Lightroom 6.5 - Very Slow Import

[catebrownphoto]

I have been running Lightroom on my iMac for years, since LR3.  I updated to LR6 and El Capitan, and it has been working just fine until about LR 6.5 which showed some issues.  I'm on LR 6.6 and El Capitan 10.11.5 now and it has not been resolved.

IMPORT is running EXTREMELY slow.  I shoot events and it used to take about 15-20 minutes to import a full 32GB card.  Now it takes an hour or more.  It's also taking much longer to build previews than before.

Also, files are getting imported in random order, not based on their time stamp.  So if I rename files during import the file sequencing is not in order when I sort by capture time.  I've resolved to not rename during import, and after importing I sort by capture time and apply my naming conventions, so a step that used to save me time during import is now of no use.

None of my equipment or workflow has changed.  I shoot with a Nikon D600 and D750, always NEF.  Importing to the local HD.  The rest of my computer is running fine.  I am just so incredibly surprised by the giant lag time import now has.   The amount of time this is now taking is excruciating.

Thoughts?

[dj_paige]

Make sure it's not your card reader that is malfunctioning causing this slowness. Make sure there's nothing wrong with the camera card.

If the order is not correct, then in Lightroom change the sort order. This can be done in the Import dialog box or in the Library Module, whichever you prefer.

[yupenggu]

I am on windows 7 and experiencing the EXTREMELY slow import since the June update. 460 raw files took 1.5 hr to build the 1:1 preview. And the LR is not responsive during that process.

None of my workflow has changed as well. I have a i7 5820, only 14% of the CPU is being used. Everything I do during the import with preview build takes at least 5 seconds to respond. It's painful...

[dj_paige]

Please read my earlier answer.

[yupenggu]

No, it's not card or card reader. Everything is on a SSD already. It's the preview building that is painfully slow. And the UI is almost not responsive during that process.

[DdeGannes]

Quote "Everything is on a SSD already. It's the preview building that is painfully slow. And the UI is almost not responsive during that process."

All your files are on one SSD drive? What is the drive size and how much free space is available on the drive. You will need at least 20 to 25 %  of the drive capacity free.  so if the drive is 500GB make sure there is at least 100GB free.

[yupenggu]

512G SSD with more than half free space. And it's dedicated to pictures.

[dj_paige]

What drive are the catalog and previews on?

[roxannh45472705]

I am experiencing super slow importing as well - and I am only importing from my computer hard drive 35 jpegs  - I have never experienced such super agonizing slowness with LR ever before.

So I decided to try a "new catalog" and presto bingo!  no problems - imported quickly as usual.  I am guessing that my previous catalog had maybe

too many files, folders, images? it isn't the end of the world for me to start a new catalog.  Also, I am unsure how I would correct this issue.

[1Levitator]

I'm using LR 6.5 on a high-power HP workstation with enough memory, hard disk space and Win7 running on SSD. Fast. Tonight I imported some 300 images and building the standard previews was incredibly slow. Had to go away for an hour and when I came back the progress was about 5%... Then something happend and I cannot put my finger on this 100%. I happend to flip between the library view and develop view and the performance increased by a light-year. It took only (hah hah) 5 minutes to do the rest! Maybe that nudged something in the program and got it out of an endless loop or something. Try this and let the community know if this was real or just my imagination.

[1Levitator]

Version 2015.6.1 fixed my problem. Works like charm!

[Pete.Green · Accepted solution]

This issue should be fixed in the CC 2015.6.1 update that went live today. Please update Lightroom to the latest version.

More info here: Lightroom CC 2015.6.1 now available

Regards

Pete

[Brian_Stormont]

I'm running Lightroom CC 2015.6.1. and am still seeing unusably slow imports.   It seems the slowness started a couple updates ago.

[Geoff the kiwi]

What is your OS and where are you importing from and to where, using what connection.

[VideoTrainer]

This is happening for me to.  I have Lightroom 6.6.1.  I took 5 minutes to import 1 jpg from the internal hard drive on my mac laptop. 

Excruciating. 

I've been researching this like crazy for the past few days.  It doesn't matter what version of Lightroom I'm using.  I tried a fresh install of just the original 6.0.  Then tried various upgrades until now I'm at 6.6.1 and nothing is helping. 

[Johan_Mellin]

Something is just not right in the code.

I also get it to work fine after "the latest update", but then next time or some imports later I'm back at 30 min to import from card reader. Card reader to internal SSD take avbout 3 min, and even from internal SSD it takes the 30 or so minutes.

As a user since 1,2 i have already passed the crossroads in my mind, I'm tired of this

I'm a bit angry that I can't show Adobe my conumer power by not buying the product anymore as it is included with other apps I use in CC

Anyhow just waiting for the release of my new RAW developer and I'm out.

[VideoTrainer]

Yeah mine is not importing again either.  Very frustrating.

[hkokko]

Running very very slow on my Mac. Import is coming from 7200RPM Mac Fusion drive which has 500 gigabytes empty and is going to fast usb 3.0 drive which has 220gb empty. iMac 3.4ghz Intel Core i7. MacSierra but same situation with ElCapitan. 32gb memory 1600Mhz DDR3 memory. Nvidia GeForce GTX 680MX 2048 MB. System is plenty fast enough for fast editing in Lightroom and any other stuff I am throwing at it.

Use grahics card accelaration is on (I tried with off - did not help). The same thing happens from any/many readers or memory cards.

All the disks are checked for corruption - none found.

The import of 40 something Cr2 (30mb) has taken several hours and only one is visible in the Download backup folders, none are visible in the import window. Copy and import bar is one third of a way thru.

Does not seem to make a difference if I put detect duplicates on or off. Nor if I have the download backup copy option on or off. Nor if I have do 1:1' previews on or off.

Catalog has 170.000 photos and has been optimized today.

Version of the lightroom is cc 6.5.latest what Adobe provides

This starts to be quite frustrating.

[Geoff the kiwi]

There is something not happening correctly for sure.

Does this happen if you first import using Image Capture to your SSD and then Import to Lightroom using "Move" to shift to the USB drive??

[hkokko]

Well I am importing from Fusion drive which is combination of SSD/Hard Drive.  It does not matter what is the source - it is same kind of slow.

I am not sure what you mean by "Image Capture to your SSD and then Import to Lightroom using "Move" to shift to the USB drive??" - the pictures are already on my Fusion drive. It is the copy and import I am using (which still is ongoing after several hours from the hard drive - without showing the first picture.

To make things laughably interesting - Apple Photos is quite fast in importing those, smae goes for Photo Mechanic. 

To me this indicates software /configuration issue in Lightroom.

I can still try to import to a completely catalogue - so let's see if that makes a difference.

[hkokko]

With brand new empty catalog - the results are the same. Takes enormous time to import a single RAW file - has not finished in minutes.

[hkokko]

It does not seem to about file movements. Using "Add" results in same slowness.

[hkokko]

Tried this with trial license of a competing major product. Got 100 (30+mb RAW) images imported in less than 4 minutes from the card in the same system. So there seems to be something odd going on...

[Geoff the kiwi]

My friend I have used Macs and Adobe apps for many years and experience shows when things are happening like this there will 99% of the time be a simple cause that just needs isolating..... understand the there are most likely millions of users on Macs and they aren't all getting what you are experiencing.. and I am not either.

So tell us the files from which camera you are importing with what hardware from where to where in detail.

Image Capture is the Apple app included on every Mac that in fact Apple Photos uses to import to disk. Lightroom calls the OS as well.

I was suggesting that you open Image Capture and use that to download the files to where you want them and then see if they import to Lightroom using ADD quickly.

Try that and also answer the question in detail..... thanks

[Johan_Mellin]

I agree, probably some small conflict with lightroom import. As this probLen is seen also on Windows it's not OSX related.

I think Adobe just decided it's not worth looking into this as it affect only a small percentage of users. And they are getting payed anyway with CC.

I'm just a sad paying user since version 1.2 that have to find another app, still loving it, but can't use it.