Comments on: What's the oldest version of Photoshop that works with Leopard?

Question: What's the oldest version of Photoshop that works with Leopard?

tremspeed — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 23:29:04 -0800

I use 10.5.2 and need Photoshop a few times a year. I went to school for design, so I'm annoyingly competent with PS and depend on some of the more 'pro' features, like CMYK (which LE or Elements lacks, I think) and Channel Editing (which Pixelmator seems to lack).

Really, I'm kind of old school, and don't use much of the new crap on offer. I happily ran 6.0 until a year or so again, and it was fast as HELL and had everything I needed.

I guess I'm looking for an old school version of PS that I can get used for not much money and get by.

By: tremspeed

tremspeed — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 23:30:00 -0800

'a year or so again' makes alot of sense. sorry.

By: heeeraldo

heeeraldo — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 00:08:41 -0800

if you're on an Intel Mac, then anything that's not CS3 will have to run via the Rosetta translation layer thing, which is a pretty sizable performance hit.

Other than that, I believe Leopard (or possibly Tiger) ditched Classic mode, so it would have to be OS X-native.

With that knowledge, paired with this handy chart of Photoshop releases, I think the oldest Photoshop Leopard will run is Photoshop 7, but a cursory google says that they don't get along.

Looks like Photoshop CS is our winner.

By: tremspeed

tremspeed — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 00:16:50 -0800

yeah, i'm on an intel macbook pro. hmm.

thanks tho!

By: stackhaus23

stackhaus23 — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 00:35:28 -0800

I was just about to suggest Photoshop 7. I had that for the PC and it was the first version of Photoshop I ever used, although I have no idea what systems it runs on. It's just an edition of Photoshop that was good enough to get me through college.

There are a crazy amount of features that I would miss now if I downgraded from CS3 though which is worth thinking about, this release has been by far the best release ever.

By: m o q s h a

m o q s h a — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 03:41:44 -0800

you might want to try seashore. its got a great price. free. open source... might fit your casual use.. looks like it does channel editing...

By: Joh

Joh — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 10:13:16 -0800

I believe you can "unlock" many of the regular Photoshop features in Photoshop Elements, with macros. I haven't done it myself, but keep meaning to because I particularly miss the curves editor. A quick google should help you out, check out these two links for examples.

By: azpenguin

azpenguin — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 10:19:17 -0800

I'm still stuck on Tiger, but I use Photoshop 7. It's the first OSX native version; 6 and before won't run natively. I haven't had any issues with it.

By: timeistight

timeistight — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 15:54:22 -0800

I couldn't get PS 7.0 to run after I upgraded to Leopard (i.e., 10.5).