Digital Photo Professional (DPP) 4.5.X is slow (performance)

[raviballa]

I would love to continue to use DPP for its color output. But, where I am struggling with is its slowness to process RAW files. Loading of the RAW files is slow and I cannot tell when my minor corrections are applied to the image (there is no indication of DPP processing my adjustments). The 'Quick Check' of images is good though, without any lag.

Any suggestions?

[Waddizzle]

There is nothing wrong with DPP4.  The problem is the hardware that people are using.  Does this looks slow to anyone.

https://youtu.be/btUuHHqvOQs

I am using a 4GB graphics card.  DPP flies Ike the wind.  Any questions?

[vincentau]

Hello, So may I know what are currently using the machine type? I am so curious to know if you are using Nvidia graphic card type computer, DPP's can support on that driver coding API, so that's why can work well all the time on your work. The question is, as I quoted previously post and I raised out one of my question about the graphic card support and I haven't got reply answers from any Canon's representative. I currently using iMac 27" with AMD graphic card type model, so if I really want to use DPP 4.5.x with great editing performance, I better bought a new one as well in order to archive what I expecting it?! I thing that's impossible in real world. That's a great conversation with you guys for the captioned subject, thanks. Regards, Vincent

[Waddizzle]

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@vincentau wrote:
Hello, So may I know what are currently using the machine type? I am so curious to know if you are using Nvidia graphic card type computer, DPP's can support on that driver coding API, so that's why can work well all the time on your work. The question is, as I quoted previously post and I raised out one of my question about the graphic card support and I haven't got reply answers from any Canon's representative. I currently using iMac 27" with AMD graphic card type model, so if I really want to use DPP 4.5.x with great editing performance, I better bought a new one as well in order to archive what I expecting it?! I thing that's impossible in real world. That's a great conversation with you guys for the captioned subject, thanks. Regards, Vincent

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I am using a Dell [Inspiron 15, 7000 series laptop] with a Nvidia GeForce GTX graphics card with 4GB of RAM.  I also have 16GB of system RAM.  You have to tell the graphics card driver to include DPP.

This is not a high performance, high priced workstation [laptop].  It is a middle of the road gaming computer.  A budget priced, entry level machine [laptop] is inadequate.

[EDIT]

[vincentau]

Great to heard you reply for those valuable information, so that Canon developers who are watching on this topic can do something about this for all Canon users like us. Thanks again for your shared information.

[Waddizzle]

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@vincentau wrote:
Great to heard you reply for those valuable information, so that Canon developers who are watching on this topic can do something about this for all Canon users like us. Thanks again for your shared information.

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Let me repeat myself.  There is nothing wrong with the Canon DPP4 software package.  Nothing. 

I cannot speak for people using Apple hardware, but those running Windows need to use a machine with the horsepower to do intensive graphics processing.  A budget priced Windows laptop is simply not up to the task. 

[KBeat]

Hi Vince,

Here's the deal with the "use graphics processor for image processing" for Mac users. Canon's documentation is a bit weak on this, but let's start there:

"To use this function, a NVIDIA CUDA (Compute Capabilty 2.0 or higher) GPU with at least 1.0 GB of video memory is necessary. Additionally, the latest NIVIDA GPU driver must be installed."

That language is entirely PC. Mac users do not install their own GPU drivers, and even if you have an NVIDIA GPU that meets the requirements, the option in the preferences to use the GPU remains grayed out. I have a CUDA 3.0 capable GPU with 2 GB of video memory, for example, and I could not enable the option.

What you have to do is download the Mac specific CUDA driver from NVIDIA, which is separate from, and does not replace, the macOS graphics driver. You can find the latest release here: http://www.nvidia.com/object/macosx-cuda-8.0.63-driver.html

Once that is installed, you can then enable the option to "use graphics processor for image processing." 

If you have an AMD GPU, you can't use this feature*. This only works for NVIDIA. For whatever reason, and I think it's because this app is just a port from Windows, they elected to use CUDA rather than OpenCL which is built into macOS and would allow the app to leverage any GPU (NVIDIA, Intel, or AMD) for extra horsepower.

*AMD users, I wouldn't fret about this. At least on the Mac, I've found a negligible difference in performance with this option enabled. 

[KBeat]

Wad,

That wouldn't surprise me. Digging into the app a bit it appears to be just a port from Windows, with little in the way of Mac specific performance tuning, like using OpenCL, for example.

It's a shame, because the vast majority of Canon's pro users (including their Explorers of Light) use Macs (this is per Canon). It's not a suprise that almost all of them use Lightroom given how DPP performs on the Mac. Canon should be embarrased that the people they most count on to showcase their cameras opt for lesser quality RAW conversions because their software peforms so poorly.

As I've mentioned, apps like FinalCut Pro X, Lighroom, Photoshop, and CaptureOne fly on my machine. I'm running a trial of CaptureOne right now, before dropping $300 on it, and I was able to process around 500 RAW files in the time it would take to do about 100 in DPP. I can bang through an entire set of adjustments in CaptureOne on my 5D Mark IV files (exposure, color correction, sharpen, crop/alignment, shadows, noise, etc.) in the time it takes DPP to load a RAW file and then load the dust/stamp tool. That's before making a single adjusmtent in DPP. No bueno.

I'm sure I could eventually throw enough horsepower at it that it runs acceptiably, perhaps with a Mac Pro. However, my MBP is already many, many times above their "System Requirements" that I'm not even sure about that. (Quad Core 2.5 GHz i7, 16 GB RAM, 512 GB SSD, CUDA 3 NVIDIA GPU with 2 GB VRAM)

[RobertTheFat]

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@Waddizzle wrote:

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@vincentau wrote:
Great to heard you reply for those valuable information, so that Canon developers who are watching on this topic can do something about this for all Canon users like us. Thanks again for your shared information.

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Let me repeat myself.  There is nothing wrong with the Canon DPP4 software package.  Nothing. 

I cannot speak for people using Apple hardware, but those running Windows need to use a machine with the horsepower to do intensive graphics processing.  A budget priced Windows laptop is simply not up to the task. 

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Waddizzle, you insist on doubling down on a statement of opinion as though it were fact. My experience (and apparently that of several others) sharply contradicts that statement. All you can say for certain is that you're not seeing the problems that we're seeing, not that those problems don't exist. And at least some of those problems don't appear to have anything to do with the power of our graphics processors. I'm running DPP 4 on a computer that's almost certainly as powerful as yours and with twice as much memory. And I see long delays when all that's being displayed is JPEG thumbnails. Are the files you edit on a server or on the local machine? Mine are usually on a server, and I see extremely high activity on my LAN. I'm going to try to address that with a faster switch, but I still suspect that software inefficiency is the primary root of the problem.

[KBeat]

Here's a quick video I put together showing DPP performance on my system. Some things of note:

• Files are stored locally on an SSD, and there are only 46 images in this particular folder (Canon suggests trying with 10 or fewer, but that's entirely impractical).

• No other apps of significance are running, and more than 12 out of 16 GB of memory are free when launching DPP

• Use GPU is enabled and running (shown in video)

• RAW test image from 5D Mark IV, courtesy of DPreview.com's 5D Mark IV review.

• I have CPU usage displayed so you can see just how much CPU DPP uses to do even basic things like scroll.

• No adjustments had been made to the image prior to opening it in DPP

Just to load the image off a fast SSD is usually in the 10-15 second range, every time. Loading the stamp/dust tab is 15-20 seconds, every time. 

I could put together a video showing the entire correction workflow, but needless to say it's a slog. Doing the same thing, with the same files, in Lightroom and I don't even see the activity wheel once. Loading an image and every adjustment is instant.

I can't speak to Windows, but on macOS it's virtually unusable in its current state. I just can't spend 30-60 seconds of each image I edit waiting on activity wheels. I didn't even show an image export in the video. Exporting that one file to JPG takes about 15 seconds. 15 seconds for 1 image export! Multiply that out times a few hundred for a large job, and you have a long wait. Not good for rush jobs. In LR, that same export is near instantaneous. The app is just very poorly coded for macOS as there is no excuse for this type of performance.

Watch the test video here. 

[Waddizzle]

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@RobertTheFat wrote:

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@Waddizzle wrote:

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@vincentau wrote:
Great to heard you reply for those valuable information, so that Canon developers who are watching on this topic can do something about this for all Canon users like us. Thanks again for your shared information.

---

Let me repeat myself.  There is nothing wrong with the Canon DPP4 software package.  Nothing. 

I cannot speak for people using Apple hardware, but those running Windows need to use a machine with the horsepower to do intensive graphics processing.  A budget priced Windows laptop is simply not up to the task. 

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Waddizzle, you insist on doubling down on a statement of opinion as though it were fact. My experience (and apparently that of several others) sharply contradicts that statement. All you can say for certain is that you're not seeing the problems that we're seeing, not that those problems don't exist. And at least some of those problems don't appear to have anything to do with the power of our graphics processors. I'm running DPP 4 on a computer that's almost certainly as powerful as yours and with twice as much memory. And I see long delays when all that's being displayed is JPEG thumbnails. Are the files you edit on a server or on the local machine? Mine are usually on a server, and I see extremely high activity on my LAN. I'm going to try to address that with a faster switch, but I still suspect that software inefficiency is the primary root of the problem.

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Sorry, Bob.  I am not stating an opinion.  I posted a video of how fast DPP runs.  In an earlier post on this thread, I even acknowledged that DPP can run like a snail on a PC.  I also pointed out that using a graphcis card makes all of the difference. 

I needed a new laptop, so I bought one iwht a graphcis card.  By using a graphics card, your System RAM is not being used for video, and neither does your CPU spend time updating the GUI.  Having a lot of system RAM can slow down a system if the hard drive is slow, BTW, because of the paging file size.  Without a graphics card, much of your paging file is consiumed with video graphics data.

If you are not using a graphcis card, then you are comparing apples to oranges.  It's as simple as that, and that's a fact.