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Photoshop CS6 - Screen flickering when using brushes with new MacAir 2013

New Here ,
Jun 26, 2013 Jun 26, 2013

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Would the Adobe team please respond to the issues reported by several users:

http://forums.adobe.com/message/5449199

A number of users experience severe screen flicker in Photoshop CS6 when using any of the larger brush type tools (cloning, eraser, brush, spot healing, burning, and dodging).  As many on this thread are experiencing, it is awfull and unusable! The flicker is screen wide black boxes, sometimes the whole screen goes black.  It only seems to happen when we put the cursor over the image to edit.

Hardware:  MacBook Air 13", Haswell 1.7 GHz, 8GB, 512 SSD Software:

Photoshop CS6 v13.1.2 20130105.r.224, OS X v10.8.4 (and perhaps others)

Looks like a CS6 is not compatible with teh new MacAir. Please look into this and advise.

Adobe Photoshop Version: 13.1.2 (13.1.2 20130105.r.224 2013/01/05:23:00:00) x64 Operating System: Mac OS 10.8.4 System architecture: Intel CPU Family:6, Model:69, Stepping:1 with MMX, SSE Integer, SSE FP, SSE2, SSE3, SSE4.1, SSE4.2, HyperThreading       

Message was edited by: GSVAI

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correct answers 1 Correct answer

Community Expert , Jul 19, 2013 Jul 19, 2013

Apple has released an update to the MacBook Air 2013 that fixes this very issue: http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1672

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Adobe
Jun 26, 2013 Jun 26, 2013

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>> The flicker is screen wide black boxes, sometimes the whole screen goes black.

What you're reporting is either a bug in the video drivers, or a bad GPU.

In either case, Apple is the only party that can solve it.

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Community Beginner ,
Jun 26, 2013 Jun 26, 2013

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This is also happening in the new Photoshop CC . I have seen a few people complaining about this on other forums such as Mac Rumors as well. I have the 2013 Macbook Air i5/8gig machine with Haswell.

Everything else works great on this machine so this is clearly an Adobe issue that needs to be resolved asap.

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Jun 26, 2013 Jun 26, 2013

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No, you most likely don't have other applications using the GPU in the same way.

Especially if it happens in CS6 (and hasn't happened on other hardware), it means a bad video card driver or GPU.

And since we haven't heard of that many people having problems, it might be bad batch of hardware.

You really need to talk to Apple about this.

We will try to pursue it with our Apple contacts.

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Community Beginner ,
Jun 26, 2013 Jun 26, 2013

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Better solution. Why doesn't ADOBE talk to APPLE about it? If a few people are already posting about it in the forums don't you think that many others haven't even discovered the problem? I just installed it onto my first Mac which is the air today. I tested the problem just to see what others were talking about - I probably would have not encountered this problem anytime soon as I rarely use huge brushes.. Don't believe me?? Hmm why not look at these threads?

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5111828?start=0&tstart=0

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1602252

Stop passing the buck and get it worked out. Thats what us and others who pay a ton of money every month to Adobe for Creative Cloud expect.

Thank you.

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Jun 26, 2013 Jun 26, 2013

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Because we haven't seen the problem, and don't have any of the affected machines.

Apple needs to know which machines are affected, and possibly test those machines.

Apple does have known bugs with their cursor handling, especially in 10.8.x - but usually that just causes the cursor to disappear, and it happens in all applications.

My guess is that in this case there is a certain revision of the GPU or driver code that has this problem, and it does not affect all machines (otherwise we would have seen it ourselves).

But we cannot solve these video driver issues - as we do not have the source code to Apple's video drivers.  Only Apple can debug their video drivers (or pass it on to the GPU maker)

I know it's easy to blame Adobe because the Apple bug shows up in Adobe software.

But Adobe is not Apple, and Adobe cannot solve all of Apple's problems.

Adobe relies on Apple's OS code working correctly, much like your car relies on a decent road to run on.  And you don't call Honda to fix potholes.

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Community Beginner ,
Jun 27, 2013 Jun 27, 2013

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It also appears to be doing it in CS 5 according to another person on Mac Rumors. They took a video of it doing it .. not very clear shot but thats what it does on my screen too.. if not a little worse. Here it is below:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=463152160442512&set=vb.324069114350818&type=2&theater

I am not trying to get into its an Adobe fault only however instead of us going to Apple it would be better if the company who makes the program goes to them and says look we have some reports of this can you look into it especially when others have said that Apple is pointing users towards Adobe. We would like this fixed as soon as possible. Surely Adobe has more sway as a company than a few of us on some forums or filing bug reports.

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Jun 27, 2013 Jun 27, 2013

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When we file a bug with Apple that we cannot reproduce ourselves: Apple ignores it.

( NOTE - I have now reproduced the issue on my own machine, and am reaching out to Apple hardware folks to get this looked at)

Apple needs to hear from customers who exerperience the problem, and needs details on exactly which systems have the problem.

We will continue to research this, and if we find a system that reproduces it, then we can file a bug with Apple and have some hope that they might investigate.

Also, thanks for the video - that is definitely a driver or GPU issue, though with that kind of flickering I'd also suspect the LCD driver circuits.

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Community Beginner ,
Jun 27, 2013 Jun 27, 2013

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Does anyone at your company have the new 2013 air? I and others would like to know if it works correctly for anyone as we still have the return period. This is the new haswell gpu drivers that may be buggy but we need to know without being told to go back and forth. Any further research into this would be appreciated. I really want this resolved as I am loving my new Mac air and really do enjoy using the creative cloud.

I found this issue after playing with the brushes and blur tool at a very large size.

Thanks.

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Jun 27, 2013 Jun 27, 2013

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Yes, we do - and can't reproduce the problem so far. (my guess is that the problem only affects some batches of machines)   We'll keep trying, though.

But without a system showing the problem, I can't isolate the cause.

It could be the driver, the GPU (or VRAM), or the LCD drivers.

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Community Beginner ,
Jun 27, 2013 Jun 27, 2013

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Chris,

Thanks for trying. I just opened up Photoshop CC again to see if I could narrow it down with the brushes. I noticed that over 60px was when a lot of problems were happening but it also depended on the hardness of the brush. Sometimes it wouldn't do it unless I moved it up in size etc. and some of the other brush settings (can't think of the names but not the normal round ones)  did not appear to have an issue. Not sure what else I could do to help.

I worry that it works on the machines you tested on but not right on ours.. shouldn't it be the same drivers for all? The LCD driver I could understand being a little different as Apple seems to have LG or Samsung. If it helps mine is an LG.

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Jun 27, 2013 Jun 27, 2013

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It should be the same drivers, but things may have been updated for a new batch of chips, or the chips could be bad.

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New Here ,
Jun 28, 2013 Jun 28, 2013

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I'll take my MacBook Air to the local Apple store and show them what is going on. I will also show them our discussions. Someone has to listen to us at Apple. Touch wood

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Community Beginner ,
Jun 28, 2013 Jun 28, 2013

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Thanks - that would be great if we know what Apple says in the store. Its a bit of a drive for me to get one and mine is BTO so if there is an issue I will have to mail it back and wait for a new one. Holding out hope that its something simple like a driver issue that can be fixed!

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Community Beginner ,
Jun 28, 2013 Jun 28, 2013

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Another video posted by someone else:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7bdy2qr4lm9py11/IMG_2355.MOV

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Jun 28, 2013 Jun 28, 2013

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That's not even a very large cursor - and not the sort of rolling/VBL like artifacts you could get from application timing issues with the GPU.  (and not much like a driver issue, either)

Yeah, the more I see the more I suspect that this is a GPU/LCD driver problem.

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Jun 28, 2013 Jun 28, 2013

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An update:

I went to the Apple store and brought myself a more recent MacBook Air (13", 4/256 FYI, they were out of the 8/512 model).    I can't reproduce *exactly* what you're showing, but got the flicker to happen by resizing the cursor.    Also, while painting, the screen seems to stop updating except for the cursor -- not only is Photoshop unable to draw, but other applications stop drawing as well.  And a few times it hasn't even updated the cursor (while all other apps seem frozen).  That's not normal.

When I see the flickering, I frequently see the menubar and other UI elements draw at the wrong location on the LCD, then black, then redraw in the correct location -- repeat in different positions and lots of "static" until I stop changing the cursor.  That's more evidence of a hardware or and odd driver issue.  The odd thing is: it doesn't happen all the time.  It's possible that the one we have at the office also shows the problem, but we didn't test long enough.

I'm trying to reach out to my hardware contacts at Apple - but it's a weekend before a holiday, so we may not make progress immediately.

One thing that would be useful here: the model of MacBook Air that you have that shows (or doesn't show) the problem. 

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Community Beginner ,
Jun 28, 2013 Jun 28, 2013

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Chris,

Thanks for taking the time to grab one at the store. I have been following several forums and some people are saying the issue isn't always "consistent". Anyway another person shot a few videos that may be helpful to you if you have not already seen it. I am seeing pretty much the same issues:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6gX2ydkVz4&feature=youtu.be

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMH6EczMrSI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElofXqNnJ58

The model I have is the i5/256 gig SSD and 8 gigs of memory. I ran some command in terminal and found that it is an LG brand LCD screen.

Hopefuly someone can figure it out or at least tell us if we have a bad batch so we can get a replacement. I don't want to bother getting a new one sent yet if it could have a good chance of having the same issue.

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Jun 28, 2013 Jun 28, 2013

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Thanks for the pointers - and I hadn't seen that last video yet.

And here's my 60 seconds of oops: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJAY6Xo0JzI.

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New Here ,
Jun 29, 2013 Jun 29, 2013

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Update from Brisbane, Australia:

I bought a 13" MBA 4GB 256GB on Wednesday - which I plan to use whilst on location shoots; as soon as I read about this problem, I tried it out and can confirm that flickering occurs (and even at times the screen completely darkens) at certain brush sizes relative to the zoom amount (ie: a large brush size with the canvas zoomed out, or a small brush size with the canvas zoomed in)
Went to the Apple Store yesterday and explained to them the situation - the genius told me to back up my MBA then come back today so they can replace it. There'd still be chances of the new MBA I'm getting to be faulty but hey, if later on, they confirm that it is a GPU problem, I'll be able to return the new one too and get a new new one.

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Jun 29, 2013 Jun 29, 2013

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After more testing, I went a couple of hours without glitches, then this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hl8D2nKAHKQ&feature=youtu.be

It looks like the backlight is turning off in some cases, and the display driver is picking up garbage or offset data in several cases.

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New Here ,
Jun 29, 2013 Jun 29, 2013

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Chis, I tried to do a screen video capture using "Jing" but as soon as Jing is active the flickering stops completely and the large brush works perfectly. Stopping Jing brings the flickering back.

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Community Beginner ,
Jul 01, 2013 Jul 01, 2013

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Chris,

Did you ever hear back from any Apple Engineers? Would like to know if this can be resolved soon.

Thanks

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New Here ,
Jul 01, 2013 Jul 01, 2013

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I think there is an issue with how the mba wakes up from sleep. I can't reproduce the problem after boot or reboot, but easily after waking my macbook from sleep by changing the brush size with the square bracket keys while leaving the brush in the canvas.

It happens on both PS C6 and CC

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Jul 01, 2013 Jul 01, 2013

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No, I haven't heard back from Apple engineers yet.

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