Digital BW, The Print

> I'm working with files a lot bigger than that - 550MB TIFF files. Drum
> scans of 4x5 film, 16bit grayscale, about an 11x enlargement. My
> computer is a 1GHz Athlon, with 3GB main memory running win2k-sp4. It's
> sloooowwww, but livable. The 1.5GB color images are killer slow though
> ;-) Anything below about 250MB seems to run fine. At 100MB you might
> even think it quick.
>
> One thing that helps is having two physical diskdrives with one
> dedicated to be Photoshop's scratch disk.
>
> I just wish the clowns at micro$oft and adobe would get their act
> together and give us 64 bit support (I'd change to Mac in a minute, but
> Photoshop is the problem there).
> --
> Hogarth Hughes

I am going to jump in here and offer a "saner" perspective? I remember
reading many years back about computers and the incredible speed with which
they did their jobs, were going to free us from the shackles of our
miserable existence. Well, as most of you have noted it just ain't true.
Flash forward to maybe ten years later, and I was fascinated by an article
(I don't remember by whom or where), in which the author had researched
thoroughly and pointed out that the "computer revolution" had indeed chopped
10%, maybe 20%, maybe even 30% of the time required to do a task, but
frequently the time was cut away from the middle of said task. In other
words, you started at 1:00 p.m and finished at 2:00 p.m. but there was a
6-18 minute "gift" in the middle . . . what do people do? The majority sit
and stare at their screen bitching about how "slow" the computer is.
Productivity is at the same snails pace as it was years ago. If your
computer is slowing down while you wait for a conversion or a rendition or a
print, pick up the f***ing mop and clean your studio. Lick and glue some
envelopes. Return some phone calls. Dust and clean your equipment . . . this
is TIME, and should be used productively, not sitting on your fat butt and
bitching that MS or someone else isn't doing enough for YOU. Do it yourself.

Honestly . . . if the print takes five minutes instead of two, does that
make a real difference in your business? Not unless you are a real
incompetent leaving everything until the last minute. The same for scans and
renditions . . . there is ALWAYS something else you could be doing, but as
an incompetent it is so much easier to shovel the "you know what" somewhere
else.

Paul Aparycki