Slow Opening on BigSur (split)

[Bojuto]

Yes. Why with Big Sur on my MacBook Air is it taking so long to open the latest Affinity versions. Should one revert to the prior Apple version to remove this annoying wait?

[MEB]

Hi @Bojuto,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
This is a known issue we are still investigating. It should only take more time open/launch after a cold boot. The second time you launch the app it should start as fast as usual. Reverting to a previous version (1.8.4) does prevent this from happening (always start fast no matter if after a cold boot or not).

[Bojuto]

I'm sorry to disagree. Design and Photo take just as long to open after first use. Publisher is now fine. I'm not sure if control click on the app icon to show latest files and opening from there might help. I'll let you know

[Bojuto]

Apologies. Yes, the apps do open correctly having closed them down. As I don't use them everyday I'll let you know if the delay occurs next time I use them.

[MEB]

Hi @Bojuto,
This will happen everytime you run the application for the first time after turning your computer off. If you close the app and start it again a second time (without restarting the computer) there will be no delays. As said above, reverting to an older version (1.8.4) will prevent this from happening (even when you restart the computer) but i don't think it's worth it as it only happens the first time after a computer start/reboot. 

[Pšenda]

9 hours ago, MEB said:

This is a known issue

Recently, there are a lot of questions and complaints about version 1.8.6 (Big Sur) on the forum, which could be expected due to the novelty of this technology. Wouldn't it be more sensible to release this "debug" version as a Beta, rather than as a release/main version that just makes a lot of problems for users?

[firstdefence]

I don’t think, this is an Affinity issue, I have recently downgraded 3 Macs because of the slowness experienced after upgrading to Big Sur. All 3 were photographers and used Adobe Photoshop and 2 used Photo Mechanic and all noticed a marked difference in a lack of speed. Dropping back to Catalina got their systems back to what they were used to.

[Bojuto]

I agree with this comment. It's not Affinity that has affected. I have found even basic functions have slowed or become erratic eg changing users takes an age and sometimes fails. Catalina may well be the best answer for the time being.

[MEB]

13 hours ago, Pšenda said:

Recently, there are a lot of questions and complaints about version 1.8.6 (Big Sur) on the forum, which could be expected due to the novelty of this technology. Wouldn't it be more sensible to release this "debug" version as a Beta, rather than as a release/main version that just makes a lot of problems for users?

Hi Pšenda,
We haven't made any changes from v1.8.4 to v1.8.6 other than provide the applications as a universal apps (so they can be installed on Intel and Apple silicon systems) and ensure macOS Big Sur compatibility. Feature wise they are basically the same. The issues we are seeing are mostly due to underlying changes introduced in Big Sur. It's not only our apps that are affected by these changes.

[Pšenda]

Hi MEB,
I understand that you have not made any functional changes by porting to the new type of OS, and that most of the problems will be in the implementation of the OS itself, but by releasing this version (not as Beta) you may have prematurely made users feel that everything is fine and it is also fully functional.
I just remember the problems clearly resulting from the errors in the WIN update (KB4517389 ???), which the users then blamed on you.

[MEB]

I see your point. To be honest, we weren't expecting such issues due to an OS update, usually things tend to go a lot smoother but i guess this time there were more substantial changes under the hood and we are now seeing some reports related with macOS Big Sur and Apple M1 systems specifically - they aren't as much as the number or reports may suggest, a lot of them refer to the same problems - nonetheless we are working to fix these as fast as we can.

[3Dshark]

I'd been holding off to upgrade to Big Sur until now and didn't come across this thread until too late (after updating). It's always a punt upgrading too soon to a new Apple OS.

Designer, Photo and Publisher take an absolute age to open the first time, not quite going to grab a coffee but certainly no way near as nippy (almost instant on Catalina). Admittedly it IS faster once it's been opened the first time.

It's frustrating as all my other software is speedy, but I use Designer on a daily basis.

Is there any timeframe on when / if this is going to be fixed?

[azguy]

Same issue here.  Version 1.9 of Affinity Photo takes over 30 seconds to load on an 2019 i7 iMac with 64 gb of ram.  Same problem with an i7 2019 16 inch MBP with 32gb ram.

[v_kyr]

Well not just for Big Sur, on my old El Capitan it also takes at least twice the time now to start up. Due to fat binaries and libs (universal binaries and their sizes) and Apple signature verification, the whole start-up process got's very slowly.

[lacerto]

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