Photoshop CS2 Mac / Rosetta - Switch Review

Okay, I've had the new MBP 17 for a week or so. Last night I dug in and actually did some editing in Photoshop in two different configurations. As an 'artistic' wedding photographer, Adobe Photoshop is the most important piece of software I own. I haven't seen many other reviews on the net that go into an actual hands on review like this, so hopefully it'll be of some use to some of you.

Short story: It's like choosing between bad and worse, and Adobe needs to release CS3 / Universal for Mac ASAP.

Config 1: Photoshop CS2 Mac, running on the Intel CoreDuo. This of course invokes the hidden OS X translator "Rosetta". (From this point on, I'll never again trust anyone named 'Rosetta', if that's any coincidence for you).

Config 2: Photoshop CS1 PC, running on Windows XP SP2 via Parallels in Full Screen mode. This runs native on the Intel, but unfortunately, there were still problems.

For Reference: I'm coming from a full on desktop workstation, self built with top of the line components including 3.0Ghz P4 with HT, 2GB the highest speed Ram at the time, 800Mhz FSB, fast 7200 RPM serial hard drives, and a fat video card. This machine was very solid, ran perfectly for just over 2 years now, but is now starting to suffer from the typical windows bog down and needing a reload. I would consider this computer "fast" by anyone's standard and is what I'm judging the MacBook Pro based upon.

Parallels: Okay, I did all my homework and planned to run CS1 in Windows until CS3 came out native for the CoreDuo. Parallels is sweet. It's fast, it works as advertised and once clicked into full screen mode, you really can't tell any difference between it and a standard Windows computer. It ran pretty well as fast as my desktop. Without real testing who knows, but in Windows mode, this 1" thin laptop flys.

Not so fast... Oh, but did I mention the down side? Well, the propaganda from the Parallels folks forgot one small detail. If you use a Wacom tablet (I rely on this thing more than my right arm, right eye, and clicker finger put together) - you can forget Parallels. For some reason, the USB recognizes this is a "pointing device" true enough, but then tells the guest OS (Windows XP in this case) that it has a standard pointing device / mouse connected. NOT a Wacom tablet. When you load up the Wacom driver, it spits and you and says you don't have a compatible tablet attached, even when you do.

The tablet will still work, but you loose all pressure sensitive features, tilt if you use it, and the difference between the pen tip and eraser tip. It's just a glorified mouse at that point. No pressure control - that's the whole reason I use it.

I could almost deal with that if not for another annoyance - when you bring up your brush (the circle telling you how large it is), Parallels leaves the previous cursor floating intermittently in the middle. Be it an arrow, resize que, hand, or cross hair depending on your previous mode. It doesn't sound bad, but suffice to say it's annoying.

But other than that - Photoshop was zooming along. No shudder at all. Perfectly smooth user interface. Have no fear runing PC based software on a Mac from this day forward. Unless you use a Wacom. Just my luck. (hit head on desk).

Why 'Rosetta' is a Four Letter Word:
Having scratched plan A, I figured the Mac version of Photoshop can't possibly be 'that' bad. I read filters run a bit slow - hey, no problem, but the acutal user interface was just fine. I had hope.

The direct answer on this one, Photoshop via Rosetta is indeed usable, but just on this side of that label. I would say "just usable". The overall everything drags a bit. Even things like changing brush diameter wth the bracket keys (which I do quite often) - takes a second to update on the screen. When actualy working, cloning, brushing, there is a very slight delay to see your stroke. It is quite short and not enough to prevent doing the work, but it's just enough I can't call it fluid real-time like I'm used to on my PC workstation.

Filters (gaussian blur, etc) did lag a spit second, but nothing too serious.

Part of my feeling of "lagging" performance I think is also due to the fact the Mac keyboard is backward, and for some reason I'll never understand, you can't assign PS keyboard shortcuts using the Ctrl key, which my finger memory is stuck on. Everything must now be keyed off the Apple/Option key, which is 3 keys down the board from where my pinky wants to push them. I'm hopeful I'll eventually work it out and re-train my hands.


What's the Plan?
Well, I paid the price of admission into the Mac club, so I'll make it work. I'm going to run Photoshop in Mac mode under Rosetta, as I must have my Wacom even if things are a bit slow.

Would I Recommend it?
If you rarely dip into PS, there's no fear going with a Macintel. And if you are, it'll work, but don't force it on yourself if you can avoid it. The short story here is that CS3 can't come out soon enough. I hope they may thrill us and release later this year, but I'm fearing it'll be late next spring or early summer by the time I actually have a copy in my hands. Maybe I'll get SUPER lucky and get ahold of a beta copy for "evaluation". That wouldn't be so bad.

As for the MBP itself - sweet computer. And once the Universal version / CS3 is out, it's going to be screamin fast. Everything that runs native on the CoreDuo runs super fast on this machine. I've just picked into FinalCut Studio and even with the included snips of HD native footage, it was perfectly smooth. If a native app as power needy as FCP runs that smooth, then the native version of CS3 doing photo editing is going to be a real treat. I'm counting the days.