Photoshop: Can't use the Type tool without incurring the spinning beachball.

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The whole machine didn't freeze, but was v-e-r-r-r-y slow to respond to my selecting other programs that were on (Bridge, my email, Firefox), before I had to shut down (by holding the power button).

Using OS 10.5.8

Don't know how to check my system for problems with the fonts, although I had no problems with them when I had CS4.

Thanks for the quick reply.

I tried Font Test. No faulty fonts.
I'm working my way through the troubleshooting fonts link that was given me (above). I'm on Solution #5/Step 3: I turned off Enable OpenGL Drawing. The problem of Photoshop freezing still occurs, at which point the instructions tell me to update the video driver.... It's been a few days since i worked on this freezing problem, but i recall having been instructed to go to some site and gather this info: Video Adapter Vendor (which is ATI Technologies), Video Card Renderer (which is ATI Radeon HD 2600 open GL engine), and Video Renderer ID (which is 137730). After gathering this info, i was to somehow (i don't remember) update the video driver; when i did this, there were no updates for me.
Can you help me update the video driver (as per Step 3/Solution #5)?

Thank you, Kyoko. I tried your solution. The first time i opened up Photoshop, it seemed to work. But upon later launches, the problem remains: when i choose the Type Tool, it gets stuck there... i cannot change the tool nor anything else. But there is one difference: after having done what you suggested, Photoshop got stuck, but after having written this reply, i went back to Photoshop, and it had released its grip... it seems that the problem is intermittent now, rather than continual.
I will try again at other times to see the results.
Thank you for improving at least part of my problem.

I have used Photoshop since my last communication, and it seems that my problem of the Photoshop getting stuck when i choose the Type Tool is still there, but if i wait some amount of time (20 seconds to a couple of minutes) it becomes unstuck and i can then use the Type Tool. Any ideas on why this might happen or other ideas on solutions?

Yes. I have tried launching with Font Previews both on and off. I have not had the spinning beach ball effect yet with either; i have not had to Force Quit. It seems that as i test the program, launch and relaunch, the lag time on the Type Tool gets shorter and shorter.
I will continue to work with Photoshop and hope for the best; will get back to this conversation if anything goes amiss.
Thanks guys and gals, for the effort on my behalf.

If it turns out that my problem is solved, is there anything i should do/write?

When I open a psd file (made originaly in CS4) in CS5.5 I experiense a lot of problems. Photoshop often stopped and I can't do anything in those documents.
Second problem is when I want to type text Photoshop stopped also.
Please help me with this problem!

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
Photoshop CS5.5 stopped when I open CS4 document!.

Cheb, I have had very similar experience with PS CS5. I followed *all* the instructions that PS Family suggested, each one after the other (it took a lot of tries, patience and a lot of time--see above conversations with PS Family), but finally my PS no longer freezes when I select the Type Tool. It seemed that with time, and with each instruction that i followed, my PS would freeze less and less frequently. Sounds bizarre, I know, but do what they tell you to do, and don't give up. Contact Kyoko Itoda at itoda@adobe.com. She was the last person to help me with my PS problems.

At my office, we've been experiencing this spinning beach ball with the type tool for about a month now. It usually begins with a flickering cursor, then it evolves to the beach ball. The pattern we've noticed is that it only seems to occur on PSDs that have a large number (10+) layers of text.

The PSDs in question are website prototypes (concepts), and the designers put every text element in a different layer. Pretty soon, you have a PSD with 30+ type layers, and it gets really annoying for them to switch from the type tool to any other tool, or to even click on the check-mark for "commit to changes."

We found a workaround: Have a duplicate (or a completely different document) of the PSD open in a second tab in the same window. The user makes a text edit on the original PSD, but then they need to click on the tab of the duplicate file (while still using the type tool). Then, they can click back on the original's tab and save or continue working on the next text edit. They need to keep clicking on the duplicate's tab again every time they make a change to text using the type tool. It's the least cumbersome way we've found to maintain the workflow.

HOWEVER, yesterday we've found that if the PSDs are opened in Fireworks, the user can make as many text edits as they want and the flickering cursor or spinning beachball does not come up.

I've been trying to convince the rest of the team to work on these website graphics in Fireworks, but since we're mostly a print-oriented shop, they're reluctant to use the program because they're not familiar with it.

In any case, we don't know what the cause is. It doesn't seem to be corrupted fonts, or graphics card incompatibility. Our designers are all on 27" iMacs or 15" MacBook Pros running Mac OS X 10.6.8.

All we have are the two workarounds above.