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iPhoto 8.0 and photo editing on certain older Macs Apps
Not exactly a hint, but more of a heads up for people -- the current version of iPhoto (8.0, i.e. the one that comes with iLife '09) -- requires a Quartz Extreme (QE) compatible graphics card in order to edit photos. It doesn't tell you this when you install, so like me, you could waste a lot of time converting your library, tagging faces, etc., before you realize this restriction.

If your card doesn't support QE, then you can run iPhoto, but you won't be able to edit photos correctly -- you just get a white box, or a black screen in full screen mode. Oddly, if you do something such as click the rotate button, it does actually rotate the image, even though you can't see it.

As a bit of background to this, as my main machine I run a G5 XServe with twin 2.0Ghz processors and a 32mb ATI PCI graphics card (don't ask). Everything else has always worked fine, but this one is annoying because there was no prior warning when installing iLife '09. Before you spend ages tagging faces, etc., make sure you check that you can edit photos!

I believe that this was also an issue for some people in older versions, and was related to the version of the AppleAppSupport.framework installed, but I am running Leopard, so mine is 1.5 and should in theory be OK. I understand that Aperture 2.1 has similar requirements, but it won't let you install without the correct GFX card, which is a more elegant solution.

Hope this helps someone, and if anyone comes up with a solution, then please post in the comments.

[robg adds: I can't test this one, as all my machines are QE-capable. There's no mention of this restriction on the iLife system requirements page, either.]
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iPhoto 8.0 and photo editing on certain older Macs | 6 comments | Create New Account
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iPhoto 8.0 and photo editing on certain older Macs
Authored by: Chucklingmetal on Feb 17, '09 09:16:12AM

Ran on my mac but lagging

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Chuck



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iPhoto 8.0 and photo editing on certain older Macs
Authored by: sjk on Feb 17, '09 11:38:52AM

Uhh, how is that helpful without telling us the specs of your Mac. :)

Maybe the editing issue is with Anonymous' video card. I'll test later on my wife's eMac G4 with its original 32MB ATI Radeon video.



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iPhoto 8.0 and photo editing on certain older Macs
Authored by: xsquared_uk on Feb 18, '09 07:21:43AM

Here are the specs from System Profiler, the card was sold as being specifically for Mac. Worked fine in iLife 08.

ATI VGA:

Chipset Model: ATY,RV100
Type: Display
Bus: PCI
Slot: SLOT-2
VRAM (Total): 32 MB
Vendor: ATI (0x1002)
Device ID: 0x5159
Revision ID: 0x0000
ROM Revision: 113-85505-110
Displays:
VGA Display:
Resolution: 1400 x 1050 @ 90 Hz
Depth: 32-bit Color
Core Image: Software
Main Display: Yes
Mirror: Off
Online: Yes
Quartz Extreme: Not Supported



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iPhoto 8.0 and photo editing on certain older Macs
Authored by: sjk on Feb 19, '09 11:13:34AM

Thanks for posting the card specs. Btw, brief testing of editing on my wife's eMac worked okay.



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iPhoto 8.0 and photo editing on certain older Macs
Authored by: vldrummond on Feb 17, '09 07:19:42PM

I've got photo editing problems in iPhoto 8.0 on a Dual 2 GHz PowerMac G5, with a GeForce FX5200 video card that does support Quartz Extreme, running OS X 10.5.6.

If I double-click a photo in my library to magnify the photo, click the "Edit" icon to display the editing collection of icons, then click on the "Adjust" icon to display the "Adjust" HUD, and change any settings, the displayed photo is not updated to display the changes. Clicking the "Done" button to go back to the library display, displays the changed photo. (Of course it doesn't do much good to edit photos with "blinders" on!)

However, if I edit photos in full-screen mode, changes in the "Adjust" HUD are applied immediately in the displayed image.

Editing in iPhoto '08 was displayed correctly in both "magnified" and "full-screen" modes.

This is a hardware-related bug since my MacBook 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo running OS X 10.5.6 handles updating images in the "magnified" view correctly. It's more complicated than just whether or not the video card is Quartz Extreme capable.

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vldrummond



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Possible Solution
Authored by: CashGap on Feb 19, '09 05:03:27AM

As a workaround, you can go to iPhoto Preferences, General and change "Edit photo:" from "In main window" to "In application", then select a photo editor that works with your configuration.



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