Use of external HD for photos

[tobindia]

I have a 2015 MBA with 256GB of storage (OS 10.15.5). It has been running low on storage for a year or so, but I've nursed it along, mostly by deleting photos, as required. The rest of the device is more than sufficient for my needs, but I will forever need to keep deleting photos. Since, I balk at the purchase price for a new MBA, and I'm not thrilled by the fact that new MBA's have only USB-C ports, I’d like to explore other options to keep my existing MBA. So, my questions are, Can I put all of my photos (I use iPhoto) on an external HD that is only used by iPhoto? Can I disconnect the xHD when I’m not using iPhoto (which is 99.9% of the time)? If I do disconnect the xHD, will that mess up the sync of photos from my iPhone, or will the sync just be on "hold" until I plug in the xHD?

 

[chscag]

You can move your Photo Library to an external drive if you wish. Just remember that each time you open Photos the external drive will need to be attached so the Library can be found.

How to move your Photo Library to an external hard drive: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201517

Don't forget that once your library is moved to the external drive, you should make a backup of that using cloning software to dupe the library to another drive for safe keeping.

 

[RadDave]

Hello - your main question about using an EHD for your Photos has been answered w/ a link given. You're on Catalina but keep mentioning 'iPhoto' which Apple stopped supporting several years ago and does not open in the newest macOS - I'm assuming that you mean 'Photos', just to be clear? More information HERE.

Also, if you might want another 'cloud based' option, look in the Photos Preferences under the iCloud tab - you can optimize storage on your laptop by letting iCloud store your full resolution images and keep smaller 'thumbnails' on you computer - Dave
.

 

[tobindia]

Thank you both! That's a lot to read and consider, but it'll give me something to do during the pandemic! And yes, RadDave, I did mean Photos, not iPhoto. Habit, I suppose.

Thanks again!

 

[tobindia]

I moved my photos to an EHD, and I thought I did it right. but obviously not. I have several problems.

1. When I open Photos, the 1st ~22,000 photos only show as blanks.
2. The last ~2,000 display just fine. They even print fine, but when I Edit them, I get an error: “Cannot Start Editing. Photos cannot load adjustments for this image.” I don’t know what “adjustments” it wants.
3. Also, before the move, pictures taken on my iPhone or my wife’s iPhone were automatically synced to both iPhones, the MBA and to iCloud. Now they only sync to the iPhones and iCloud, not to the MBA.

A list of the Pictures folder on my EHD is attached. I did Time Machine backups of my MBA before and after the move.

Any ideas? I have no clue.

 

[MacInWin]

You didn't say exactly HOW you did the move, but what you should have done is to first fine the photos database by opening Photos/Preferences and looking where the library was located, then copy that library to where you wanted it, then change the location in the Preferences. Here are the directions from Apple: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201517

As for the missing images, there are two ways to import images to Photos. One copies the actual file into Photos, the other just uses an external reference to the image file wherever it is on your system. It may be that you broke the links in the move somehow. If you have the original files, you should be able to re-import them.

 

[Rod]

If you still have your Photos library on your MBA maybe you would like to just redo the process.
I see you mentioned 22,000 images at one point so no doubt you have better things to do than check all your images one by one.
The process is fairly simple but requires a bit of management.
In your Pictures Folder (side menu in a Finder window) you will see your Photos Library. It is a Data Base and contains everything you see when you open the Photos app other than the app itself.
You should drag an drop that into your external hard drive (EHD). That will copy it to the EHD and may take some time. I like to right click on both the original and the copy Get Info and compare size.
Now you need to name the copy just adding a 2 will suffice eg Photos
Library 2.
Now with your EHD still connected open the Photos app holding the Option key down. You will see a window with both libraries as options to open, you can also choose which is the default library here.
Here is where the management part comes in. If you open the Photos app without the EHD connected it will either open the original library or failing to find it, create a new library. Next time you launch Photos that will be the library it opens even if the EHD is connected. So you will always need to check by launching Photos with the Option key held down.
Assuming your copy on the EHD is complete and intact you can now delete pics from the "on board" original library or if you have a backup eg Time Machine delete the original library completely.
Obviously this works seamlessly with a desktop computer where the EHD is permanently connected but requires a bit more effort with a portable.
You will inevitably end up with pics in your on board (local) library especially if you use My Photo Stream as I do. This means you will need to move pics regularly from one library to another.
The Photos app can only open one library at a time so it's always a two step process. Eg Photos Library > Desktop > Photos Library 2 (EHD).
This works but it's tedious if you have large numbers.
Alternatively you can resort to the one app I know of that can open more than one Photos Library at a time and move content between them. It's not free or perfect but it does what Photos doesn't. It's called Power Photos from Fat Cat Software.


Sent from my iPhone using Mac-Forums

 

[IWT]

Excellent summary, Rod.

Ian

 

[chscag]

Yes, good summary Rod and I must congratulate you on being able to do all that from your iPhone!

 

[Rod]

Just goes to show how well the revamped site works now on iOS.

 

[tobindia]

This seems to be getting worse! I have been away from my MBA for a day or so, during which the EHD has been attached, and I have not performed any of the actions suggested above. But things have changed:

1. All Photos show up now. They are not blank as I described above.
2. I can now edit seemingly everything, so #2 above seems to have resolved.
3. Photos are still not synced between devices, but I’ll worry about that later.

However, I have a new issue:

1. Most, of the photos are now duplicated and some are even triplicated! The duplicates/triplicates have the same name as the original. Whereas before, I had about 25,000 photos, I now have 57,943. And a process called photolibraryd, which I assume to be the Photos app, uses between 0.2% and 39% of the CPU, even though I’m not doing anything and usually even have Photos quitted. The size of the Photo Library has not changed.

What’s happening — and how do I (safely) stop it?

 

[MacInWin]

photolibraryd is the process for syncing your photos with iCloud. Let it run. When I last went through a re-sync, it ran for several days before it finished but at the end all the duplicates were gone. photolibraryd runs with very low priority so it should not impact your general use of the Mac as it gets out of the way when you make a demand. When you let it idle, it takes up more CPU.

So far, what you are seeing sounds kind of normal for being in the middle of a sync. Let it run to completion. It will complete faster if you leave it powered on overnight, if you can, so that it can get lots of CPU time and finish sooner.

 

[Rod]

I did say in my post #7,"That will copy it to the EHD and may take some time." Of course that varies depending on the size of the DB which in my case was about 20Gb. If you are using a USB 3 connection to an external HDD that will further slow the process. it would also be advisable to prevent your computer HD from sleeping when the display is off. Check your Energy Saver settings for this.

 

[tobindia]

I’ve let photolibraryd run since MacinWin’s post on 7/13. To date, photolibraryd has used over 6 hours of CPU time. Initially, it was using 20-40% of the CPU, but has been relatively idle for the past few days. photoanalysissid has been in and out of memory since that time and often used 20-30% of the CPU, but has also been relatively idle recently. So, I’m assuming that whatever syncing was happening is now complete.

Unfortunately, things appear to be unchanged since my last post on 7/13. Most photos are still duplicated and some are even triplicated. I still have 57,943 in Photos (whereas I only had about 25,000 photos before all of this. The size of the Photo Library has still not changed from what it was when I started (13.8GB), which doesn’t seem to make sense. The duplicates/triplicates have the same name as the original, although the extensions differ. For example, here are 3 different photos:

IMG_6210.jpeg
IMG_6210.HEIC

IMG_6214.jpeg
IMG_6214.HEIG
IMG_6214.heig

IMG_1920.jpeg
IMG_1920.JPG
IMG_1920 (1) .jpeg

I did not (knowingly) create and of the .heig or .HEIG or (1) files.

Shall I continue to wait? If not, ow do I get rid of the duplicates?

 

[Rod]

This article may help explain https://www.macworld.co.uk/feature/iphone/what-is-heic-3660408/
As for a file number with a (1) or (2) following the file number or name is a duplicate.
Getting rid of photo duplicates is a popular topic. You will find a number of apps for that purpose for both iOS and macOS in the App Store.
Duplicate Photos Fixer Pro is what I'm using.

 

[pm-r]

I did not (knowingly) create and of the .heig or .HEIG or (1) files.

Have a look and read here for some information about those files and Apple devices:
https://www.tomshardware.com/news/how-to-open-heic-file,36733.html


More and more complications and confusion it seems...




- Patrick
=======

 

[tobindia]

Those are both interesting reading, but I don't understand why they were created in the first place. And why didn't they cause the size of Photo Library to increase?

If the only way to get rid of them is by means of 3rd-party apps, is there one that anyone might care to recommend?

 

[pm-r]

If the only way to get rid of them is by means of 3rd-party apps, is there one that anyone might care to recommend?

You might want to have a read here:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8418810

But maybe also have a read of some of the hits from here:
can one delete apple photos .heig or .HEIG files
https://www.google.com/search?q=can...57j69i64l2.36455j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8



- Patrick
=======

 

[tobindia]

I’ve decided that moving Photos to an EHD is not worth the risk and the effort! I’ll just continue to nurse my storage for a while.

So, I have restored the Pictures folder from a Time Machine backup and pointed Photos to that Photos Library, but I have 2 problems: (1) When I Edit a photo, I get the error: “Cannot Start Editing. Photos cannot load adjustments for this image.” (2) When I start a video, I get the error: “Cannot Play Video. Photos cannot play this video because the resource is unavailable.” I’ve waited a couple of days to see if it would clear up. photolibraryd is using little or no CPU. But it hasn’t.

What have I missed?

 

[MacInWin]

"Adjustments" are any edits to the images you may have made. Photos is a database, with the images as the starting point, then any edits are also stored in the database, which is why Photos can do a restore back to the original image. When Photos then retrieves the image for you, it starts with the original and reapplies all the edits, in order, to get to the image you last saw. From the two messages, it sounds like the database you restored is compromised and Photos cannot get to the list of adjustments. A corrupt database would also result in the video error you see.

Back in post #6, I said, "As for the missing images, there are two ways to import images to Photos. One copies the actual file into Photos, the other just uses an external reference to the image file wherever it is on your system. It may be that you broke the links in the move somehow. If you have the original files, you should be able to re-import them." You never responded to that, but maybe it's time to return to that topic. How were the images imported into Photos in the first place? If they were actually imported to Photos then it may be corrupted. If you were pointing to the original files and not actually importing to Photos, it may be that the images are moved or missing for some reason. Given that you restored, photolibraryd has nothing to do, so that's why no activity from it.

At this point, if you have the original image files, it may be easiest to import them all into a new, clean, empty Photos database and start from scratch, clean. Or do a new TM restore from before the one you just did.