Stenis
(Sten-Åke Sändh (Sony, Win 11, PL 6, CO 16, PM Plus 6, XnView))
564
!! Isn’t it pretty unfair to compare Apples behavior with the iPhones that I guess was deliberate with DXO:s bugs? I have hard to believe that they have made those to fuck with trheir users.
Sinced my first problems I have got a new Windows PC tailormade for me and I must say it is a very big difference having to small system resources for Photolab 9 like I had with my 3060 Ti 8GB both for DXO and running bigger Google Gemma 3 models on Ollama on my new PC with faster 32 GB RAM and a much more powerful 5070 Ti with 16 GB.
I´m pretty pleased for now and haven´t got any issues so far and I´m using the keyword AI-masks in the drop down lists too when I need to.
You buy a product, it should work, it should do all the things it said it would do, it should do them the moment you fire it up. If it doesn’t, it is not fit for use.
Imagine this, you buy a car off one off those online car companies that deliver it to your door. (You know the ones for those lazy feckers who think it’s an intelligent way to buy a car).
So the guy hands over the keys and drives off. You get in the car and go to start it up and it fails to start. You ring up the company and (they ignore you - oh no, that’s DxO) they tell you that there’s a problem with the engine management system but it’s on their “to do list”.
Then they call you back and tell you to do a software update and that will fix your problems. So you do the update and sure enough the car starts up, but you can only use the reverse gear.
The latest update from DXO on my open case regarding AI masks:
“Hello John,
We sincerely appreciate your patience regarding this matter. The work is still in progress, as DxO and NVIDIA are actively collaborating to achieve a permanent resolution. Rest assured, we will keep you informed and notify you as soon as we have an update.
Sorry for the delay. As a software engineer, integrating a new feature that include in part on an API, a framework, or any new technology takes a little bit time, which is often incompatible with the time frame given by the Product Line Manager, who is more focused on the commercial side of things (no judgement here, just fact).
That’s why I think PLB10 could be a little more mature, because DXO’s development teams will have had a little more time to come to grips with these new technologies that need to be integrated.
My 2 cents.
Sorry if I'm startling the DXO team...
Long ago, IT professionals worked nights and weekends to debug applications
they'd prematurely deployed to production. That's not the impression
we get from the DXO team. And stop using the phrase "minor bug fixes."
It's annoying... The problem is that we paid for working software.
I suggest upgrading to PLB10 for 10 euros, hoping you won't ask
us for i9s and 5090s to compensate for your development blunders.
I understand that PL 9 is not working on your PC / MAC. I must be lucky then; it works perfectly on my Ryzen 5700G / 32GB and 5060TI / 16GB. I can add as many AI Masks as as I like and it develops them with no problem. What kind og hardware are you using? The photo is developed with 4 AI masks of different types:
The photo is just a sample. It’s more like the last 50 or so that’s developed without any error message. I recently did 15 photos in one job, no problem. So, on my side, it looks like the problem is solved.
Anyway, I agree that all the problems that have occurred with PL 9 is unacceptable. After all, I started this thread… I just wondered what the reason could be that it works perfectly on my PC, but not on your machine.
2 Likes
Stenis
(Sten-Åke Sändh (Sony, Win 11, PL 6, CO 16, PM Plus 6, XnView))
573
I agree and 16 GB and Nvidia RTX generation 4xxx or 5XXX is probably the new defacto standard level of hardware needed to get Photolab to shine without any resource limitation based problems.
Before everyone screams at DxO, we do need to bear in mind that both M$ and Apple seem to made some awful cockups at the OS level, possibly before DxO had the time to do enough to remedy their code.
My humble metadata app for macOS suffered from such a problem and I had no choice but to wait for their update before I was able to continue using that feature. Since my code uses the Spotlight search mechanism, and that was where the problem lay, I was equally unable to do the same thing, even through Finder.
You really need to do more screaming at M$ or Apple rather than laying into DxO, who are just as much a victim.
Yet it’s DxO that decided to release their product anyway, surely knowing that many of their customers would have a less than smooth experience with it. DxO is hardly a victim.
Of course, we had the trial, and it was so unstable for me on Windows that I started testing on Mac instead, and then discovered enough problems there that I decided to skip PL9 altogether. In fact, recent releases have been such a make-work project that I’ll probably drop PL altogether. If I need to test every release this extensively then DxO can start paying me instead.
PLB8 has no problems, and PBL9 does... It's Microsoft's fault in both cases...
Thanks for the humor
1 Like
Stenis
(Sten-Åke Sändh (Sony, Win 11, PL 6, CO 16, PM Plus 6, XnView))
577
I can´t answer about the Mac OS eventual fuck ups but I wonder if it really is fruitful to blame Microsoft this time. Remember that we were able to make Photolab at least partly work with the new AI-models when we downgraded the Nvidia drivers - in my case about 20 generations of those drivers - used in the spring of 2025. At least we could use the “freehand masking method” after trhat. Is that really something we can lay on Microsoft how much we even are prepared to blame them for generally because we hate them so much that no other thoughts get any room in our minds?
All my limitation problems I earlier had with my RTX 3060 Ti-card with 8 GB VRAM have just vanished after I got my new machine with my new Nvidia RTX 5070 Ti-card with 16 GB. So in my example I used exactly the same Windows release in my old computer as in my new since I always let Windows update automatically control when there are new releases awailable.
Below is the driver screen in Nvidias App and the marked texted says in Swedish:
Drivers:
“Get driver updates automatically and let me choose when to install them.”
If the developer staff at DXO had been a little bit more professional they would have had that switch activated. If they had they would have got aware of new drivers had been released half a year before they actually did. So this is definitelly on DXO. When they urged us to downgrade to a driver version 20 generations back they in reality admitted this was the case. That is a hard evidence on which driver version they actually had used when developing Photolab 9. I think that is obvious because otherwise they would have been in sync with Nvidia long before October.
I totally agree with @asvensson and see that reaction as an evidence of the cost DXO now will pay for it’s mistakes. it is more than one now that have decided to go for more stable alternatives that still works on the hardware that they happen to have when using Photolab 8 without any problems. Do I have to remind you about that Capture One (that I know because I use that software personally) and Lightroom (through other witnesses here) works perfectly fine with 8GB GPU-cards and even less, despite they are as advanced or more when it comes to AI-masking?
What a terrible mistake they have done when deciding to rush a release like that just to be “first” out there to steal all market light when the “release season” started. As we know not the least from your ever lasting bad memories from Windows XP you used 20 years ago some other users will remember DXO’s terrible post release night mares for ever. This has not so much with the reality around these softwares real historical technical status over time to do as about a bottomless disappointment, a lost perspective over time and a reluctancde to move on with your business and face the reality we all has to face. Shit happens and this case was neither the first or the last we have had to face - the only special with it really is how badly it has been handled by DXO.
We can always critizise Nvidia too but even here the blame price goes to DXO because it was DXO that never upgraded their drivers (remember) or got notices about new releases when they were released. If they had turned on that switch you see above in the Nvidia app these problems with the new AI-models in Photolab would have been known a long time before they actually hit us all in September. …. and for some people DXO now has taken the place of the arche type company to hate for ever even if you still seems to be stuck there with Microsoft.
You can’t be serious! You’re showing an Nvidia app (which, by the way, can be installed optionally by the user) and you want DxO to initiate the driver update?
I interpreted it as meaning that DxO should have had this enabled on their own machines, or otherwise ensured that they tested with the latest drivers. If they had, on anything but high-spec machines, then they would have been aware of the problems, and should have had qualms about releasing their product without very dire warnings about what many could expect.
3 Likes
Stenis
(Sten-Åke Sändh (Sony, Win 11, PL 6, CO 16, PM Plus 6, XnView))
580
Yes I’m very serious about that. I don´t intend to comment your comment since @asvensson seems to have understood perfectly fine what I wsanted to sat and I guess most of the others have done soo too. I still think I got to say exactly what I felt had to be said on this matter.
Fully agree Stenis. Used Photolab from V1 and for the first time I am not using the current version.
DXO could have released V9 with Predefined AI selections in Beta as they have done for DeepPrime in the past. All of the pluses for V9 without any of the damaging negative press which is ongoing.
Product Managers are paid to take the difficult decisions.
I will upgrade to a RTX5060 16Gb, but my RTX2070 functions perfectly with more sophisticated AI masking in Capture One and ON1 Photoraw, and so I will wait for Photolab V10 before upgrading.
Stenis
(Sten-Åke Sändh (Sony, Win 11, PL 6, CO 16, PM Plus 6, XnView))
583
Yes, that is also an option, that might be a vide one:-).
Photolab 9 is still in Beta and the whole community is doing that job for free.
Photolab 10 will for sure be more optimized and refined since it will probably be what version 9 was intended to be.
