar painting software to augment Affinity (which also has great paint capability, but learning curve, different w/ what she's used to).  Affinity likely better, but she'll have both.  Like having two cars, two or many more guitars, etc...
I am also discovering this Forum is great for asking questions and getting good advice.  I need to put a lot more work on my own, tutorials, practice, trial/ error, etc.  But I know now if I reach a stop point or get stumped, I know I can come here.

Generally there will be a learning curve whatever software she starts out with, just because it will have a different user interface to what she is used to and probably a lot more features, which she will not yet be familiar with. That can be frustrating until one gets over the hump - it is the same for all of us. I would suggest that if you have already bought both Affinity photo and designer, that she starts out with photo, because it is a general painting application (as well as a photo editor) designer on the other hand has a steeper learning curve and in any case is more specialised in it's uses. Affinity photo is as good or better than anything else for this purpose, and easier for beginners than some other programs, so you are unlikely to find anything more suitable elsewhere. It is important when viewing tutorials on youtube to actually work through the examples and experiment, you don't learn a lot by just watching videos on their own. And if you search for "affinity photo tutorial" on youtube there is plenty of good material to work through.   

Get a tutorial or something. Don't blame the software of your own ignorance. 
You don't even respond to the answers you've gotten. You're only bitching about how hard it is.
it's not gonna get any better with that attitude.
Read a manual or watch a tutorial. Put the effort in to understand the difference between pixels and vectors and don't expect to understand it all overnight.

For those not familiar:
Illustrator's awkwardly named Merge performs two basic Boolean operations in one move, based on their color:
It Unions touching (abutting or overlapping) fills of the same color. It Punches (subtracts) overlapping fills of different colors. (Frontmost punches others). So it results in the minimal individual paths around visually contiguous regions of the same color.
One common real-world use case for this is when preparing a design for cutting from sign vinyl. In that common workflow, you don't want any cuts across same-colored regions, because as the vinyl shrinks over time, void slivers appear. So the Merge command saves a lot of time and tedium.
However, it addresses just half of that use case: When different colors of a sign vinyl design need to appear to abut, one actually does need a small amount of overlap for the very same reason: It's very difficult to physically perfectly abut different-colored pieces of vinyl when applying it, and even if you could, the eventual shrinkage would again cause slivers between them.
The practical fix is analogous to that of color trapping (chokes, spreads, and overprinting) in print.
So this is yet another opportunity to improve upon an Illustrator feature by addressing its shortcomings instead of just mimicking it in 'me, too' fashion: Such a command should incorporate an Overlap setting that would default to zero, but could be set by the user whenever a trap (parallel to the shapes) is needed. That would address the tedium of having to manually apply Offset Path (in AI) or Contour (in Affinity) to the results of a Merge operation. In other words, the suggested new feature function should incorporate three basic operations (union, subtract, and offset), not just two (union and subtract).
Illustrator could have long since addressed this by providing a checkbox in its Merge command: Respect Manual Traps or Respect Overprinting Strokes. But it doesn't. And its 'Pathfinders' generally ignore strokes anyway. Expand Appearance 'sees' manual traps built in Illustrator, but treats them as 'third' colors instead of as the same color as the spread or choked color.
Another low-hanging-fruit opportunity to surpass Illustrator's functionality by avoiding its endemic characteristic of too many grab-bag standalone features being 'unaware' of each other.
JET

Nice. Well done with an appropriate style. What is your problem? Maybe your problem could be solved. Do you expect help from anyone with your attitude?

Installed and removed this piece of c**p after 20 minutes.  Could have been shorter if it was able to just change my brush in less then 5 minutes...
Hope I can go back to previous version.

i cant believe that anyone would complain about discounts for affinity  software ... go buy photoshop and then justify your moans  about pricing . Affinity is a bargain at twice the price .... If you dont like the fact they are discounting during a global pandemic stop using affinity and use other software

Just pointing out that you're comparing apples and oranges. Two different kinds of "selected" having two different highlight colors seems quite reasonable to me.
If you were to expand that group, and both the group and a layer inside it had the bright blue highlight you would commplain about that, as you wouldn't be able to tell which one is really selected.

Affinity -
I'm running version 1.9 of both Designer and Photo, and they are STILL painfully slow to launch. I'm running a 2019 MacPro with 96GB ECC ram, 16 core Xeon and the 32GB Radeon Pro Vega II, with 2TB SSD. In other words, a very expensive and high-powered Mac Pro. Affinity software loads like a pile of rubbish. For the cost, I get that it's more economical than Adobe and it's good design software in general but the performance is not worth any savings in value. Sadly to say, regardless of any cost of entry, being at a version 1.9 and still loading like a bag of bricks shows extremely poor attention to detail and coding.
Will you guys actually fix this problem, or continue to pretend it doesn't exist?

Could you explain a bit more, for those who haven't used Illustrator? On the face of it a cookie cutter would behave how the Affinity "subtract" operation does, i.e. "cut one object out of another". And you can also do that non destructively using Layer -> Create Compound, then selecting subtract on the first object, in the layer panel.

Apologies in advance...  I'm just so excited, I can't contain myself.
I now have all three of the Affinity suite!
I recently acquired an entirely FREE version of Aurora HDR 2018...and I successfully installed and use as a photo plugin.
Digital creation life is good.  That is all.  I just had to share that.
Feel free to delete this.  I just needed to say it.

What kind of a moron makes such a feature default in the first place?
You want more users and to make them feel "like at home" OR NOT.
STOP doing such idiotic changes! First Figma, now you.
Another one - you could make a tooltip next to "scrubby" zoom because I have no F**king idea what that is and whether I want it or not.

In which parallel universe?
Every time I've been (re)installing MacOS  or setting up a new Mac in the past decade or so, I've been spending a significant amount of time to re-sync my most used keyboard shortcuts across apps, including Apple's own, so that they actually match when using the same or at least similar commands. Some apps have their own propriatery shortcut editing interface, like Affinity, Logic Pro, Adobe etc., others needs to be configured via System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts > App Shortcuts.
As for the latter, in the meantime I have learned how MacOS stores and handles these custom shortcuts via plist files (it's pretty complex and not necessarily obvious) so that I don't need to retype all of them all over again, simply copying and pasting the NSUserKeyEquivalents dictionaries from my old MacOS installation or backup over to the new installation instead.
And then add other variables like region and language specific keyboard layouts:
For example, try to find " [ " and " ] " on the Swiss keyboard layout, let alone actually use it for such common shortcuts like changing brush sizes or "Back", "Forward" etc. Good luck.
Heck, already in the 1990s I learned how to use ResEdit and "hacked" e.g. the XPress 3 app resource forks to have keyboard shortcuts that actually work with Swiss keyboard layout.
And nowadays you have apps that don't give an F about MacOS Human Interface Guidelines at all, including some Apple's own, and force you to resort to clumsy workarounds like UI scripting, global macros via Keyboard Maestro and the like.
It'll always be an uphill battle.
That all said, some default Affinity shortcuts are "a bit off", indeed.
But since there's now Preferences > Keyboard Shortcuts > Save/Load, I definitely can't complain.

Grow up

So will all loyal customers -  been with Serif since PagePlus Release 1 in 1990 - be getting a refund? I await Affinity's generosity! 

Having paid full price for the apps as an early adopter I find late-comers getting it half price galling! No incentive to pay the full price in future just wait and you can have it discounted! Not really a good way to support existing long term loyal customers is it!
So advertising to loyal customers that late-comers get it at a knock down price is hardly good promotion!