Edit: I had missed your post admitting photoshop always uses 8-bits per channel, so this may seem a little redundant, but it may clarify things for some, I don't know. I don't mean to sound like an ass, but I see this question too much to believe that the truth is well-publicized. The original post is as follows:
Photoshop isn't misbehaving, it's doing exactly what it is designed to do. There is a vital schism in terminology, however, that is confusing you.
See, 32-bit color is actually 8-bits per channel, four channels (red, green, blue, and alpha), which totals 32. 16-bit color is 4 bits per channel, 4 channels. In photoshop, the "16 bit" and "8 bit" refer to bits per channel , meaning 16-bit photoshop images contain 64 bits, and are double the file size of the 32-bit standard.
16-bit is not really something you should be using unless you have a film scanner. It's 16 bits per channel, which means it contains twice as much data as a monitor can display. It's meant to be used to capture this extra data, so that when you adjust the exposure (via curves, brightness/contrast, levels, etc.), you can pull details out of the highlights and shadows. Once the exposure and color is how you like, you change the bit depth back to 8 to work with specific areas via layers. Also, there is no output device capable of rendering all of a 16-bit image, except possibly a print-to-film machine.
The "filter" menu is greyed out because filters are not programmed to deal with double their usual data, and the "layers" functions are nixed because the files would get too big too fast.
In short, just leave it on 8-bit, 'cause it's as much as anyone needs. Oh, and no amount of re-installation would change this.
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- o n y x -
"I dn't type. I'm a kybard artist "
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(This message has been edited by Onyx (edited 02-16-2004).)