Help!

[Zeeem99]

Dear Affinity Team,

 

I hope that this finds you all well.

 

I am a free-lance photographer and recently purchased Affinity Photo as a replacement for PS, as I'm sure a lot of people are.  Unfortunately I have had problems with the software from day one.  Version 1.5 was totally unusable, crashing after a few seconds, most of the tools not working when it did run and having crippling lag.  I did go on the forums to see if anyone else was having the same problems and, unfortunately many people were.  Therefore I put it down to one of life's bitter experiences and accepted that I'd been basically shafted out of 50 euro plus I was/am quite busy with my work and couldn't afford to waste time with the program.

 

Than the 1.6 update was released and suddenly Affinity Photo opened and stayed open.  I even managed to edit a few photos- although still quite slow compared to Photoshop, Fotor, Paintshop Pro and other programs I was testing out- it was working.  God know how I'm going to maintain my workflow with its slow speed but at least it was working.   In my euphoria I went and ordered the Affinity Photo workbook, which cost me the same as the software!  Will I ever learn?!  A week later and it still hasn't been posted to me -is the book going to turn into a saga as well?  I pray no but something tells me yes.

 

Than update 1.6 something was released and guess what?  Yes this totally destroyed the software again! Crashing as soon as it opens-unresponsive tools-selection tools not working etc.  I uninstalled  the software and reinstalled it with the 1.6 update, not the second 1.6 update (wish I'd never seen that one) but the first.  Marginal improvement but still crashing etc.

 

Before you ask I have uninstalled/reinstalled it numerous times,  I have changed the settings to low dithering and to run on WARP,whatever that means.  I have tried everything in my limited technical knowledge to make it run smoother.

 

I am at my wits end and as a last ditch attempt I'm writing to you to 1. see if the program can be fixed  and 2. see if there is anyway to recoup the 100 euro I've just flushed down the toilet?

 

I am using an Acer 8943G, intel core i5-450M processor, ATI Mobility Radeon HD5650 Graphics Card with latest drivers and 8GB of RAM.

 

By the way PS flies on my machine, as does Lightroom (and that's a slow program) and I have downloaded trials of other photo editing software and I am only experiencing these problems with the one piece of software I went ahead and bought before trying, based solely on reviews, Affinity Photo.

 

I hope you can help and I look forward to hearing from you.

 

Regards

 

Ed  

[Alfred]

Welcome to the Serif Affinity Forums, Ed. 

 

8 minutes ago, Zeeem99 said:

I am using an Acer 8943G, intel core i5-450M processor, ATI Mobility Radeon HD5650 Graphics Card with latest drivers and 8GB of RAM.

 

Please also tell us about your operating system and any utilities running in the background.

 

[Pšenda]

I would try to switch to a graphic card driver, WARP (Windows Advanced Rasterization Platform) is a bigger load for the processor.

[Zeeem99]

Operating system is Windows 10.  I did have it running on the graphics card option but I read somewhere that running it on WARP was better -to be honest neither option make any difference, the program is still unusable.

 

What do you mean by utilities running in the background and how do I find out what these are?

[Alfred]

17 minutes ago, Zeeem99 said:

What do you mean by utilities running in the background and how do I find out what these are?

 

I mean things like anti-virus software (particularly if it does real-time/on-access scanning) and screen capture utilities or anything else that might intercept mouse clicks or key presses. Continuous backup software can also cause problems, but that usually affects saving rather than general program operation.

 

Press Ctrl+Shift+Esc to launch Windows Task Manager so that you can inspect the list of background processes.

 

[Zeeem99]

Did as you said;  in the compact view only the Opera browser shows and in the details view there are 102 "background" processes.  I am assuming that said processes are always in the background and yet do not interfere with PS or Lightroom or Photo Director 4 etc.  just in case you were going to advise me that this is where the problem lies! 

[R C-R]

4 hours ago, Zeeem99 said:

I am assuming that said processes are always in the background and yet do not interfere with PS or Lightroom or Photo Director 4 etc.  just in case you were going to advise me that this is where the problem lies! 

If Windows is anything like the Mac OS, background processes can interfere with the proper operation of only one or a few apps, so it is not safe to assume anything about the significance of that.

[gdenby]

Hi, Zeeem99,

 

Have you tried to open doing a reset to default? On Windows, I think its hold down Control when launching. I had a system problem on my Mac, and AP took 2 1/2 minutes just to start. After a reset start, it is just a few seconds, as it was at first.