macOS Monterey and Affinity Designer Pauses

[Mark Harris]

I've been using AD for years, and have never had any performance issues that I can (ever) recall.

After upgrading to macOS Monterey and downloading the latest AD update, I am having pauses between tasks, whether dragging an object/symbol, hiding/showing a layer, etc.  It's consistent, and highly reproducible.  Any thoughts, etc?

iMac Pro (8-core Xeon @ 3.2Ghz), 32 GB, Radeon Pro Vega 64 16GB.

Moreover, is there a way to downgrade from an update?

Thanks!

[stokerg]

Hi @Mark Harris,

Could you attach a screen recording showing the issues?  I'm running Monterey on my 2019 Intel Mac and can't replicate the issues you mention.  I have noticed some lagging when scrolling the brushes panel, which i've been able to replicate on multiple Macs, so will get that logged separately. 

 

[adolphsen]

@stokerg, same issue here. After updating to macOS Monterey (12.0.1) over the weekend, Affinity Designer has become super laggy. Simple actions like moving an object, undoing or changing between open files/tabs gives me the beach ball loader. Never had any of these issues prior to Monterey. I've tried screen recording it, but it's a bit difficult to see as the beach ball doesn't show in recordings. I'm on AD 1.10.4.

Any way to quick fix this until a new AD release hopefully solves it? It has pretty significant impact on my workflow.

Thanks!

My specs:

MacBook Pro (16-inch, 2019)

2,3 GHz 8-Core Intel Core i9

16 GB 2667 MHz DDR4

AMD Radeon Pro 5500M 8 GB
Intel UHD Graphics 630 1536 MB

[stokerg]

13 minutes ago, adolphsen said:

I've tried screen recording it, but it's a bit difficult to see as the beach ball doesn't show in recordings. I'm on AD 1.10.4.

Hi @adolphsenand Welcome to the Forums,

Thanks for the screen recording  

Would you mind uploading the afdesign file shown in your screen recording to our Dropbox here and i'll try replicating the issue.  Also, if you disable the Layers Panel (View>Studio>Layers) when you try to move something on the canvas, is it still laggy?

 

[adolphsen]

Thanks @stokerg and thank you for the quick reply  

I've just uploaded the AD file to your Dropbox. It's quite complex with several artboards each containing hundres if not thousands of layers, but I've worked with even more complex files previously without any performance issues.

I tried disabling the Layers panel but it doesn't seem to change anything. Also tried disabling all other panels (using Tab key), but again no changes in terms of the lagging.

As a test I tried creating a new AD file and draw a few simple shapes. No performance issues here, so it's possibly related to files with many layers(?)

[adolphsen]

@stokergTo elaborate a bit further, the issue seems to affect pretty much every aspect of AD. A few examples of cases that now has a lag + beach ball loader:

• Scrolling in panels
• Clicking a layer in the Layers panel
• Moving a (simple) object on stage
• Undoing and redoing simple actions (like moving an object)
• Selecting/deselecting an object
• Hovering over bounding box hot spots (e.g. the resize handle)
• Changing tool (using keyboard shortcuts)

I'm thinking of trying to reinstall AD as it's currently so laggy that I can hardly use it, but will need to make sure all my keyboard shortcuts, studio presets, etc. are kept.

Hope this helps!

 

[Mark Harris]

@adolphsen That's exactly what I'm experiencing.

The application has become entirely unusable.

[Mark Harris]

1 hour ago, LondonSquirrel said:

How do you know it's not a problem with Monterey? I notice the original poster updated to Monterey and the latest version of AD. It wouldn't be the first time that an OS update has caused problems.

Given that it's the only application that is experiencing these types of issues, I'd lean heavily on the recent application update.  Nevertheless, I wouldn't rule out either.

[Mark Harris]

Update:  The issue appears to be related to Symbols.  After uninstalling, and cleaning up the application leftovers, I launched the app and did not experience issues -- *until I updated my Studio settings to include Symbols.  It is reproducible on my machine.  Unfortunately, I rely on these heavily... so again, the application is unusable at this time.

[Prasolov_V]

I had exactly the same problem with AD after upgrading to Monterey. Macbook pro 16 intel i7

Edited November 3, 2021 by Prasolov_V

[adolphsen]

9 hours ago, Mark Harris said:

Update:  The issue appears to be related to Symbols.

That's an interesting observation. My first intuition was that it might be related to linked files, which had some performance issues when it was first introduced a few versions back. As a UI designer I rely heavily on both symbols and linked files.

I did some further investigation on symbols after testing an even more complex file than the one I posted about yesterday. This more complex file performed way better, though still laggy, even though it has more artboards and more layers. Doing a Symbol count (using Select > Select Object > Symbols) shows 835 symbols in this more complex file while the more laggy file from yesterday has only 456 symbols, so this doesn't fully explain the performance issues. Maybe the complexity of each symbol come into play as well?

[stokerg]

18 hours ago, adolphsen said:

I'm thinking of trying to reinstall AD as it's currently so laggy that I can hardly use it, but will need to make sure all my keyboard shortcuts, studio presets, etc. are kept.

 

This is due to the symbols and also Monterey.  When i was trying to replicate the issue, i just had a very simple file with no symbols. Turns out Monterey is causing us some issues for our apps, we do have an FAQ which was created yesterday here which will be updated when this is resolved.

@Mark Harrisand @Prasolov_VYou are both running into the known issue mentioned here, it is caused by Monterey.  I've updated the report we have with the Dev team and have included a link back this thread so i can update you all when its been resolved  

[droego]

I can exactly relate to this issue. Even with only a few symbols affinity designer is currently unusable for me. For me, resizing objects in particular is hardly possible any more. MBP 13" i5 Monterey.

Edited November 3, 2021 by droego

[Mark Harris]

3 hours ago, stokerg said:

This is due to the symbols and also Monterey.  When i was trying to replicate the issue, i just had a very simple file with no symbols. Turns out Monterey is causing us some issues for our apps, we do have an FAQ which was created yesterday here which will be updated when this is resolved.

@Mark Harrisand @Prasolov_VYou are both running into the known issue mentioned here, it is caused by Monterey.  I've updated the report we have with the Dev team and have included a link back this thread so i can update you all when its been resolved  

@stokerg Thank you!  I'm very happy to hear that the DEV team is aware and has an idea of the issue.

Also, I wouldn't be upset if they added the ability to sort, search, re-attach, and 'delete non-referenced symbols'.  

[LionelD]

Hi, I think I also have this issue.  The slowest operation in my case is simply switching from one open document to another in Designer on MBP; I haven’t tested files with no Symbols (something I use a lot, possibly every file).

I have both Affinity (Designer, Photo and Publisher) and Photoshop CC on my MBP.  I’m sorry to say Designer performs like a dog, no complaints about Photoshop (which I’ll abandon when Serif has a fully functional alternative for me - I need Layer Comps at a minimum).

Diagnosis appears to have reached an advanced stage, but I’ll provide any information Serif requests.

Regards

[zimmt]

Same issue here. Upgraded to Monterey a day ago and now Affinity is a pain to use due to choppiness. This is evident in pretty much any operation from clicking, scrolling, manipulating, opening documents, etc.

Most frustrating when manipulating elements.

MacBook Pro 15" 2018 2.9 GHz i9 32gb Radeon Pro 560X 4GB

[zimmt]

I can confirm it does seem to be confined to documents with symbols only.

[v_kyr]

I've actually seen this here related to MacOS 12 Monterey and possible huge memory issues ...

• MacOS 12 Monterey: Cause of memory leaks found

So there are still some bugs in Monterey which can also cause side effect behaviors for third party app software!

[Guest]

Just adding another +1. Designer (and Photo and Publisher) have become almost unusable in Monterey. Click. Wait. Repeat.

[stlADfan]

For what it's worth:

2016 MacBook Pro 13", i5, 8GB memory.

Problem:  After AD loads it cannot open files.  Easy way to tell if this is the case is that there is no visual preview, either on the Touch Bar or in Finder.  It knows the files are there but it can't "see" them.  You try to open a file and nothing happens.

Solution:  Don't ask me why, but it appears the following works:

1.  I open up the user account that has AD.  

2.  I open up AD (which doesn't work) and leave it open.

3.  I then quit out of the user altogether (with the "reopen windows" checkbox checked).

4. I open another user account on my Mac and do something for a minute.

5. I then log back in to the AD user account.

For some reason this "hard re-open" convinces it to come to its senses, and AD works again (with some lags here and there, but functionality is overall intact).

Hope this information is useful to someone!

[Old Bruce]

All users should have access to Affinity Designer if it is correctly installed.

/Applications/Affinity Designer.app

That is where it should be.

[R C-R]

5 hours ago, stlADfan said:

Problem:  After AD loads it cannot open files.  Easy way to tell if this is the case is that there is no visual preview, either on the Touch Bar or in Finder.  It knows the files are there but it can't "see" them.  You try to open a file and nothing happens.

What happens when you click on File > Open after AD loads? You should get a Finder style window where you can navigate to any folder where any file types that AD can open are stored. That includes JPEG, PNG, SVG, PDF, PSD, & the native Affinity format files (with any of the 3 file extensions .afphoto, .afdesign, & .afpub).

If you are not in a folder where any of those file types are stored, then whatever you see there will be greyed out because AD can't open it, so you need to navigate to a folder where they are stored.

[adolphsen]

Hi @stokerg, I was wondering if you could provide a status on a fix for this issue. I hate to be pushy as I could've just waited updating to a newly released OS, which is what I normally do, but working in AD over the last month has just been unbearable to a point where I need to look for alternatives. If you could provide some sort of time horizon for when a fix is expected, I can at least consider if it's worth going through the pain of downgrading macOS.

Thanks in advance from a long-term and otherwise happy user!

[adolphsen]

How to temporarily fix the constant lag:

The performance issues seem to be related to the Symbols panel. Either due to the amount of symbols you have, the complexity of them or the number of times a symbol is used in your artboards – or maybe all three. I check all three boxes, but experienced a drastic improvement in performances after removing all symbol from the Symbols panel.

While it's probably not ideal for some to delete all symbols from the Symbols panel, this does not unlink the symbols already used in artboards from one another. So you will still have the benefit of changing one symbol in an artboard, and see that change reflected in all instances of that symbol used in any other artboard. If you need another instance of that symbol, you just copy it from one of your artboards rather than dragging it from the Symbols panel.

Deleting all symbols from the Symbols panel can take a while as it's currently only possible by right-clicking every single symbol individually and choosing "Delete Symbol", but you will see the lagging gradually disappearing for each symbol you delete.

I also noticed that the load time of opening the AD file after deleting all symbols was reduced more than 50%.

---

Correction dec. 3: After continued work with this approach, it seems like deleted symbols from the Symbols panel are in fact unlinked on all artboards. I do, however, still have files where all symbols are now deleted, but are still linked in my artboards. I don't know why this is.

[v_kyr]

• More memory leaks in Monterey 12.0.1: how to avoid them