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Very disappointed with performance of Capture One 21 on MacBook Pro M1 Max fully specced out

Comments

29 comments

  • Dave R

    I have a new 14 inch Mac book pro and am extremely impressed how fast CO runs on it. Import of pictures from sd card is limited by speed of sd card so that standard previews build as fast as pics are imported. Switching between images is instant and zooming into 100% happens with no noticeable delay.  Very satisfied.

    Dave

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  • C-M-B

    From my personal experience - it starts faster on OSX, loads and displays all images faster - but switching from one image to the next and editing is faster in Windows.

    I don't know why but it looks like it's making better use of the GPU under Windows. Could be the switch from OpenGL to Metal and that it wasn't a great implementation.

    You might want to try disabling Hardware Acceleration and see whether that helps with the performance. Then you'll know for sure. 

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  • photo by FA

    I know the problem, your GPU is not enough especially if it is a large screen. iMac Pro is 5K so GPU is not enough, MBP Max is nearly 4K so GPU is not enough. GPU's are never enough for high resolution screens if you are using C1P. I have this issue since 2015 with v9 and the feedback I have received from support team is always my GPU is not enough.

    This is from their release notes

    Recommended system requirements

    If working with high-resolution images and doing calculation-heavy adjustments we recommend the following: 

    • Intel CPU with 4+ cores 
    • 16+ GB of RAM 
    • Solid State Disk (SSD) 
    • NVIDIA or AMD GPU with 8GB+ RAM 
    • Calibrated monitor with at least 1920x1200, 24-bit resolution at 96dpi 
       

    4k / 5k monitors
    Due to the significant additional calculation overhead, systems using 4k/5k monitors will require additional resources in addition to the above-recommended spec (both in GPU and CPU power). For professional experience, we recommend at least doubling the specification above for these configurations. 

    So you need to have 2 NVIDIA or 2 AMD cards, each with 8GB+ RAM. I don't know any laptop that has 2 GPUs

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  • BeO
    Top Commenter

    I wonder if any C1 employee uses a fully maxed MBP, or what are they using, what is David doing so that it does not look sluggish in his webinars (is he using an iMac "Maxi")?

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  • BeO
    Top Commenter

    Especially in the Mac world (as opposed to the Windows machines) my impression is that there are not sooo many different choices regarding hardware, so one could think that C1 could give specific recommendations (models and specs) if they tested with them or use them during their work to their satisfaction. Similarly, they could discourage users from those models / specs which do not work favorably with C1. No?

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  • Jeroen Bouman

    @ photo by FA: you're talking about INTEL machines with NVIDIA or AMD GPU's. Topic starter asked about the new M1 Max, that's a totally different beast. 

    Back on topic: I have a 2020 M1 MacBook Pro with just 8GB Ram. I shoot my GFX100s (Raw, lossless compressed, 14-bit) tethered to C1 (prefs are set to the -default- 2560px previews). When images are transferred to the Macbook, previews appear in a split second, un-pixelated. Same story when I start editing back home: no noticeable lag, my machine is very responsive with C1. And it stays responsive even with 300 images in the capture folder.

    Your experience with a machine that's at least 4x faster than mine is mind baffling. Have you tried setting preview size at 2560px?

     

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  • photo by FA

    Ok your MBP is what 13/14 inch, so not a 4K or 5K display. I’m very well aware of it is M1 CPU with different GPU however C1P requires a great deal of GPU power as the software relies heavily on GPU unlike Lightroom. Therefore on some tests, C1P is lagging really behind. It is very possible the software is not fully optimised for M1 Max.

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  • Christoph Müller

    Hi,

    @C-M-B: I tried with hardware acceleration off. Moving the exposure slider is a lot faster without hardware acceleration, if the preview size does not match your monitor. But if the preview size is matching your monitor, hardware acceleration ON is faster.

    I forgot to say, that I do not work on the 16" build-in display. I work on my Apple Pro Display XDR 6K. Capture One is fullscreen. Of cause the smaller I resize the window the faster the slider reacts.

    But the pixelated view when navigating through my images with the cursor keys on my keyboard is the same with hardware acceleration on and off. Also with the highest preview setting.
    It is also noticeable but much less with the C1 window resized to a 1/4 of my 6K screen size.

    Greetings,
    Christoph

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  • renek(a)

    J'ai eu le même problème... en désactivant la mémoire dans les Préférence (Général :  Accéleration matricielle), voir .JPG en attachement... J'ai aussi réduit légèrement la résolution de l'écran... le problème est résolu... en tout cas chez moi... reneka

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  • renek(a)

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  • photo by FA

    Christoph, I think you are out lot luck mate with 6K screen. 100% GPU issue they’ll say. A Mac Pro would be the right choice

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  • BeO
    Top Commenter

    Which somehow backs my point of having a list of recommended and maybe non-recommended Macs from C1, instead of plain vanilla more is better "at least double the specs".

    We have a real software in existence, and real available Mac specs available to buy from Apple, not just fuzzy virtual specs no one can actually identify or even buy.

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  • Phrank

    Hi, I don't have the newest Macs, but also wonder about the preview render performance.

    I have the feeling my 10 year old MacBook Pro isn’t much slower in dispaying the pictures than my maxed out Mac mini 2019 with 64GB RAM.

    I just remember the workflow from Lightroom. Let the Mac render the previews (after import at night) in monitor display size and you can jump between the pictures without wait for each picture to display when you do the edit.

    Quite annoying. Seems like I have to do the dirty work before in Photo Mechanic…

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  • Jonathan Fussell

    I have an MBP 19-inch 2019 and recently tried using Lightroom, results are fine but it was noticeably slower than C1. However, I am only using a 4K 10bit screen with 26 megapixels, switching off "automatic graphics switching" gives me the best performance.
    The experience showed me that I had not realised how quick capture one was, not that I was distressed at its speed.

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  • ---

    software performance is in my view a rather complex issue as a lot of  factors play a role, raw files size, amount and type of adjustments, the steps needed to accomplish the desired results, cpu & gpu, type of disks, available hd space and speed,  type of connections, screen resolution etc. which makes a reliable comparison impossible it is only the user who can decides what is fast enough for him. I also think it would be better to look at overall workflow performance taking into account every step and the complete work environment than just the software alone. 

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  • David Green

    Hi Christoph,

    I'm seeing the same thing as you. I just got a new 16" M1 Max decked out laptop and same deal. Using the M1 based version, each image is very slow to load and every adjustment I make can take a long time to register. Although I find it to be very inconsistent. Sometimes images take a full second or two to respond and other times they are pretty quick. It's all over the place in terms of responsiveness as you scroll through / edit photos. I am really hoping this is just some weird bug with C1 or the OS that just need to be worked out because it would be a real bummer if this is what we're stuck with. My main computer is a fast windows desktop (AMD 5950x / 3080Ti) and everything is absolutely instantaneous, even working with 45MP Canon R5 files. The desktop should technically still be a little faster than the MacBook but the difference should be barely noticeable in actual use.

     - Dave G

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  • Jeroen Bouman

    FYI, my positive experience as described earlier is with C1 running on macOS Big Sur 11.6.1. Perhaps Monterrey is to blame like Dave suggests - it wouldn't be the first time Apple releases a buggy OS. 

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  • BeO
    Top Commenter

    CSP,

    "lof of factors... which makes a reliable comparison impossible"

    A lot of factors, yes. But, there are tools out there for developers or software testers which simulate user interaction for automated testing, so with a defined test set (and please not only Phase One files :-), one could create a reliable comparison / benchmark test, and test out and compare different hardware, C1 versions, or MacOs versions; automated (ie.. reliably and repeatibly, with not much effort, once the tests and machines are set up).

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  • ---

    true but it will still not tell you what performance you will get and so it is only a theoretical interesting no ?

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  • Rainer Neumann

    Also disappointed with some issues: Yesterday the new 14" MacbookPro arrived: M1Max; 32 GB Ram. I thought that should be enough to speed it up in comparison to the 16" Intel 2,3 GHZ 16 GB Ram, but: sometimes while exporting pictures it freezes, sometimes it´s fast. Sometimes while drawing a mask and then refining it, it is fast as hell. Some task with the next pic from the same series (same size, same dimensions, etc) it takes up to 45 seconds until the job is done! The 16" wasn't fast with that task, it took always up to 5-10 seconds depending on the mask and the pic, but 45 seconds????

    The Mac OSX was fresh, the Capture one 14.4.1.16 installation also, so I guess the support for the M1 doesn't work right.......

    PS: while still trying out Capture One with M1 Max I realized that the problem seems to be weird: when one presses  command&Q at any time of the process of "rendering the mask" the notification window disappears an the mask is rendered perfectly, so it seems that Capture One keeps stuck only with the notification not with the process...... 

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  • jradamsjr

    I have two 2021 M1 Macs. One is a 14" MBP w/ 16 Gig and 1TB SSD and the other is a 23" iMac, also with the same 16Gig/1TB configuration.

    I have zero issues on the Macbook Pro with the 14' screen.

    I have all kinds of memory issues on the iMac w/ 4.5K built in monitor. I run out of RAM and physical memory every time I run the program on the iMac, which is annoying as hell since I obviously prefer to use the larger screen for this work.

    I am not technical enough to diagnose the problem. I just know it is there and I am guessing the monitor has something to do with it, as others have hinted. This really sucks.

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  • Lotuso10

    @Christoph Müller - are you getting any better performance after upgrading to CaptureOne 22? I wonder also if - takings @photo by FA's comments into consideration - you have experimented with a 2560 x 1440 res monitor?

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  • C-M-B

    I think it's due to the high-efficiency cores being used instead of the high-performance cores.

    The high-efficiency cores should take care of low priority processes/background tasks - those where it wouldn't matter whether they freeze for an instant or not.

    So it's possible that Capture One simply uses/addresses all cores, regardless of whether they are high-performance or high-efficiency and this could sometimes cause lags etc. - which would mean it's "just" a software issue which could be fixed with an update. 

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  • Rainer Neumann

    @lotuso10:
    I tried the 22 upgrade 3 months ago, but had the same issues. Capture one support gave up to resolve the problems only saying the last 22 update had solved the problems. Couldn’t verify this because my trial expired and I don’t intend to buy a new version only because “ perhaps” an existing problem might be solved….

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  • jradamsjr

    Has anyone tried the 15.2 version of Capture One '22? Just loaded it onto my M1 iMac and M1 MBP and letting them 'perculate' for a while to see what happens with the RAM usage. See if it leaks, as usual...I went back and forth w/ C1 support and ended up in a dead end. Was told by a support rep that this release "might" help. I read it is supposed to be "faster" with M1, which is great, but that was not my real problem although I know others have mentioned processor issues related to time to render images, etc. Keeping my fingers crossed. If anyone has any updates based on this new release, would love to hear about it! Thanks!

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  • Fraser Embrey

    I've been having a similar problem recently but I don't remember being as frustrated in the past.

    I've tried regenerating the previews, although I have no idea if it does anything as there's no feedback or noticeable change.

    I set previews to be enormous so it would always be able to use them.

    I edit on my M1 MacBook Pro 13" with 16GB of RAM, either with an external 4k display or the built in one. There's no difference as far as I can tell when I use either screen, or if I resize the window. Sometimes it's fast to load but often can take 10-20s per photo and even switching back and forth between photos takes time to load them again.

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  • Lotuso10

    @Fraser Embryo - I am working on the same system as you. Have you updated to the latest MacOS? I was experiencing the same issue with delay in loading images but after updating to 12.3 there is no lag when switching between images.

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  • Fraser Embrey

    @Lotuso10 I think I recently updated (and reinstalled too) I'm currently on 12.3.1

    It might be something to do with the update but I hope not, I can try to update/reinstall but am loathe to do so in the hopes it might improve.

    The switching is instant but the pixellated to clear is not. Interestingly I can sometimes open a photo and see it instantly (is this the preview being used?). Generally though, I wait 10-20 secs to load a not pixellated version.

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  • Phrank

    I have recently got a new little MacBookPro with 16MB RAM, but also wonder why Capture One is so slow only showing previews. Aren't these only JPG files in a selected size rendered from a RAW photo? My workflow with Aperture and Lightroom in the past was to import the photos and process the previews in 100% (over night). Then I did all the culling work. I don't really want to buy PhotoMechanic only to do this in an acceptable speed. I wish there would be an option like in PhotoMechnic to use also the embedded Previews of RAW photos. Beside of this issue, why it's soooo RAM hungry? But this is more an Apple Silicon M1 issue…

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