# Good idea to upgrade to LR5? Regrets?



## sunnyVan (Dec 2, 2013)

Been hearing problems about LR5. I regret upgrading to Maverick OS because I think it created more problems than it solved. LR4 seems fine to me now. I'm concerned that upgrading to 5 will give me the same ordeal as my Mac OS. Any current LR5 users out there? Comments? Worth the trouble?


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## sagittariansrock (Dec 3, 2013)

I upgraded to LR5 from LR3 on Mavericks and I haven't had any issues yet. What problems did you hear of? I can check if you tell me.
BTW, what problems did you have with Mavericks?


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## sunnyVan (Dec 4, 2013)

sagittariansrock said:


> I upgraded to LR5 from LR3 on Mavericks and I haven't had any issues yet. What problems did you hear of? I can check if you tell me.
> BTW, what problems did you have with Mavericks?



In LR 4 the sliders lost their colors. That's the only problem I have with LR4 after upgrading to Maverick. 

Then on desktop when I open a folder that contains pictures, 
I don't get real time preview update. Specifically if I have 10 pictures and I delete picture number 2, the file number 2 is gone now. But if I select file number 3, the preview up above will still show picture number 2, which has already been deleted. If I have multiple pictures I want to delete I lose track of what I wanted to delete in the first place very quickly. The only solution is to close the folder and reopen. I find this very annoying. 

The most common complain I heard about LR5 is speed. Some people say their mac become super slow. 

I just ordered LR5 anyway because it was only 60 bucks. Hopefully my 2 yrs old mac can handle it well. And probably the color slider problem will not be an issue with an upgrade.


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## IslanderMV (Dec 4, 2013)

"In LR 4 the sliders lost their colors. That's the only problem I have with LR4 after upgrading to Maverick. "

That is a known issue that is fixed in LR5.2.


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## Rienzphotoz (Dec 4, 2013)

sunnyVan said:


> Been hearing problems about LR5. I regret upgrading to Maverick OS because I think it created more problems than it solved. LR4 seems fine to me now. I'm concerned that upgrading to 5 will give me the same ordeal as my Mac OS. Any current LR5 users out there? Comments? Worth the trouble?


I have not faced any problems ... however, I do miss not being able to do Time Lapse in LR 5 (I could use a plug-in LR4 for time lapse but not in LR 5) ... other than that no issues whatsoever.


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## Swphoto (Dec 4, 2013)

FYI, there's a significant issue when upgrading from LR4 to 5.2, with any images where the spot removal tool was applied: http://feedback.photoshop.com/photoshop_family/topics/lr_5_2_is_not_rendering_correctly_photos_with_spot_removal_applied_in_lr4

It's better in 5.3RC, but the behavior still isn't identical to LR3/4 - so depending on the particular image/edits applied, you might need to replace the previous spot edits.

I do really like the new Spot Removal and Radial Filter tools, though. For me, those alone are reason enough to upgrade, and aside from the hassles mentioned above, I haven't had any issues with 5.2/5.3RC.


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## Jamesy (Dec 4, 2013)

I just upgraded a couple of days ago to LR5.2 on Win7 - so far, so good. It took quite a while to upgrade my LR4 catalog to LR5 - I have 25,000 images in my catalog.

I did some product shots tethered tonight and it seemed to work well. I love the new 'F' for a full screen view of a picture in the main screen view - way faster than clicking E and Shift-tab to remove the side panels. It even works for ingesting tethered shots.


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## eml58 (Dec 4, 2013)

Upgraded all my Macs to Mavericks no issues at all.

Upgraded to CC, including LR5, also no issues.

Only problem ? was today when I went to process RAW files from my new a7r, Sony make nothing that I could find that would handle the files (what a bunch of Bozos), LR5 also wouldn't then I upgraded to 5.3 release, all good.


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## sagittariansrock (Dec 4, 2013)

sunnyVan said:


> sagittariansrock said:
> 
> 
> > I upgraded to LR5 from LR3 on Mavericks and I haven't had any issues yet. What problems did you hear of? I can check if you tell me.
> ...



Congrats on your purchase. I didn't even notice when the sliders lost color and when they came back, LOL!
My 2-yr old Macbook Pro 15" is handling it fine, so I guess yours will too.
I didn't have a problem with deleted files hanging about in the preview, but you probably know that already.


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## MLfan3 (Dec 4, 2013)

go Capture One 7 or DXO9 + PS CC.
much better IQ than LR5.


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## fragilesi (Dec 4, 2013)

I went from LR4 to 5 and have not looked back. LR4 was the first version I tried.

As mentioned above the improvement in "spot" removal was a big improvement.


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## Jamesy (Dec 4, 2013)

fragilesi said:


> I went from LR4 to 5 and have not looked back. LR4 was the first version I tried.
> 
> As mentioned above the improvement in "spot" removal was a big improvement.



Agreed - I saw this feature in a review somewhere and that was the first thing I tried and it seems to work well. Doing circular is OK to remove blemishes but there are times you want to remove or patch a broader area and this new feature shines in that regard. It will likely keep me out of PS more often...


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## alexturton (Dec 4, 2013)

both mavericks and LR5 (from LR4) were painless upgrades for me. LR5 seems snappier than LR4, but still not as snappy as LR3.

content aware spot treatment brush is now better. Plus the radial filters are quite nice.


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## wsheldon (Dec 4, 2013)

alexturton said:


> both mavericks and LR5 (from LR4) were painless upgrades for me. LR5 seems snappier than LR4, but still not as snappy as LR3.
> 
> content aware spot treatment brush is now better. Plus the radial filters are quite nice.



+1

Same experience on Win7/64 for me. As soon as I realized I could drag with the spot treatment brush and adjustment brush to create any shape I needed I deleted LR4 and didn't look back. Huge impact on my workflow.


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## pelebel (Dec 4, 2013)

If this can help, on Windows you can keep both LR4 and 5 working. So if an image gets messy, you can still work it on your LR4 installation.

I'm not sure if Mac lets you do this.

And BTW I would never go back to LR4, I've gained lots of productivity when I switched because of LR5's new tools.


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## sagittariansrock (Dec 4, 2013)

pelebel said:


> If this can help, on Windows you can keep both LR4 and 5 working. So if an image gets messy, you can still work it on your LR4 installation.
> 
> I'm not sure if Mac lets you do this.
> 
> And BTW I would never go back to LR4, I've gained lots of productivity when I switched because of LR5's new tools.



I have both LR3 and LR5 on Mac simultaneously.


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## Famateur (Dec 4, 2013)

Swphoto said:


> FYI, there's a significant issue when upgrading from LR4 to 5.2, with any images where the spot removal tool was applied: http://feedback.photoshop.com/photoshop_family/topics/lr_5_2_is_not_rendering_correctly_photos_with_spot_removal_applied_in_lr4
> 
> It's better in 5.3RC, but the behavior still isn't identical to LR3/4 - so depending on the particular image/edits applied, you might need to replace the previous spot edits.
> 
> I do really like the new Spot Removal and Radial Filter tools, though. For me, those alone are reason enough to upgrade, and aside from the hassles mentioned above, I haven't had any issues with 5.2/5.3RC.



I had issues with spot removal being treated differently between version 5 (my first installation) and 5.2. I think it had to do with introducing feathering for the spot removal tool in 5.2. All the spot removal I had done suddenly had feathered edges, requiring much of it to be redone. Thankfully, I had only been using Lightroom for a couple of weeks.

As far as performance goes, I'm on an ancient (six years old!) laptop and manage. I have to be careful not to have too many photos open at once, and the more brushes I use, the more it lags, but I'm getting by. Despite my computer's inadequate hardware, I'm quite happy with Lightroom and can't imagine what I would do without it.

By the way, when I jumped aboard the Lightroom bandwagon, it already had the radial filters and paintable spot removal tool. However, I use those two tools so often that if I had a version without them, I'd upgrade just for those two features. 

I hope this was helpful...

PS - Here are my sucky hardware specs :

HP Compaq nc8430 (circa 2007)
Windows 7 Ultimate x64 (Upgraded from Windows XP Pro)
Intel Core 2 Duo T7200 2.0Ghz
4GB RAM (Upgraded from 1GB)
7200RPM HDD (Upgraded from 5400RPM)
1680x1050 Display

It may be old and battle-worn, but with some hardware and OS updates, it has stayed relevant enough for me to use it as my primary work computer nearly every day for six years (including some graphic design, multimedia, et cetera). It even got me through the laptop display resolution drought where everything was offered with a miserable 1366x768 resolution (I love me some _wide _spreadsheet action ). Obviously, when I eventually replace this workhorse, I'll appreciate the huge jump in performance for things like Lightroom, but I'm doing okay as-is.


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## Albi86 (Dec 4, 2013)

It runs faster than LR4 and the radial filter itself is worth the money


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## vstrike (Dec 4, 2013)

I switched from LR4 to LR5 still the same process. I think the spot removal is better now than it was on LR4. It still isn't as good as photoshop, but I am able to do about 95% of my work on LR5. Auto straightening feature is cool and really can make a big difference in the picture. Doesn't always work great, but it normally gets it on the right track.


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## drmikeinpdx (Dec 4, 2013)

I love the new radial filter! I was complusive vignetter with LR 4, now I'm even worse!


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## pwp (Dec 4, 2013)

pelebel said:


> If this can help, on Windows you can keep both LR4 and 5 working. So if an image gets messy, you can still work it on your LR4 installation.
> And BTW I would never go back to LR4, I've gained lots of productivity when I switched because of LR5's new tools.


+1
Ten minutes with LR5 had me 100% convinced. It's an incremental, though powerful upgrade. 
The Radial Filter alone was worth the price of entry for the way I work. 
The more I use it, the more I use it, the scope of its usefulness being revealed with every session. 
FWIW I use LR on both Windows 7 and OSX Mavericks machines with no issues.

-pw


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Dec 4, 2013)

LR5 works fine for me with Windows. There were some issues due to the MAC coming out with a new OS. I think they have been fixed. There will always be bugs, most of them are minor.


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## Swphoto (Dec 4, 2013)

Mt Spokane Photography said:


> There were some issues due to the MAC coming out with a new OS. I think they have been fixed. There will always be bugs, most of them are minor.



They fixed the slider color/Mavericks issue in LR 5.2, but there's no fix (that I've seen) for LR4 users other than upgrading to LR5.


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