Partition Magic ?

[jtk]

I'd like to automatically scan 12 35mm frames while I'm doing

something else...and I get MUCH more sharpness when I scan at 3200...

 

HOWEVER the big files that result don't allow more than one scan until

I Save the scan (eg 40MB)...so I have to baby sit the scanner. There

seems to be some kind of memory limit that won't even allow two

3200ppi scans without Saving.

 

Partitioning with Partition Magic seems like an answer, but I'm a

user, not a geek...

 

QUESTION : If I use Partition Magic to partition my external 120G

hard drives without losing the data that lives on them now?

 

QUESTION : Will this address my problem with disc space for sequential

3200ppi scans?

[eric friedemann]

QUESTION 1: If I use Partition Magic to partition my external 120G hard drives without losing the data that lives on them now?

 

 

ANSWER 1: Setting aside the syntax of your question, yes, the idea behind Partition Magic is that you can partition drives without having to reload all the stuff on them. I'm not a techie either; I had a geek friend partition my drives for Pshop use and he used Partition Magic- works like a charm.

 

 

QUESTION 2: Will this address my problem with disc space for sequential 3200ppi scans?

 

 

ANSWER 2: I'll have to leave this question to the literati.

[beauh44]

Hi John,

 

QUESTION 1: If I use Partition Magic to partition my external 120G hard drives without losing the data that lives on them now?

 

Partition Magic works great - I've used it often. It performs a non-destructive re-partitioning of your drive. However, you'd still be very wise to back everything up first. I've never had it lose anything but ya' never know.

 

QUESTION 2: Will this address my problem with disc space for sequential 3200ppi scans?

 

Assuming your diagnosis is correct that disk space is the problem. However I'm not entirely certain that your diagnosis is correct. When you say "there seems to be some kind of memory limit" do you mean "disk space" or "RAM"? They're two very different things.

 

We don't know what kind of scanner you're using, or what happens when it dies - do you get an error message? What operating system are you using? How much RAM, etc, etc. Tell us oh soothsayer! ;-) Good luck!

[Ed_Ingold]

1) Why would you want to partition any drive, especially one used only for data (images)? Partitioning is an IT thing, presumably for easier administration, and they despise PC's (and their users) anyway.

 

2) If you don't partition the drive, you'll have more space for sequential scans.

 

This begs the question, why do you have to save the scan before proceeding? Don't scan to import an image directly into Photoshop! Use the scanner or imaging software to scan directly to a file. You can always work on the file in Photoshop later. If you "import" files, you will eventually run out of memory and crash Photoshop, possibly your O/S, and lose all of your unsaved work to that point.

[beauh44]

A few reasons to re-partition drives might be: 1) If for some reason a drive is already partitioned into logical drives like C,D,E and your C drive is full but the D and E are not; 2) If you have a really large drive it might improve performance by splitting it into two - the read/write heads will have to look through half as much to find something; 3) Organizational reasons - all your programs would be on one drive, data on another, etc. 4)It works well when booting to multiple operating systems. Not all IT people despise PCs and people! Many of them aren't the most social creatures on the planet though. ;-)

[ethervizion]

This thread seems to be going off on a tangent here. John, from what you've described, partitioning your drive will not help you (though, there are many good reasons to partition your drive).

 

We need more information on your problem. What software are you using to scan? Is it standalone or a TWAIN driver used with other software such as Photoshop? What kind of error messages are you getting? A more thorough description of your problem would really help. If it really is a shortage of memory, then the things that might help are: more memory; increased swap file size; unload programs from memory. However, since you haven't provided much information, there is no way to tell if memory is really the issue.

[madwand]

<i>"Don't scan to import an image directly into Photoshop! Use the scanner or imaging software to scan directly to a file. You can always work on the file in Photoshop later. If you "import" files, you will eventually run out of memory and crash Photoshop, possibly your O/S, and lose all of your unsaved work to that point."</i><p>

 

Edward might seem a bit alarmist in saying this, but I think he's right. I've had lots of problems with large files and Photoshop CS using the Nikon scan import. Running the Nikon scan utility outside of Photoshop is much more stable regarding memory issues in my experience, and has all the features minus a bit of convenience.

[Ed_Ingold]

Beau, your points are well taken. What I'm suggesting is, since drives are so cheap, and image files so bulky, that it makes sense to keep the O/S and programs on one physical drive and data on another (or others). It makes backups easier that way too. Use Ghost on the O/S drive, and simply copy data to alternate media or other drives. With NTFS and indexing, larger discs are as easily accessed with or without partitions. Directories are more efficient than partitions for organizing and retrieving data (with an emphasis on retrieval).

[jtk]

First, sorry about the syntax.

 

I'm currently using either the native Epson scanning application in Elements 2 or 7, or the Silverfast that came bundled with Elements 2 and seem not to want to unbundle. Silverfast deals with especially dense negatives (eg. errors, century old B&W, and shots into the Sun) better than the Epson application.

 

I've got plenty of computer, Pentium IV with two external 120G hard drives.

 

From your responses (thanks!) it seems I need another scanning application (nobody mentioned that) as well as partitioning.

 

I'll also look into saving to a file in some way other than through Photoshop, especially when I install a new scanning application. This will become especially relevant when I start to play with my new/old Polaroid SprintScan.

 

fyi, after a 50+MB scan the scanning application quits without a negative word and loses the scan when it gets part way into a second scan of that size.

[dave_nelson___atlanta__ga]

Partitioning a HD for PhotoShop will actually slow things down. For maximimum efficiency you can have three hard drives. One for the OS, one for the scratch disk, and one for the data. Using just two drives, one is the OS/Software and two is the scratch disk/data.

 

Your scanning software crashing is either a limit of your software or the lack of RAM (whcih should not happen in WindowsXP if you have plenty of disk space.)