PSPx5 Bugs and Fixes.

[TripleHeinz]

Hi everyone,
I want to report something that looks like a bug to me.

I'm new to the forum but have been a long time user of PSP, since version 7 to be specific, then moved to version 9 and didn't used other versions untill now. At first i was a bit afraid of the X versions from Corel, to me PSP9 was the most perfect version ever. After trying PSP10 completely disliked and immediately stayed away from Corel PSP but after years now i tried PSPX5 and i'm really amazed of how similar it is to PSP9. I also like its new features, the GUI and the performance. Thought PSPX5 is missing all the fancy icons in the menues wich are a good guide to me.

Anyway, here's the bug:

The maximum image quality level in the JPEG Optimizer is really lame comparing it to PSP9. I use PSP for the web but this turns PSPX5 completely useless for my purposes.
I better explain with images, see and try for your selves:

I made a basic multicolor image (Multi.png, attached):

Multi.png (359 Bytes) Viewed 7383 times

If you try to export it to JPEG with optimizer in PSP9, setting the maximum quality (1 = default) and chroma subsampling set to NONE (default) then you obtain perfect 1:1 results (check the preview window):
[PSP9]

But try doing the same in PSPX5, you'll get different results with unwanted colors added (specially where the colors blend together) and after viewing the exported image, the results are really undefined (check the preview window, zoom if necessary):
[PSPX5]

Try doing it yourself.

Setting chroma subsampling in PSPX5 to 1x4 1x2 1x2 seems to achieve better results but i haven't tried this on my production images (can't afford the risk).

[eL_PuSHeR]

Why in the hell do you want to use lossy JPEG compression on an already small PNG file? I don't get it. The web supports PNG almost perfectly. On the other hand, yes it looks like a bug to me.

BTW: Optimizing the PNG, it gives a resulting filesize of just 160 bytes.

[hartpaul]

Is the JPEG Optimiser relevent today. I can understand the need to maintain best quality and lowest amount of data when most of the communication was by slow dial up , or people had very limited bandwidth, but on an unlimited broadband connection whether a file occupies 64 Kb or 240 Kb is just a blink in time.

[dinasset]

Laviana,
if by merging down or merging visible you mean flatten the image (i.e.produce as final result a single layer image) i have the same problem, and this happens also with only two layers. After some testing i came out with a bypassing trick, that is:
ask psp to save the image (which is multi-layers) onto a single-layer image (e.g. .jpg); psp will inform you that it will flatten the image before saving, accept (ok) and the image is flatten and saved by the application. On the screen it remains multi-layers, but you can close it and - if you need to process further the image - reload it.
Hope this will help also you.

[JStanley]

Is the JPEG Optimiser relevent today. I can understand the need to maintain best quality and lowest amount of data when most of the communication was by slow dial up , or people had very limited bandwidth, but on an unlimited broadband connection whether a file occupies 64 Kb or 240 Kb is just a blink in time.

Not everyone has unlimited broadband connection...

[xfsgpr]

I am not able to register the product and this is not only driving me crazy but also crashing the product. I can't use it because of this bug. This link is always unreachable:

http://mc.corel.com/servlet/TCM2/beginReg.

Other stuff in that link has been deleted because of sensitive info.

How can I disable product registration? I don't want to register the product because I don't want to be bombarded with spam messages.

None of the three ways I tried is allowing me to register the product so that this message goes away and newer starts when it is launched.

Thank you.

[xfsgpr]

PSPX5 is not able to read .psd files or to ignore them when PSPX5 starts. This must be corrected because it is crashing the product in Windows 7 Professional. I wasted nearly 6 days to find this problem.

The interface of PSPX5 is very professional and it looks like a very serious product to compare with Photoshop, Photoshop Elements or LightRoom.

[photodrawken]

PSPX5 is not able to read .psd files or to ignore them when PSPX5 starts.

Not sure what you mean "when it starts", but PSPX5 can open PSD files I created in PSE10. The only effects that don't carry over are layer styles and clipping masks. Make sure you've saved the PSD files with a setting of "Maximum compatibility" in their originating application.

Ken

[TripleHeinz]

Why in the hell do you want to use lossy JPEG compression on an already small PNG file? I don't get it. The web supports PNG almost perfectly. On the other hand, yes it looks like a bug to me.

BTW: Optimizing the PNG, it gives a resulting filesize of just 160 bytes.

The image in PNG format was just for demonstration purposes. I could have used a ".pspimage" file but i wanted the image to display in the forum.

[Hootowl]

I am having a lot of problems in Manage when I am deleting pics I don't want to keep. I can delete a few and then it will stop and takes a long time, like a few minutes, but then completes deleting the pic. Once it hits this point, sometimes I can switch to a different folder and delete a few before it starts slowing down. I have tried it with the RAW/jpg pairs off and with it set to jpg and get the same results. Sometimes you can delete more pictures than others and if you do one pic at a time it seems to work better.
In frustration I sent back to X4 to finish deleting some pics and found that there are folders with pics in them that don't show up in X5.
Is anyone else having these types of issues with deleting pics?? I have emptied temp files, cleaned my system, rebooted and opened nothing but X5 and still have this problem.

[TripleHeinz]

Hello again,

I set up a list with suggestions, i hope these optimizations fit in this topic:

1) At first i was scared because there were lots of tubes, gradients, textures, patterns, etc that were missing from previous versions but then i discovered they were available for free as a separate download at the Corel Guide. It would be cool if the next PSP build comes with the regular stuff preinstalled. Or make a package with all the stuff in one installer.

2) The auto-preserve feature could give an extra option to store copies in a centralized database. This would be much more easy to clean these temps files in case they're not needed anymore. Also the database could store the files as compresed blobs in order to save disk space.

3) Tubes, gradients, textures, patterns, etc should display its name/description in the tooltips, not their file name. This is really practical when viewing these elements as Small Thumbnails, or when the name is too long because it gets clipped and when you wait for the tooltip to display in order to get more information about the element, you only get a COREL_06_XXX.

4) I don't know if this is already possible but the Organizer could manage the recently opened files automatically.

5) Bring back the fancy icons from PSP9 for the menues!!! They help to find things more quickly.

6) And finally, this will sound ridiculous, but if you are one of those persons who likes details and perfection, then you'll notice that when using tabbed documents, the close button on the tab itself feels like it is located too much to the right and when highlighted it gives this sensation that it is floating outside the tab...please move the button 4 pixels left, that would give a perfect alignment and mind peace hehe, here look:

CloseAlign.jpg (36.62 KiB) Viewed 7195 times

Thanks for reading.

[ADonahoo]

I am having a lot of problems in Manage when I am deleting pics I don't want to keep. I can delete a few and then it will stop and takes a long time, like a few minutes, but then completes deleting the pic. Once it hits this point, sometimes I can switch to a different folder and delete a few before it starts slowing down. I have tried it with the RAW/jpg pairs off and with it set to jpg and get the same results. Sometimes you can delete more pictures than others and if you do one pic at a time it seems to work better.
In frustration I sent back to X4 to finish deleting some pics and found that there are folders with pics in them that don't show up in X5.
Is anyone else having these types of issues with deleting pics?? I have emptied temp files, cleaned my system, rebooted and opened nothing but X5 and still have this problem.

Using PSP to delete images is way more trouble than it's worth. I think it has to do with updating the database; if you check the folder you will see that the file gets deleted right away. It just takes too long to get back the ability to actually use PSP. And that difficulty goes all the way back to X2.

[jrmach]

Does anyone else have this problem. If I open a jpg then save it in pspx5 it strips the IPTC keyword, Byline Title, Byline, and Copyright tags from the jpg file?: Re-Solved by JrB.

[AdrianW]

I've been using X5 on Windows 8 Pro regularly for the last two months without any issues.

But, over the last two days it has become very unstable. It keeps hanging and I usually have to kill it from Task manager.

The hang is reproducible - all I need to do is start the program, go to the edit tab, snap off a toolbar and move it, then move it back and snap it into the UI. The will almost always result in the mouse pointer being stuck as the 4-way pointer, and the program stops responding.

Showing the desktop (Win-key D) and then restoring the window (Win-key D again) - sometimes frees up the program (but the moved toolbar ends up free-floating again).

The program also hangs when doing other tasks, like editing etc. But, moving a toolbar seems to be the quickest way to reproduce it.

I've tried resetting the enviroment (starting PSP with the shift key down and choosing to reset). I've also uninstalled and reinstalled (and updated to SP1).

This problem seems to have started a couple of days ago after a Windows update.

[AdrianW]

I contacted support about X5 becoming unresponsive in Windows 8 (see previous post), and they confirmed it was a known issue and that they were working on it.

They gave me access to a hotfix patch, but it failed to fix the issue for me. (The hotfix bumped the version number up to 15.1.0.11).