Photoshop CS3 tool inaccuracy under Leopard: fix likely coming in 10.5.2

There exists a significant issue in Photoshop CS3 when running under Mac OS X 10.5.x (Leopard) where the crop tool does not work properly, eliminating a large portion of the selected portion of the image. In other words, the cropping tool is wildly inaccurate, using values different than those expressed by the tool or otherwise entered by the user. The same inaccuracy pervades other CS3 tools.

MacFixit reader Bob Burgess writes:

"Since installing 10.5.1 I have found that, in Photoshop CS3 (version 10.0.1) the crop tool reduces the image to a small dot in the middle of the frame. Gone, but recoverable with the Command-Z keyboard combination (Undo)"

Tools affected by the problem include: Art History tool, Blur tool, Brush tool, Burn tool, Color Replacement tool, Clone tools (all), Crop tool, Dodge tool, Eraser tools (all), Gradient tool, Healing tools (all), History tool, Lasso tools (all), Line tool, Magic Wand tool, Marquee tools (all), Paint Bucket tool, Pencil tool, Polygon tool, Quick Selection tool, Red Eye tool, Rounded Rectangle tool, Sharpen tool, Smudge tool, Sponge tool, Slice tool, Type tool.

Kirsten Harris, a Product Support manager at Adobe Systems, recently issued the following statement regarding this issues, indicating that a fix for this issue will appear in a forthcoming release of Leopard (hopefully Mac OS X 10.5.2):

"Adobe and Apple are working closely to provide a fix to a known issue running Adobe Photoshop CS3 and Photoshop CS3 Extended on Mac OS X Leopard (v10.5.1). Currently, when you enter values in numerical fields to set sizes for the brush, crop, marquee, lasso, type, and other Photoshop CS3 tools, those values revert to previously entered values when you try to apply them.

"While we have identified workarounds for some of the affected tools, this issue prevents people from working as precisely and intuitively as they expect. Providing a fix to customers is a top priority. Please note the following: The fix will be provided through an update to Mac OS X Leopard. Consequently, it is not part of the Photoshop CS3 (10.0.1) update."

"Apple is collaborating closely with us to get this fix incorporated into a Mac OS X Leopard update. No public schedule is available at this time, but both companies understand the urgency of this fix. As soon as the appropriate update to Mac OS X Leopard is available, we will immediately alert our Photoshop users."

Adobe's current workarounds are as follows:

• "Workaround for tools with sliders: Instead of typing in a number, use the sliders to change the value."
• "Workaround for tools with pop-up menus: Enter a value for the size but don?t press Return/Enter to apply the value. Instead, choose it from the top of the Size pop-up menu to commit it."
• "Workaround for tools which do not have sliders or pop-up menus: For certain tools, such as the Line tool, you may want to set up presets that you can load to set common sizes. Alternatively, you can restart Photoshop CS3 to clear the problem. You will then be able to enter values again. However, the issue typically re-surfaces quickly. "

If you absolutely cannot live with the inaccuracy issues until a Mac OS X update, you can use our instructions for reinstalling the system to revert to Tiger.

Feedback? Late-breakers@macfixit.com.

Resources