I read an interesting review of the iMac Pro today. c't magazine was loaned a fully loaded iMac Pro (16 cores + hyperthreading, 128GB RAM, V64 graphics, 4TB SSD) to test. They had already tested the base model, when it was first launched.

What was interesting was that they ran the usual benchmarks on it and Affinity Photo showed a huge reduction in processing time for complicated effects, with the "Red Streaks" macro, it finished processing a 100 mega pixel image in 34 instead of 56 seconds (base iMac Pro), but with Photoshop CC using a 100 step macro, the top specced machine was 43 seconds slower than the base model! It seems that Photoshop becomes totally overwhelmed, when faced with 32 cores to spread its workload over...

All the other tests showed huge improvements, only Photoshop embarrassed itself.

Final cut to preview 2 x 8K videos at the same time, the base model could manage a single 8K stream without stuttering. Bitwig could mix 200 sound channels, compared to 151 on the base model.

Doesn’t surprise me on Photoshop, Adobe’s software is so buggy - they can’t seem to fix the basics like getting it to run without quitting unexpectedly.

Seriously tempted to switch to Affinity software, at least on my home MacBook Pro which is still running CS6 and only gets fired up maybe once a month now so not worth subscribing to CC - but just hanging on for Affinity Publisher to be released later this year (their version of InDesign). If they get that right, I could easily ditch Adobe software, so it’s good to hear their software appears to be well written.

I did it on my Windows machine (25% discount a couple of weeks back). Even at full price, it is less than a month of Adobe CC gouging.

The CC Photography bundle is a lot cheaper if you only need Photoshop/Lightroom but even that can't match the value of Affinity Photo. Methinks this may be the last year Adobe gets any money off me.
Shame they don't appear to have anything that handles the photo management side of Lightroom (yet).

Yeah, that is the missing element, although I've switched from Lightroom 3 and Photoshop Elements to Capture One and Affinity Photo (CO came as a special Sony version with my camera, I haven't decided whether it is worth updating to the Pro version yet).

Yeah, Capture One Pro looks rather expensive to buy as a stand alone