Note I am using Elements 10 and Irfanview.
Use Adobe ACR for Raw instead of Irfanview. Probably you are, probably not your meaning, but...
Irfanview, Faststone, etc, are NOT Raw editors. They might "read" DNG and NEF files, but they do not see the edited changes you may have previously made in ACR. They only show the original unedited data, every time, regardless. They have no other Raw capability. Basically, no Raw capability. They are NOT Raw editors.
If you edit in Irfanview, you are editing RGB data, and it can save that data as a new file type. No problem with that. But afterwards, if you open the original Raw file again, you again only see the original data, not your current changes. These are NOT Raw editors.
Whereas, Adobe ACR is very different. It reads the Raw files, and when you make edit changes (white balance, exposure, cropping, whatever), ACR only saves THE LIST of those changes that you have specified, into a same-file-name.XMP file. It has other ways too, but XMP is only 8 KB, and very fast to update. Bypassing the XMP file is "cutting off nose to spite the face".
Then when you open the Raw file next time, it also reads both files, and applies those previous changes, as your new starting point. And you can change those instructions in that list at any time, just tweak your edit. For example, you can Uncrop - your original pixels are not gone. Lossless editing.
Here is the big deal:
ACR NEVER changes the original Raw file. We don't even have tools that can change a Raw file. Subsequent edits only changes the list of your edits. It always starts with the original Raw file, which is LOSSLESS editing. Meaning, if you change White Balance half a dozen times, every day for a week, it does not keep shifting the data back and forth. It merely saves your last stated change, and it applies that last shift to the original data ONE TIME, at any output. Raw tools and capability is a big deal, and this lossless editing is another big deal.
Adobe ACR can also do this same losseless editing for JPG files, like from your compact camera. It can open JPG, and it saves your edits as a LIST in the JPG file somewhere. The original JPG data is NOT changed (no new JPG artifacts created). But at any access, it applies that list of changes to the Original JPG file data, which is lossless editing. No more JPG artifacts every time, no shifting data back and forth, etc. JPG does not have the range that Raw has, but still, lossless editing is Really Good Stuff.
However, then other programs (like Irfanview) don't understand these new ways, and if opening that edited JPG file, they only show you the original JPG data, and they don't know about the list. So ACR has to OUTPUT a new JPG for other programs to use, like ACR outputs a JPG from Raw, for other programs to use (but this is only done ONE TIME, i.e., any JPG is expendable, discard it and its artifacts when any change is needed, and start over in ACR, and create a new JPG, ONE TIME)
