New iMac questions

[IWT]

Could Time Machine then back up the photo files?

Only if they are present on your Mac's Hard Drive.

By your next question: "How do I transfer all those photos from my 4 TB EHD to the other without losing dates and key words?" - this suggests to me that all your photos are only on that 4TB Drive - am I right? Key question, poppi.

If yes to that:

1. I'd keep those photos on the 4TB Drive. Apparently they are stored in a way that preserves all the associated Data, Key words and any alterations you made to the photos. BTW, and this is important too, have you moved the Mac's Photos Library to the 4TB EHD? I ask because you state that all the data and additions are intact.

2. If your photos still reside on the Mac, then Time Machine will back them up as I said above. Here again we need to know if the Photos Library is still on the Mac??

These questions will guide us. For example: you can Clone the contents of the 4TB to another EHD, that way keeping the data etc intact.

If your Photos Library (that is the Library associated with the Photos App) is still on the Mac, then we can guide you as to how you deal with that. If NOT present any longer, we have to move in a different way.

Sorry for my ramble, but you can see that various options are available depending on your answers.

Ian

 

[poppi]

Thank you Dave. Reoplies below in italics

Only if they are present on your Mac's Hard Drive.

They are on the 4 TB EHD and not on the Mac and yes they do have dates, key words, etc.Once I get the new iMac (and I am going to bite the bullet and get ther 1 TB built in),I plan on storing them on the Mac

By your next question: "How do I transfer all those photos from my 4 TB EHD to the other without losing dates and key words?" - this suggests to me that all your photos are only on that 4TB Drive - am I right? Key question, poppi.

Again yes they are om the 4 TB EHD.

If yes to that:

1. I'd keep those photos on the 4TB Drive. Apparently they are stored in a way that preserves all the associated Data, Key words and any alterations you made to the photos. BTW, and this is important too, have you moved the Mac's Photos Library to the 4TB EHD? I ask because you state that all the data and additions are intact.

Yes they have been on the 4 TB EHD and have been for a long time

2. If your photos still reside on the Mac, then Time Machine will back them up as I said above. Here again we need to know if the Photos Library is still on the Mac??

Again I do not have the new Mac yet and am still on my original and do plan to move the photos library to thenew Mac once I get it set up with the 1 TB storage

These questions will guide us. For example: you can Clone the contents of the 4TB to another EHD, that way keeping the data etc intact.

Is that something I can do now or should I wait until I get the new machine?

If your Photos Library (that is the Library associated with the Photos App) is still on the Mac, then we can guide you as to how you deal with that. If NOT present any longer, we have to move in a different way.

Sorry for my ramble, but you can see that various options are available depending on your answers.

Please don't apologize for the ramble. You are a life saver

poppi

Ian

 

[Jimmysb]

As you will see from the snip below, you can include or exclude EHD from TM, so you could leave them on the 4TB, and back up to TM.
As @IWT says, leaving your photos where they are will preserve all the meta data, moving them in theory, should take all the meta data with them, but this does not always happen.

 

[RadDave]

Hi again Poppi - a couple of questions about your photos on the EHD - how are these organized, i.e. in an Apple 'photos library' or on your own in directories/folders in Finder? If the former then you must be using Apple's now obsolete app iPhoto vs. their current one called Photos which will be on your new iMac (more HERE) - their photo libraries are not compatible which brings up complications in transferring your photos. Now I'm not a user of Photos on my Macs (organized them in Finder with plenty of backups), so I hope after you more accurately describe the app you are using on your old iMac, others who have used both of these photo apps will chime in with specific suggestions. Dave

 

[MacInWin]

Hi again Poppi - a couple of questions about your photos on the EHD - how are these organized, i.e. in an Apple 'photos library' or on your own in directories/folders in Finder? If the former then you must be using Apple's now obsolete app iPhoto vs. their current one called Photos which will be on your new iMac (more HERE) - their photo libraries are not compatible which brings up complications in transferring your photos. Now I'm not a user of Photos on my Macs (organized them in Finder with plenty of backups), so I hope after you more accurately describe the app you are using on your old iMac, others who have used both of these photo apps will chime in with specific suggestions. Dave

If Poppi is using iPhoto, then when the new machine arrives with Photos, part of the migration process will import that iPhotos library into Photos, including all of the meta data he has referred to. That is what happened when I first got a machine with Photos instead of iPhoto.

 

[poppi]

Hi again Poppi - a couple of questions about your photos on the EHD - how are these organized, i.e. in an Apple 'photos library' or on your own in directories/folders in Finder? If the former then you must be using Apple's now obsolete app iPhoto vs. their current one called Photos which will be on your new iMac (more HERE) - their photo libraries are not compatible which brings up complications in transferring your photos. Now I'm not a user of Photos on my Macs (organized them in Finder with plenty of backups), so I hope after you more accurately describe the app you are using on your old iMac, others who have used both of these photo apps will chime in with specific suggestions. Dave

Thank you Dave

Here is what I get when I click "Get info"

Kind: Photos library
Size" 64 GB on disk
Where: Photos/Backup (This is the "name" of my 4 TB EHD
Created: 7/5/21
Modified: Yesterday
Open with: Photos Library

When I 2x click on the photos icon in the dock it opens the file which is on the 4TB EHD

Hope this answers yor questions. Thanks again

poppi

 

[RadDave]

If Poppi is using iPhoto, then when the new machine arrives with Photos, part of the migration process will import that iPhotos library into Photos, including all of the meta data he has referred to. That is what happened when I first got a machine with Photos instead of iPhoto.

Thanks Jake - that was my assumption but had no experience in making that photo migration. Dave

 

[MacInWin]

Thank you Dave

Here is what I get when I click "Get info"

Kind: Photos library
Size" 64 GB on disk
Where: Photos/Backup (This is the "name" of my 4 TB EHD
Created: 7/5/21
Modified: Yesterday
Open with: Photos Library

When I 2x click on the photos icon in the dock it opens the file which is on the 4TB EHD

Hope this answers yor questions. Thanks again

poppi

Poppi, if you open Photos, the application, and then click on the Photos name in the top bar, then on Settings, or Preferences, on the General tab will be a location and name of the library that the application is using. Here is what my setting shows:

I blanked out my account name.

In yours if you are using that external drive library, it should show the path to that location and the filename of your library. When the new Mac arrives and you want to store that libarary on the internal storage, all you need to do is to copy from the EHD to your own account in whatever folder you want to put it (I used "Pictures" as you can see.) and then start Photos, go to settings and set the location and filename to that location and file and Photos will open the library, do any conversion/update needed and use that library until you change the setting. All of your edits and metadata will be preserved. To change the location you click on the "Location" line and navigate to the library and then click on "Use as System Photo Library" and it will be the default from then on.

 

[poppi]

UPDATE.Thanks to all.. I have decided what I an going to do on the purchase of my new iMac. I will order the middle of the road version with 2 adders, the number key pad and the extra 1 TB storage. I will have it delivered to the ASpple store and (hopefully) I can bring in my old machine and my 4TB EHD to have evertthing transferred to the new machine. I hope to use my EHD for time machine only and transfer my photos from it to the mew 1 TB storage on the new product. Does this make sense?

Beyond that I haev a new problem with my 2008 iMac. Yesterday I was working on a Firefox internet site when everything froze. I shut down using the power button and tried restarting. As usual the Apple icon appeared followed by the progress bar but after some time the screen went completely grey with no response. I then tried restarting holding down the N key(I think) which opened the diskutility. I then tried every option offered including repairs etc but it still would nt start after shutdown. I then opened in Safe Mode (**;fding shift during startup). That seemed to work but everything is now incredibly slow. I can live with that until I get my new iMac but am afraid I might lose EVERYTHING in the interim. Comments please

Sorry to be such a pest.

poppi

 

[MacInWin]

Having booted in Safe Mode, will it now boot normally? What Safe Mode does is disable anything but known Apple products from loading at boot. It's slow because it even disables some accelerations that Apple uses.

Normally, Safe Boot is used to get past some third party software that is blocking the continuation of the boot/run process.

 

[poppi]

Having booted in Safe Mode, will it now boot normally? What Safe Mode does is disable anything but known Apple products from loading at boot. It's slow because it even disables some accelerations that Apple uses.

Normally, Safe Boot is used to get past some third party software that is blocking the continuation of the boot/run process.

Once opened in Safe Mode if I go to the Apple icon and click Restart I get the problem previously described. It looks like it's trying to open and then the screen goes completely grey and unresponsive.

poppi

 

[poppi]

While opened in safe mode I did Disk uti;ity > Repair on the HD. I also looked into Applications to see if there was a recent addition of anything suspicious but the latest modification was 9/23/23 long before this problem started on Monday. Is there any way for a novice to find the offending third party software?

Thank you poppi

 

[MacInWin]

Normally, it's something that was just installed, or updated. If you don't know, I don't know how to tell you to look, other than to use Finder in the Applications folder and in the List mode, look at "Date Modified" to see if anything was updated just before the problem started. You can also look at your account in Preferences/settings and see what is opening at login. Eliminate them one at a time until the system will boot normally, or remove all and add them back one at a time until it fails again. Bottom line, it's a lot of work to find the culprit.

 

[poppi]

Normally, it's something that was just installed, or updated. If you don't know, I don't know how to tell you to look, other than to use Finder in the Applications folder and in the List mode, look at "Date Modified" to see if anything was updated just before the problem started. You can also look at your account in Preferences/settings and see what is opening at login. Eliminate them one at a time until the system will boot normally, or remove all and add them back one at a time until it fails again. Bottom line, it's a lot of work to find the culprit.

Thank you Jake for your enormous patience. Still in Safe mode, here is what I did - Clicked System preferences > Users and Groups > Log in items. Sounds different from your suggestion but maybe because I am on such an older OS (10.11.6). That DID present a list of 5 items (including "Kind") - 1) iTunes Helper (application), 2) Wonder share (application), 3) Fitbit (Unknown), 4) Garmin (application), and 5) Dropbox (Unknown). I deleted all of them by clicking (-) for each and tried to restart with the same failure experience so I had to open again in Safe Mode which is where I am now. By the way of those 5 items neither Fitbit nor Dropboxshows up in the Applications list

Completely baffled
Poppi

 

[MacInWin]

Ok, of the items, the only innocent one is the iTunes helper. Wonder share is not a good application, IMHO, as it is a sneaky bit of stuff that has been known to trigger slowdowns on Macs. I would suggest getting rid of it. You can also use Etrecheck to find the files associated with it that are loading. Fitbit is probably associated with your Fitbit wrist device, assuming you have one. Garmin is for various Garmin devices, including their wrist devices. Dropbox is a file sharing service. If you didn't install them, they should all be uninstalled. There is an app called AppCleaner that will clean up all files associated with an application. You run AppCleaner and then drag the app to the AppCleaner window and it will show all of the stuff the app installed for you to review and approve to be removed. AppCleaner is here:

AppCleaner

Etrecheck is here:

EtreCheck

etrecheck.com

Here are instructions to delete WonderShare:

How to Uninstall Wondershare on Mac - Step-by-Step Guide

A complete guide on how to remove Wondershare studio on Mac completely, including the Wondershare browser plugin. To uninstall Wondershare manually...

nektony.com

And just to be sure your Mac is clean, you can scan for any malware with the Intego VirusBarrier Scanner, found here:

VirusBarrier Scanner | Intego

Number 1 Leading Mac security and antivirus software since 1997. Award-winning AV, network security, utility and parental control software exclusively for Mac OS X and macOS

www.intego.com

 

[poppi]

Thanks for all the support. None of the suggested apps work in my 10.11.16 El Capitan and I cannot get into the App store to download the one that supposedly does work with El Capitan.

poppi

 

[MacInWin]

At this point all I can suggest is to continue to run in Safe Mode until your new machine arrives.

 

[poppi]

At this point all I can suggest is to continue to run in Safe Mode until your new machine arrives.

Thank you Jake for your valiant effort to help. I think the main problem is the ancient age of my iMac and it's antique operating system. One final question Do you think the Apple store will be able to transfer everything to the new machine if operating in safe mode?

Thanks again

poppi

 

[MacInWin]

One final question Do you think the Apple store will be able to transfer everything to the new machine if operating in safe mode?

I don't know, but maybe they can sort out why it won't boot normally.

 

[ferrarr]

Poppi, do you have files on the. external (TM) drive, that are not on the internal drive? Or do you have files on the internal drive, that are not on the external (TM) drive?