How to back up iPhoto library to external drive

I have purchased a seagate external drive to back up my iphoto library. I currently use Time Machine but want to have my pictures in another place just incase of drive failures.
Wen doing the following User>Pictures I try to drag iphoto library onto my desktop Seagate drive icon. Nothing happens. The files do not copy onto the external drive.
Can anyone help with what

It should not be a problem. How is the drive formatted?
Select the Drive in Finder, then Get Info (cmd-i).
You'll see the format in the General section:

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Would like to know how to back up iphoto library to external harddrive

I know this question has been asked and very well answered, but I could not find it in the pop up discussions. I have copied my library to an external hard drive by dragging and dropping the events into folders. This works, however is time consuming and all the photos, I think are out of order. I would like to use the "export library" link in iphoto, but when i do it say something about can't create volumes?? Sorry if this is not as clear as it could be, but I don't think I am the first with this problem. Links to previous solutions would be great! I do use time machine as a back up to an external hard drive, but would like to back up the library to a USB also, which I can then put somewhere else.
I have a Mac Mini 10.6.8. and a sweet new bluetooth keyboard!

Copy the iPhoto library intact to the EHD -- or use a incremental program so you can update it without recopying everything - I use Carbon Copy cloner - Superduper is another good one - there are others
LN

How to back up iTunes Library to external drive so it can be restored

I recently moved my iTunes Library from a firewire Lacie external hard drive to a Western Digital USd hard that is now having problems (It keeps unmounting itself and I don't think that's good). It was not easy to move my iTunes folder and make it work again. I do not want to send 3 weeks plus using my spare time relinking songs or recreating playlists. I had to re-link 6,000 songs one by one. I iTunes will make a backup on CDs or DVDs why not an external device? Why would I want to copy 80 plus gigs to CDs?
If I simply copy my iTunes folder to the LaCie drive like apple recommends and the WD fails, I will lose all my playlists, track info, art work. I just got it all back. There must be some type of back up program I'm not seeing.
Please, some one help me. I am very disappointed that this solution is not on here.
I'm going to copy the file for now but it's really a poor solution.
Message was edited by: CindyLoo

I want to back up every thing, but I can't find a way to do it. That is the problem. Apple recommends if you are backing up to an external drive to copy folder the music folder to the drive via drag and drop. But I know when you do this that if you try use the backup you will only have the songs as if they were first added to iTunes.
I was able this time to move my music folder successfully (Last time the problem wasn't immediately apparent as it didn't affect my iPod, so I hope I'm not jinxing it). For now, my music is back on the Lacie drive, but it's still not backed up. If the LaCie drive were to fail I'd be faced with reimporting all my music and re-purchasing the TV shows and movies. (I almost always make a CD of new iTunes Purchases. which is why I have no desire to have a second huge stack of CDs.) My computer will not burn DVDs.
I want to backup everything so that it could be restored and be like it is now, but I don't see a way to do it. And I am not backing up all 80 plus gigs to CDs. My computer would crash and burn.

How do i launch iphoto on an external drive with my iphoto library already on it, how do i launch iphoto on an external drive with my iphoto library already on it

how do i launch iphoto on an external drive with my iphoto library already on it, how do i launch iphoto on an external drive with my iphoto library already on it

If you start iPhoto while holding down the option key you will get the library choice window.
From here you can select the library on the external drive and have iPhoto open it.

Can't read iPhoto library from external drive

I suddenly can't can't read iPhoto library from external drive. I have talked to WD and nohing is wrong with the network drive. I can open images and files from it. But, I can't read in iPhoto Library.

Network Drive? a NAS?
iPhoto needs to have the Library sitting on disk formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Users with the Library sitting on disks otherwise formatted regularly report issues including, but not limited to, importing, exporting, saving edits and sharing the photos.
Basically, you need to move the library to a correctly formatted disk.

How to back up iPhoto Library to an external source?

I am using OS X Mavericks with iPhoto v9.5.1. This morning iPhoto tells me my photo library is either in use by another application or has become unreadable. Stupidly I have not backed it up. I am reluctant to try making a repair for fear of losing my photos. So, how can I back it up to an external source (iCloud/external drive), before attempting a repair, when I can't seem to find a folder marked iPhoto Library on hard drive because I can't get past the message which seems only to permit 'Quit'. Thank you.

Most Simple Back Up:
Drag the iPhoto Library from your Pictures Folder to another Disk. This will make a copy on that disk.
Slightly more complex: Use an app that will do incremental back ups. This is a very good way to work. The first time you run the back up the app will make a complete copy of the Library. Thereafter it will update the back up with the changes you have made. That makes subsequent back ups much faster. Many of these apps also have scheduling capabilities: So set it up and it will do the back up automatically.
Example of such apps: Chronosync - but there are many others. Search on MacUpdate or the App Store

How do I transfer iphoto to an external drive?

Hi Apple support communities,
I know there are plenty of discussions out there but I am still confused.
My start up disk is almost full so I need to transfer my photos into an external drive. I copied iphoto library to my hard drive and deleted all photos in my mac air's iphoto. But when I wanted to test if the transfer was done correctly, I had to relanch iphoto on my mac air ( restoring all photos into my mac air).
So I am now worried that if I just transfer the current most updated iphoto library to my hard drive and empty my mac air's iphoto, in the future i will have new photos in my mac air, but when I want to revisit my older photos from my external hard drive I would have to relaunch the old version of iphoto which will wipe out the newer stuff. What should I do?
Cheers

I'm not sure I understand you but this is how to move an iPhoto Library:
Make sure the drive is formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
1. Quit iPhoto
2. Copy the iPhoto Library from your Pictures Folder to the External Disk.
3. Hold down the option (or alt) key while launching iPhoto. From the resulting menu select 'Choose Library' and navigate to the new location. From that point on this will be the default location of your library.
4. Test the library and when you're sure all is well, trash the one on your internal HD to free up space.
You do not have to move the images back to your computer to view them. Note step 3.
Regards
TD

Accessing iphoto library on external drive via wireless

I'm running out of room on my macbook so I moved my iphoto library to an external drive (after reading other posts on how to accomplish this, copied to the external drive and connected without a problem). However, i'm accessing the external drive wirelessly from my airport extreme and now iphoto is painfully slow - it takes several seconds for each photo to resolve properly. Any suggestions for the best way to manage? Do i need to keep older photos in a library on the external drive and a library for more current ones i want to access regularly on my local? I don't think i want to have multiple libraries but the performance this way is driving me crazy.

Welcome to the Apple Discussions.
A strong warning: If you're trying to edit the Library (that is, make albums, move photos around, keyword, make books or slideshows etc.) or edit individual photos in it via Wireless be very careful. Dropouts are a common fact of wireless networking, and should one occur while the app is writing to the database then your Library will be damaged. Simply, I would not do this with my Libraries.
A wired connection is the best way to have your Library on an external.
Regards
TD

Burning cd's from iPhoto library on external drive

ok, here is my problem... I've got an old powerbook g3 which I gave my mother for storing and sorting her photos. As the disk space on this powerbook is quite limited I though of buying a firewire card and an external firewire drive and load the whole iPhoto library onto it. My question is; is there some way to burn cd's or DVD's out of iPhoto from this external drive on my powermac G5?

Blanche:
Welcome to the Apple Discussions. You won't be able to burn the disks directly from within iPhoto but if you're just wanting to burn a disk containing image files you can do that.
In iPhoto create an album of those you want to burn. Then select the album and use the Share->Export->File Export menu route to export the full sized files to a folder on the desktop. Name the folder appropriately and insert a blank disk. When the disk mounts on the desktop drag the folder to the disk. Once copied to the disk, make sure the files are full sized (a couple of times I got aliases only so make it a point to double check before burning). Then drag the disk icon to the Trash which will turn into a Burn button.
But iPhoto will only recognize internal drives for burning iPhoto formatted disks right from inside.

Backing up iPhoto Library on external hard drive through Time Machine

Hi - I was advised by the folks at the Genius Bar to move my iPhoto Library to an external hard drive (drive 1), and then buy a separate 1TB external hard drive (drive 2) for all of my Time Machine backups. They said I could back up the Library in drive 1 via Time Machine, to drive 2. That way, I'd have 2 spots where my photos were stored.
I can't figure out how to make sure the Time Machine is also backing up the Library in drive 1. Where do I set that up? At the Genius Bar, they insisted I could do it, but when I poke around Time Machine on my System Preferences, I can't figure out how to tell Time Machine where to find the iPhoto Library. And when I open up Time Machine, I just get the application view, not a set up view.
Please help! Thanks!

By default Time Machine will backup all locally connected disks. so if the iPhoto library is on a locally connected disk it will be backed up.
To double check that the disk with the iPhoto Library is not being excluded open System Preferences->Time Machine and click on the Options… button.
If the disk with the iPhoto library is in the excluded list remove it.

How do I transfer iphoto library to external hard drive keeping events intact?

Had a one to one session but forgot how to do this. I would like to transfer my iphoto library to an external hard drive keeping the folders and events intact. I figured out how to send all my photos to the hard drive but they all transfer in single images, if that makes sense, and then i have to go thru all of the 15,000 images by hand and sort them into folders. Ahhhhhhh!
When they showed me how to do this at apple I am able to open my external hard drive and see a folder labled 'iphotolibrary" and I am able to click it open and then all my events show up just like in iphoto library.
Also does your iphoto library "Trash" take up space on your HD? Forgve me if thats a dumb question but I am kind of a computer "dummy".
thanks so much. My hard drive has VERY little space left on it so I need to transfer ASAP.

I just posted this to another topic, but it applies here as well. Hopefully there's no prohibition on cross-posting on this board, my apologies to all if there is:
"I haven't read the whole thread, so someone could have already mentioned this, but I did the same thing, move my music library to an external drive. The Help articles are helpful, but only up to a point. When that didn't work, I called up AppleCare support up, and they took me through all the standard steps, and got stumped at the same point I did. Finally she suggested trying something, and that ended up doing the trick. So here in brief is what you do:
1) Copy over your "iTunes Music" folder to the external hard drive
2) Go into Advanced preferences to have iTunes look for the "iTunes Music" folder in the new location. If you're like me, your music won't appear in the Library.
3) In iTunes, go to the Library window (which is probably blank), then in a Finder window, find the icon for the "iTunes Music" folder in the new location. Drag that icon onto the Library window.
You should now see a progress window pop up showing all the songs that it's populating the Library window with."
20" Intel iMac 14" iBook G4, 233 MHz Beige G3 Mac OS X (10.4.5)

Error code -36 - when backing up Iphoto library to external

While backing up my iphoto library to my external hard drive - I got this message - "Finder cannot complete the operation because some data in iphoto library.2 could not be read or written. (Error code -36) What to do?

Right click on the iPhoto Library and "Show Package Contents" a folder opens a inside folder called "Originals"
Open that and copy in sections until you find the corrupted file(s), then remove them from iPhoto or replace with good copies.

Can't back up iPhoto library to external hard drive

Just purchased a new ext. hard drive; when I try to back up my iPhoto library (v. 5.0.4) to it I get a message "can't copy one or more of your items". When I click to continue, it simply stops. I had no trouble backing up iTunes and other files. What am I doing wrong?

Hi Lori;
Thanks to you for your support as well. I have tried dragging the iPhoto Library both directly from the Pictures File in Finder, and from a copy of the iPhoto Library folder on my desktop. I get the same non-result in both cases: "One or more items can't be copied. Do you want to skip them and copy the remaining items?" It doesn't specify what items can't be copied, and when I click yes (to continue) nothing gets copied.
As I said earlier, I successfully backed up my entire iTunes folder with room to spare, so I know the external hard drive is operating properly. Any ideas? Thanks again.

Backing up iPhoto Library from external hard drive through ChronoSync to Time Capsule

I have a 2008, 2GB Mac Mini. I moved my iTunes library, which is mostly movies, to a 4 TB My Book Studio, as it exceeded the space on my Mac. I back up my computer to a 2 TB Time Capsule. I exclude the My Book Studio from being backed up on the Time Capsule as it takes up all the space due to the iTunes library. I am wanting to move my iPhoto library as it is starting to take up to much memory on my Mac also.
My question is, if I move my iPhoto library to the My Book Studio, then get an application such as ChronoSync (or an App that will do incremental back ups & not do a completely new back up each time) to automatically back up my iPhoto library to my Time Capsule, can I set it to specifically bak up the library off the external hard drive, or will it only back up info that is stored on my Mac?
Thanks!

Thanks Terence!!! I received a reply back from Chronosync. I will be purchasing their app......it sounds pretty slick
Here is their reply to the same question I asked here:
ChronoSync Express will back up the contents of whatever volume or folder you target as your source target to the volume or folder you choose as the destination target. As long as you can access the volume or folder via Finder of your Mac, ChronoSync Express can access it as well. You can create a sync document that targets your iPhoto library and nothing else on the My Book Studio and backs it up to the Time Capsule then schedule it to run automatically.

Time Machine wont back up iPhoto Library on External Hard Drive

I have tried and tried, but I cannot get Time Machine to successfully back up my iPhoto Library on an external hard drive. I found out the hard way that TM was not backing up iPhoto. Sometime TM would work and other times it would not. I realize now that the times it worked was the times I had iPhoto open. The times it did not was when iPhoto was closed.
I have checked the troubleshooting steps, repaired disks ,etc - but still nothing. Anyone have any suggestions?

I bought a new MacBook Pro in late august this year, and since then I`ve had some serious problems backing up my iPhoto library. I have searched severals forums in both english and norwegian, with no luck. But today, I found this... http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4116
Thank you so much, Pondini. You made my day
Kind regards, Erlend.

How to back up iPhoto library to external drive

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