ok so ive been struggling with uploading to pictage for DAYS. ive been having uploading issues elsewhere for what seems like months now. i just signed on to pictage this week to see how i will like it. so far im not having trouble with anything but uploading my first event! heres my situation...
i was with photoreflect for the last 2 years or so. but ive been having nothing but problems with them since july. troubles getting orders processed, trouble uploading events, trouble getting answers from them. they tell me to upgrade my program, so i do and then find out that i cant use it unless i have a support plan. awesome. so now i cant access any of my old galleries. i have customers calling a few times a week saying they cant get an order placed. so i decide to try pictage. in july i felt like my upload speeds got dramaticaly slower and had no idea why. that was the first time i had to upload an order for a proof set of 1200 prints. it took 24 hours, but it sent and since then it seemed like my connection hasnt been steady or something. i called comcast and complained that uploads are taking too long. the girl told me to clear my cookies and that should help. i wanted to tell her she was an idiot. well a few more weeks go by. at the end of sept i couldnt even get a full event to post on photoreflect because of so many upload errors. so i called comcast again when i got home from vacation and they sent out a guy this week. the girl on the phone said something was out of spec. the guy comes and looks at all of the cable in my house and says it all looks like it is hooked up improperly and some of it is garbage. so he replaces EVERYTHING. he even replaces the cable from the pole to the house. he finds lots of reasons that the signal could have problems. well after all that work. NOTHING. i was still having problems. i tried bypassing my router and thats not the problem either. so he says it is either my computer, which is old and slow, my modem, or something deeper in comcast land. i have a 6 year old desktop and a laptop both only have 512mg ram and def need some upgrading bad. and when i say the upload is slow im talking 10kbps, or less with the signal breaking up every 15 mins. ok so i decide to upgrade my desktop computer, i need to anyways and that might help, even though i cant really afford it right now. well i get it home and start working and it seems to be going pretty well. the signal seems faster and more stable... for a little while. in the evening, peak internet time, it slows down again... down to 20ish kbps. then at about 10pm it jumped up to 60kbps and for a min or 2 was giving me 400kbps! i was hoping that the upload would go all night and possibly be almost done this morning. well. it didnt. i guess shortly after i checked it for the last time before going to bed it timed out or something. i restarted it when i got up this morning. it will go at 50kbps for a bit and then slow back down to 12kbps... in the last 45 mins it has uploaded 20 files and then froze and timed out. at that rate its going to take me 30+ hours. im about a third of the way done at least.
so now i am sure that the problem is not the computer, the cables, the router, or pictage, which leaves the modem and then back to comcast. i know that cable is shared with the rest of the neighborhood(which would explain why the speed jumped when all the kids got sent to bed and kicked off the internet). but should it be slowing down THAT much?? has anyone else had issues like this??? does anyone think dsl might be a better choice? i dont think there are any other options for my area... if anyone has any ideas tho i would be happy to hear them!

First, what FTP Client are you using?

Second, how are you saving your JPG's for upload to Pictage? Are you doing JPG12, 300DPI, etc. You may be uploading larger files than necessary.

Third, can you use paragraphs in your response, that was kinda hard to read

Sorry about no paragraphs...

I have tried using windows explorer, wsftp, core ftp, and ftp commander, all with the same results.

All of my files are about 3-5mb each.

Try using FileZilla as your FTP Client. I've paid for and used a bunch of different clients, but I've found that FileZilla, which is completely free, works the best for me. This probably won't help your slow speeds, because that's a function of your ISP, but it will help with the random disconnects, I'd imagine.

Save your files as 300DPI JPG quality 10. This is what Pictage will resize to upon upload, so if you are uploading anything bigger, you're just wasting time. The lower file size will allow you to push more files/hour to the Pictage server.

Good luck!

Im giving the pictage dec client a try.. and calling comcast again! But I will also try Filezilla. Thanks so much for the help!

I hear your frustration - my first uploads took days! Seriously - I think my first wedding upload of 1000 or so images took 3 days!! I thought I was going to lose it!

I called my ISP and upgraded to faster upload speeds - I wasn't concerned with download speeds - just upload speeds. (I have a Verizon DSL.) I don't know if there are different plans with Comcast, but you might want to check around and see what other options you have available to you - it doesn't seem like Comcast is working out!

I use DEC - Pictage's FTP client - I know it doesn't work for everyone, but I found for me that it is the fastest.

My files are about 3-5mb each - same as you. I am uploading about 80-100 images/ hour.

I am SOOOOO glad that Im not alone in this trouble! I will be calling comcast again today for sure... THANK YOU!

update: i had comcast upgrade me from the 300kbps upload tier to the 700kbps upload tier... it went fast for like a minute... then slowed back to an average of 45kbps. i then talked to a tech guy who ran some tests and said he saw my upload speed as 700kbps. i would be happy if i could get a steady 200 or 300kbps...
seriously....

You can check your upload speeds here: http://www.speakeasy.net/speedtest/ - don't know if it will tell you anything different! There is also a recent thread on the Pictage forum here: http://forums.pictage.com/showthread.php?t=21363 where you might be able to pick up some tips too...

Hoping this improves for you! I know when I finally got it right, it was pure heaven!!

Good luck!

Here's another thread on the Pictage forum with some good advice!

http://forums.pictage.com/showthread.php?t=19662

Hope this helps!

What size files are you guys uploading? Just curious. I shrink all mine a bit before uploading since Pictage doesn't even offer that huge of files... you could also just setup custom items for larger prints and process those yourself so you don't have to upload 10 Mb files if that's what's going on.

Also, forget DEC... lol At least my experience with it was awful. I use SmartFTP now (Filezilla works good too) and if you drop the pics into the bottom section of the FTP client then you don't have to worry about the upload timing out while you're sleeping... it will re-start itself if something goes wrong. Any wedding I've uploaded so far I started before going to bed and it was done in the morning.
Rion

It's not your ftp program. DSL is normally a much worse choice - but maybe not in this case.

First, 3-5MB files are way too large. You should save them as jpg 10 in Photoshop and 6MP (2Kx3K). That will give you about 800K to 1.5M files - and no one will ever notice the difference. Under normal circumstances it shouldn't take more than a couple of hours to upload your files. But you should probably schedule them for after midnight.

If the problem happens during peak times, then it's like that someone is doing a lot of file sharing in your neighborhood. (Though considering how many wedding photographers there are in the world - maybe you have half a dozen or so of those too!)

I did have intermittent problems with RoadRunner in the late afternoon at two different houses. They both ended up being bad neighborhood routers that were overheating in the afternoon. It took six months for them to find the first problem - only a couple of days to find the second one.

Leave Comcast if you can ... they are TERRIBLE. I had them in Charleston and my uploads took forever and a day. They always had a different reason.

I moved to Georgia a couple of months ago and got mediacom service - but their most expensive service with fast uploading times. Same computer. I can't even believe how fast my uploads are. I just uploaded 96 images while I was at the gym (maybe an hour and a half). With Comcast in Charleston, that would have taken 4-5 hours.

i called comcast several more times and they are pretty much giving me the runaround... saying they have no promised upload speed. there is a local dsl company that i might switch to... hopefully it works.

filezilla has helped alot!

i think i am really liking pictage so far!