Having just had to reinstall my XP system due to yet another catastrophic failure (it deleted its own configuration files on shutdown, and not for the first time either), I am rebuilding the windows file structure while I wait for Ubuntu 8.0 to be published.

OK, Elements problem. I have just over 11,000 images on my picture drive. The organiser is, allegedly, building the keywords for these. The task manager shows the organiser as active, CPU usage (3.3khz) at 70% and memory (1gb) usage similar. The problem is it has been like this for 6 hours, with the task bar stuck at 50% complete (I know that this doesn't necessarily mean that is how  much is done).

I know from before the crash that the Elements OrganiZer is one of the slowest pieces of software ever created, but does anyone have any idea how long it should take to process 11,000 files and their keywords?

Or shall I just stop it now and cut my loses?

Thanks in advance,
Howard

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I turned it off - it had locked up. And then windows wouldn't restart except in safe mode. And people pay Adobe money for this stuff? Damn . . I did!

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I use Elements and like it very much, but I will not use it for backing up my files. I used to have the original Adobe Photoshop Album and so I used that to make a backup of all my photographs onto CD's. I verified everything so I knew it was ok.

Then my computer crashed big time and I had to reinstall Windows and everything else. I wasn't too bothered as I'd backed up my Photo's. Big mistake. On reinstalling Photo Album I proceeded to attempt to bring back all my files off the CD's. Photoshop Album wouldn't recognise the disks. Nothing I did would work. Luckily I had backed up using Windows Explorer as well so I got most files back.

Now I always use Nero to back up my images. I wouldn't touch Photoshops backup with a barge pole.

Fundamentally there's nothing wrong with Windows, Photoshop, Elements or indeed their backup mechanisms especially with a long running OS as XP. However, Microsoft, Adobe and Co. can't test their applications against every other application known to mankind especially the thousand and one pieces of freeware/plug-ins there are out there. And this IMHO is where the problem lies - users clog up their PC's with all sorts of applications - in my case it's Quick Time which I thoroughly loath, alway causes my PC not to shut down correctly but is an application I have to use because I download and watch various Photoshop TV episodes and Lightroom bits and pieces. If it ever got to the stage where my PC was crashing regularly involving the loss of data then of course it would have to go.

It is only relatively recently that I stopped using Elements in-built backup facility and only then because I wasn't too enamoured with it's policy of changing the file names. No doubt as part of the restore process (never used so never tested) the original file names would have been restored in the catalogue but this kind of put me off a bit. Whichever method of backup a user chooses my own advice would be (a) to always ensure by careful research that a backup created in one application would work i.e. be restoreable in another application and (b) run a test using a small file first that comprised of either non important data (images) or copies of same. By the way, it was through (b) that I stumbled upon the file name change.

I wasn't using elements to back up - I use genie for all back ups. And then I duplicate the backups onto DVD.

There is actually a well known glitch in the Adobe file tracker (apdproxy.exe) that causes start up problems. It tries to locate a non existent .dll file, one that's not in the Adobe package to start with. The bad news is that no-one seems to care. I've googled it and found that there is no solution offered, other than to uninstall programmes one at a time until the problem disappears. Trouble is it is a random problem - sometimes it appears in an error box, sometimes it doesn't. So I will continue to rely upon google's excellent free Picasa for organising the library, especially as this works in Linux without having to use WINE.

I also obey rule number one with windows - never, but never, store any data in the same partition as the operating system, and preferably not on the same physical drive. This way when windows folds irreparably, as it periodically and inevitably does, all you have to do is reinstall the devil's work itself.

Conclusion - Adobe Elements Organiser best avoided.

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Forseti, forgot to mention, Windows Media Player 11 plays the Photoshop TV quicktime files no problem - it says it doesn't recognise the format, but if you go ahead and press 'play' anyway, it's quite happy.

Howard.

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Howard,

Thanks for the tip - I'll try that one. Here's a tip by way of return. The apdproxy thing is only too well known by Adobe and has been mentioned and complained about in the Adobe Lightroom forum since the early beta versions. Users have reported that if you have Lightroom installed then upon inserting a CF card Lightroom automatically opens which will not always be desired of course. Worse still, some users have reported that when starting up their printers this also fires up Lightroom. The solution is by good fortune easy although why Adobe should foist this upon users is beyond us all.

Start > Run > type in msconfig ok > go to Start Up Tab > uncheck apdproxy and click OK.

You will get a system pop-up window asking whether you want to restart the computer amongst other things - click yes if you want to or cancel if you're not particulary bothered at this time. Upon next system start you will get a system pop-up again advising of a system change which will pop up every time you start the system up unless you check the box 'do not show again'.

End of problem.

 

Forseti, Thanks for the tip : just one thing though - I don't have Lightroom, so where on earth has it come from? Nevertheless, I'll do the disable thing, if it comes up again. It didn't this morning. Howard.

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I think it started with Elements as you've already discovered and then migrated it's way into other Adobe products but seems only to have caused major headaches in Lightroom. Strange how Adobe drop one annoying thing (for some anyway) e.g. Adobe Gamma and then introduce another pain in the buttocks. Anyway, everyone I know has disabled it so maybe Adobe might take the hint. There is one other nasty piece of call-home software and that is called Bonjour and has something to do with Apple believe it or not. Trying to get rid of that (which nobody is 100% sure of what it does) is like........well nigh on impossible.

It really annoys me when applications install things you neither know about nor want.

BTW, the way I discovered that MP11 will play the Photoshop TV shows is because it was the last player I had left that I hadn't tried - nothing else would play the files, including Quicktime . .

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I did a full backup using Elements a couple of months ago which filled 6 CDs (I also do a regular backup to an external hard-drive of all data on my PC). To be honest, I'm not that sure what the Elements backup offers over and above just copying the files via Windows to an external hardrive. The files are given funny names and each disk contains a couple of extra files that I assume relate to the Photoshop albums.

I like Elements for editing but the organiser doesn't seem any better than Picasa 3. Does anybody else agree?

newsnapper:

I did a full backup using Elements a couple of months ago which filled 6 CDs (I also do a regular backup to an external hard-drive of all data on my PC). To be honest, I'm not that sure what the Elements backup offers over and above just copying the files via Windows to an external hardrive. The files are given funny names and each disk contains a couple of extra files that I assume relate to the Photoshop albums.

I like Elements for editing but the organiser doesn't seem any better than Picasa 3. Does anybody else agree?

 

I received a copy of Elements 6 with an OU course I did last year. The organiser is pretty good, I think, and I have created a number of albums to sort by pictures into manageable chunks. What I don't like is the rename facility; Picasa beats this hands down. The backup facility is a bit weird as well and I prefer to just copy all photo files to my external hard-drive rather than use any software specific method. Other than that, I don't have a problem with the Elements organiser.

Felix, can I pursue your mention of Albums. I don't have the original problem (yet!) which was the basis of this thread but I do have a problem with Albums. When I first bought PSE6 I thought Albums would be a great idea and created approx 4. Since that time I have been unable to display or open them. I click on the little tabadjacent to albums but although it expands the box there is nowt but a "In the last 6 months" title which has nothing in it.

Do you have albums and /or Smart Albums? Do you have any problems opening them or listing them?Have you found them to be better than catalogues or even just using Keyword tags? Any observations from yourself or others most welcome.

Many thanks, Vincent

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VincentvanFluff
Vincent's DCM Gallery

Vincent

 I haven't had a problem with albums at all; in fact I find them very useful. I started by setting up albums for the family holidays and sub-albums under them for the various activities we did. They make locating pictures very easy indeed. I haven't bothered with tags yet. I was going to tag each picture with a keyword or two but realised it would be a lifetime's work so haven't got round to starting it!