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hello, all. i recently upgraded from a 2010 macbook pro to a 2011 macbook pro, making the leap into 64-bit processing. problem is, i'm a student and can't yet afford to upgrade all of my old software, and even some of the free versions of the software i use still hasn't even caught up to 64-bit technology yet.
apparently, apple's rosetta program is supposed to handle the translation of 32-bit software into 64-bit machines, but it doesn't do a very good job, and this ends up taxing the graphics cards pretty severely.
occasionally i have minor graphics problems (screen refuses to refresh; photoshop and painter brushes lag; etc). but every now and then, they become quite bad, and i end up losing work and study time while i try to fix it or wait for it to fix itself.
today's example that just about gave me an aneurism (not to mention being quite cool in a bad way; you can't normally animate a static image in maya...):
i've taken it in a few times for tests and repairs, on the off-chance that it was something bad with the computer, but all of their tests say that it is a rosetta problem and that there is not much i can do about that.
my question
is anyone else having these kinds of problems? am i alone? are everyone elses' problems less severe than mine, about the same, or worse?
either way, is there an alternative to rosetta? my google searches haven't really shown anything other than suddenly becoming some sort of a coding genius and making my own programs––and that isn't going to happen any time soon.
legal addendum
keep your "macs suck," and "windows suck"comments to yourself. i use both, but for graphic imaging, i use a mac; it is what i am comfortable with, and what i own software for. both platforms have their uses and their strengths and weaknesses.
I know in Windows it simply installs it as a 32 bit program, but I haven't the slightest clue about how Apple's OS handles it. Bumping for answers, I'm curious to what the answer is.
02-22-2012, 10:43 PM
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n/a posts
Quote:
apparently, apple's rosetta program is supposed to handle the translation of 32-bit software into 64-bit machines, but it doesn't do a very good job, and this ends up taxing the graphics cards pretty severely.
Rosetta actually does translation to let PowerPC programs run on intel processors. It has nothing to do with x86 vs x86-64. It was also removed from 10.7, so if you're running the latest OS, you don't even have it.
You shouldn't have any issues running 32 bit intel programs on a 64 bit mac at all (x86-64 is just an extension of the old 32 bit x86). The only issue might be some legacy kernel extensions that are 32-bit only, but that shouldn't be an issue.
Your old MacBook Pro was 64-bit capable, and could run 64-bit applications (even while running a 32-bit version of Mac OS X). It just did not boot a 64-bit kernel by default. The new Macbook Pros boot the 64-bit kernel by default, but can also boot a 32-bit kernel.
Not sure what is causing your problem, but if it were due to bugs in a 64-bit version of the display driver that were not present in the 32-bit version of the driver, you could boot the 32-bit version of the kernel on your new Macbook by following the directions in the second link above. 64-bit Mac OS X has to use 64 bit drivers, 32-bit Mac OS X has to use 32-bit drivers. For the most part, applications should not know or care which OS you are running. The most visible difference is probably the availability of kernel extensions and differences between the 32 and 64-bit versions of those kernel extension
The 2010 MBP is 64 bit also, so there's really no difference there. Rosetta is NOT a 32-bit program translator, it's a PowerPC program translator. It is not available on OS versions later than 10.6.8. That could be the problem.
first, i meant to say that i upgraded from a late model 2008 mbp, not a 2010. that one, i am pretty sure was not 64-bit.
second, i have snow leopard 10.6, on my new machine, not lion.
third, yes, it is ppc issues that they said i was having, but then they related that to 32-bit vs 64-bit. i don't really know enough about computers either way, and i forgot the ppc part. i just use computers for graphic imaging with photoshop, illustrator, maya, zbrush, etc, and i am pretty well-known in my digital media program for breaking any software i put my hands on (my wife thinks i have a weird magnetic aura or something *smiley icon*).
so, my adobe cs3 products ran fine on my 2008 mbp, but not on my 2011. would this be a ppc problem? i still don't understand what is ppc about adobe cs3 products, but not cs5. similarly, all of my autodesk 2010 (maya, mudbox, etc) products were listed as ppc and 32-bit, which i was told was causing the same problems.
they said that these two software makers (autodesk and adobe) run some sort of daemon or something that boots up as soon as i turn my computer on, which causes rosetta to start working before i have even turned on any applications, and that this is then compounded when i actually begin to run any of these programs, especially with large graphic files.
I know in Windows it simply installs it as a 32 bit program, but I haven't the slightest clue about how Apple's OS handles it. Bumping for answers, I'm curious to what the answer is.
On a Mac, if you install the same 32-bit software twice, it runs it as a 64-bit.
first, i meant to say that i upgraded from a late model 2008 mbp, not a 2010. that one, i am pretty sure was not 64-bit.
You're mistaken. That MacBook Pro from 2008 uses a Core 2 Duo CPU, so it is 64-bit capable, and the system is capable of optionally booting a 64-bit kernel, but does not do so by default.
Quote:
so, my adobe cs3 products ran fine on my 2008 mbp, but not on my 2011. would this be a ppc problem? i still don't understand what is ppc about adobe cs3 products, but not cs5. similarly, all of my autodesk 2010 (maya, mudbox, etc) products were listed as ppc and 32-bit, which i was told was causing the same problems.
Creative Suite 3 was the first version that ran native in Intel Macs, so it should not be a PPC issue, as you should be running native. PPC and Rosetta should not come into play at all. CS3 was a universal binary, meaning the executable programs had both PPC and x86 code in separate sections, so the OS could choose which section to execute depending on the architecture of the system running the program. CS5 is Intel only, so no more universal binary.
If CS3 doesn't run correctly on your new MacBook, it could be that there are some incompatibilities running that old software on a newer OS.
CS3 runs just fine on snow leopard in my experience. Very weird And macs have been 64 bit since 2006. 32 bit programs should just run in 32 bit mode on the 64 bit OS. Hold down 3 + 2 when you boot up to start in 32 bit mode. May I suggest upgrading Maya to 2012? It's free for you as a student. Maya wasn't much good on the mac until 2012 - though don't install lion as it won't run!
Last edited by archineer; 02-23-2012 at 05:45 PM..
You're mistaken. That MacBook Pro from 2008 uses a Core 2 Duo CPU, so it is 64-bit capable, and the system is capable of optionally booting a 64-bit kernel, but does not do so by default.
Creative Suite 3 was the first version that ran native in Intel Macs, so it should not be a PPC issue, as you should be running native. PPC and Rosetta should not come into play at all. CS3 was a universal binary, meaning the executable programs had both PPC and x86 code in separate sections, so the OS could choose which section to execute depending on the architecture of the system running the program. CS5 is Intel only, so no more universal binary.
If CS3 doesn't run correctly on your new MacBook, it could be that there are some incompatibilities running that old software on a newer OS.
CS3 known issues | Mac OS X 10.6
Quote:
Originally Posted by archineer
CS3 runs just fine on snow leopard in my experience. Very weird And macs have been 64 bit since 2006. 32 bit programs should just run in 32 bit mode on the 64 bit OS. Hold down 3 + 2 when you boot up to start in 32 bit mode. May I suggest upgrading Maya to 2012? It's free for you as a student. Maya wasn't much good on the mac until 2012 - though don't install lion as it won't run!
do any of you run autodesk programs on snow leopard? maybe this is the issue, if it isn't cs3.
i still have the autodesk 2012 programs on my computer, but they act up as much as 2010 does––though everything with graphics acts up lately. i keep 2010 around because i own a permanent student license for it, and because i actually find it to be less buggy than 2012.
either way, if cs3 isn't ppc, what in the world would the apple technician be telling me that it is and that it has to run through rosetta for? he even ran some test where i had to download a diagnostics program, and then he checked every function of my computer at the time, and he said that it was cs3, autodesk, my wacom tablet drivers (at the time 32-bit), and a few other minor programs that i don't use anymore that were causing the problem. but he was very specific about cs3 being one of the culprits.
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