Aperture Library on External Drive Keeps Locking Up

Hello all!
I have the aperture library that I created after my most recent wedding shoot on an external hard drive. Since I was importing photos out in the field, I created the library on my external from my laptop. I now want to edit photos on my desktop mac at home, and am able to launch aperture to my wedding library on my external, and browse for up to a few minutes, but then it freezes, and sometimes will unfreeze after a few minutes, but sometimes I am simply forced to force-quit. The external is properly formatted (Extended, Journaled), and is connected via USB 3.0. What could I be doing wrong?
Paul

and browse for up to a few minutes, but then it freezes, and sometimes will unfreeze after a few minutes, but sometimes I am simply forced to force-quit.
Have you repaired the Aperture library after the Force -Quitting? That is strongly recommended.
Next time you launch Aperture, open the Activity viewer (From the Windows menu > Show Activity). This way you will see, which media Aperture is currently processing, when it is starting to hang.
You may have a corrupted video or photo in your library, that cannot be processed and is causing Aperture to hang. You can test that by launching Aperture while holding down the Shift-key. This will defer the generation of preview images. If Aperture does not hang when launched this way, it is very likely, that a corrupted file is causing this, and you have to try to identify it.
If the shift-key does not make a difference, test with a new, empty Aperture library and add a few test images. DO you have the same problem with a different library?

Similar Messages

Backing up Aperture library on external drive.

Lately I haven't been using Aperture, I've just been organizing all my pictures into folders, and keeping the folders in my Pictures folder. Then making a copy of the whole thing onto my external. I decided to start using Aperture.
I finally just finished organizing everything the way I want it. But how should I go about saving a backup to my external.
I have 2 libraries. I also have 2 vaults saved (one for each library). So when I go in my Pictures Folder, I see Aperture Library, Aperture Library 2, and my 2 vaults. Is it enough to just put the Vaults on my external? Or do I need to put the whole "Library" on the external. I would think it would be enough to put the Vaults, cause that's what I would think the vaults are for. To completely restore the library incase anything goes wrong. But I just wanna be sure before something happens to my computer, and all I have are Vaults that don't do me any good.

Issues,
I would think it would be enough to put the Vaults, cause that's what I would think the vaults are for. To completely restore the library incase anything goes wrong. But I just wanna be sure before something happens to my computer, and all I have are Vaults that don't do me any good.
Yes, that is what vaults are for. With a vault you can restore everything that was in your library. Remember that referenced photos are not stored in your library and therefore not backed up in a vault. Also remember that the most likely reason to use a vault is because the disk with your library is damaged or unavailable in some way. For instance, my MacBook internal drive bit the dust absolutely, completely, just before Christmas. No booting up; the Apple store couldn't even look at the hard drive by attaching it as a secondary drive to a different computer. If you find yourself in that situation, your vaults in their current state would be completely useless.
nathan

Aperture library on external drive for multiple computers

I would like to store my aperture library and all masters on an external hardrive (with a backup). Ideally I'll be able to only transport this external drive to work to edit photos and return home to my personal computer and continue where I left off. I've tried something similar but ran into problems with lost adjustments, etc and am wondering what the simplest method is that others have discovered.
Cheers

All the editing work is stored in the *****.aplibrary file.
THe most obvious way will be to keep it on the external drive. If you experience it is to slow with USB you could probably have a better performance with FW800. Probably not so much with FW400.
I have no experience with ***-aplibrary on external drive. Probably ist it to slowdown the editing.
The best way to edit on 2 different macs will need in my opinion some extra preparation.
Set both Aperture in exactly the same way pointing to referenced files on the external drive.
Keep the *****.aplibrary file on the HD of the mac you are using and at the end of your work copy it somewhere (may be on the same external HD where you keep the referenced masters). Before starting to work on the second mac copy this ****.aplibrary on it. You will need to do the same reversed to go back to the other mac.
This will probably give you the fastest editing but you will need time to copy the *****.aplibrary files, may be a lot of time. Even if you use a program like Tri-Backup to do the copy you will se that even if the *****-aplibrary has few changes it takes a lot of time to overwrite the older copy.
Keep projects and libraryes as small as possible, or you will waste more time coping it compared to the more speed in editing.
This is only my opinion, and I am not 100% sure of it. I'm giving it to you only as a suggestion you could try and see if it works for you.
Regards
Walter

Large aperture library on external drive; too large to move to internal before switching to photos

I have a 395gb aperture library on an external drive. It used to reside on my old macbook pro, but i got a new one (retina) with a smaller hard drive and i haven't found a way to bring it over yet. My plan was (and i started) to slim it down by getting rid of photos and projects that I don't need, but it'll take a while.
I was hoping i could bring it over piecemeal, like by exporting some folders/projects as aperture libraries, and then importing them into photos, but i'm not sure that's possible.
I tried opening the aperture library (on the external) in photos so it would migrate, but it said i need much more space (the external is pretty full). Any ideas?
Thanks,
Adam

jpvp wrote:
Hi,
NoisyScott: do I understand it correctly that your masterfiles on the server are just sitting in a folder individually, or are they within an aperture library that is on the server that just has your masterfiles???
And FINALLY: can you back up your referenced files (or versions) as well, and how do you go about that?
My master files are just sitting in folders on the server. I leave the Aperture Library on my laptop hard drive as it just contains thumbnails, previews and the actual Aperture database.
You can back up your master images any way you want; a separate hard drive, a Network Attached Storage device, Mozy.com, Amazon S3, etc. The issue is that backing up these images is now up to you as you can't use the Aperture Vaults with referenced masters.
For what it is worth, moving master images around in Aperture is ridiculously easy once you get used to it. You can Reference your masters to a new location at any time you want, as many times as you like then change your mind and consolidate them to your Aperture Library (and thus make them managed masters again) all without Aperture missing a beat.
The critical thing to remember is you must do any and all Master Image file operations through Aperture.
If you decide to re-organize your Master Image folder structure through the finder, Aperture will no longer be able to connect to those Master Images and you then have to attempt to re-connect the images to the references in the Aperture database. This sounds like it should be easy, but for some reason Aperture has a very difficult time doing this. If you only ever use Aperture to move the files around, everything works swimmingly.
Try all of the Relocate and Consolidate Masters functions with a small test project or two at first until you are comfortable with how you want to organize all of your files and then go for it.
Good luck.

Aperture library on external drive that just died...

Not sure if this is the right place to post, but here goes.
I recently moved my Aperture library to an external firewire drive. I set my Time Machine to back it up from the external drive. Its the only thing I backup from that drive, all other backups come from my built-in interal drive on my iMac. Problem is, I don't remember the name of the drive and where I put the library file. So I am planning to get a new drive and I want to restore it from the backup. Any ideas?
If you know of a better area to post this, please advise.
Thanks

Alfredo,
Is your old drive no longer available?
You can browse your Time Machine backups like a disk in the Finder. Perhaps you can tell, what the name of your old drive and the name of the Aperture Library was. For example, my Backup drive "Lacie RaidBackup" looks like this in a Finder window:
It has a folder "Backups.backupdb" and with in folders for each Computer, then folders for each drives. Here you can see the backed up drives on your machine.
You can search the backup for Aperture libraries:
Select the the backup of your external drive and type ":aplibrary" into the search field, then set the search range to the name of your exterternal HD.
The Path bar at the bottom of the search window will show you the location of your Aperture library.
To restore your Aperture Library from Time Machine, open a Finder Window showing your "Computer" with all drives in "Column View" - set the Finder's Preferences to show all devices in the Sidebar, if you have not already done so:
With this window the frontmost Finder window dive into the Time Tunnel from the TM menulet:
Go back in time, until you are seeing your external drive appear in that window:
If you named your new drive exactly like your old drive, you should be able to restore your library using the "Restore" button .
For more general Information on TM see Pondini's excellent page: Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions
Reagrds
Léonie

Aperture - library on external drive Firewire 800 or S-ATA?

Hi
Which is the best kind of connections to store and edit images on Aperture library?
Do you suggest FW or S-ATA external drive?
thanks
Koferc

While eSATA is marginally faster in real world use than FW800, the fact that you have to retrofit it makes the calculation a little more difficult. I have a MacPro and was thinking of using the Newer Technology upgrade kit ($25) to add this to my setup. But after reading the experiences of a number of users regarding the complexity of the upgrade compared to the benefit, I decided to hold off. You can see some comments by people who've actually done the upgrade after the article.
http://www.macworld.com/article/133689/2008/05/newertechesata.html?
It seems that eSATA on a MacPro is a bit faster than FW800 on writes and about the same on reads. I was looking for a huge speed increase connecting a Nexto DI Extreme unit I use on the road, as it is limited to eSATA and USB2 (SLOWWWWW). But I only use this unit once a month, and once I factored in spending an hour taking my MP apart I decided it was better to do file transfers while I was out of the office. The cheapest way to "speed things up" - just do them when you aren't looking!

Aperture library on external drive - Aperture not responding

as my laptop filled up - I created an external Aperture library on an external drive - with a matching drive used as a vault - worked fine - then I was deleting images from the laptop library that were also in the library on the external drive and when I re-connected the external library drive Aperture would be unable to start, had to force quit - I can not open the library on the external drive in Aperture - I can open the library on the laptop - but I need the images in the external drive - the vault was updated 6 days ago -
I am in the process of restoring the library from the vault - my question -
can anything be done to open the current library on the external drive? - any kind of work around?

Well, yes and no. When my laptop drive got full, I copied the laptop library to the external 500gb drive and gave it a different name. Then I proceeded to use it as the primary library as I shot 3 weddings. So, yes, I have 2 separate libraries, the one on my laptop and the one on my external drive(s), both have masters (no referenced files), the external drive has everything that the laptop has - the external drive has probably 100 gigs more than the laptop (the laptop has about 85 gigs of files) - I also have a second matching 500gb external drive that backs up the first external drive which is where the vault for the first 500gb drive is located.
I just restored the library from the vault (from December 1) to create yet another new library on another totally spare drive just to see if it would work - that was successful now it is recovering the 41 projects
that were in the vault - it looks to be running pretty smoothly - although the process has so far taken several hours. Recall, however, that this vault backup is 6 days old. The most current library still will not load. This new restored library opens fine. So, there is something corrupted (a bad image perhaps?) in the most current 500gb library that is hanging Aperture.
I still have the original cards that I shot in the past 6 days (about 20 gigs) which were not in the vault, but I did a lot of work with those files and would like to recover the projects from the library
that can't currently open. I have a desktop at my studio and I am thinking I will try opening the problem library (on the 500gb external) there and see what happens.
This whole thing started when I figured I could clear some files from the laptop that were both on the laptop and the external drive. I have done this before to create more working space on my laptop.
Have I clearly answered your questions? - thank you for your P.S. - I didn't know I could get the .approject files out - I may try that -

Currently my internal drive is full due to Aperture. I want to work with Aperture from a external drive verses my internal drive. In addition, I want to back-up my work to another external drive. Is this easily done? Does this make sense? Pros / Cons...

Currently my internal drive is out of space due to my Aperture files. I want to place Aperture on a external drive to work from verses in intnal drive. In addition, I want to back-up all my work to another external for safe keeping. Once I move aperture to the external, I want to delete it off my internal drive. Does this make sense to do? Pros / Cons....

It is common for people to move their Aperture, iPhoto, iTunes etc. files to an external drive when those files become too large to conveniently keep on the internal drive.
The best approach is probably to keep the applications (iPhoto, Aperture etc.) where they are now, but move the files (photos, music, videos etc.) to the external drive.
You should set up a process to regularly backup all the files from both the internal drive as well as the external drive you'll be using. Here are two approaches:
(1) Use Time Machine. You can configure Time Machine so that it backs up both the internal drive as well as the external drive, all to a third separate backup drive. This is done via the Options button in the Time Machine preference pane.
(2) You can use a "cloning" program, such as SuperDuper, Carbon Copy Cloner, to make complete copies of files on your internal drive and that external drive. One way to do this is to use a very large disk for the backups, and to partition it into two backup drives, making one dedicated to the internal, the other dedicated to the external.
Two separate types of backups are recommended. I use both (1) and (2) above, and I disconnect and shut down the clone type backups when not being used. That way a power failure or surge that might destroy the original disk(s) plus the Time Machine backup(s) would still not damage the backups made under (2).
Don't delete your original Aperture files until you have verified that they are working properly from the external drive AND you have made a backup of them.

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.

Saving aperture library to external disk

I did a search and it appears time machine is not a great way to save aperture, and for my needs in general time machine isnt a great option until I can easily afford huge disks. Anyway, my Aperture library is growing and saving each time from internal disk to external disk is taking longer and longer. Is there any way to save changes in Aperture without having to move the whole library every time?
Thanks

i use this in a shell script. change the paths to reflect your situation and save the file with a .command extension that way you can run it from the finder.
#!/bin/sh
# Sync of Aperture library with external disk muse one
echo "Sync of Aperture library with external disk muse one"
echo "----------------------------------------------------"
rsync -avE --delete /Users/joost/Pictures/Aperture\ Library.aplibrary/ /Volumes/muse\ one/Libraria\ Principal\ Aperture/Aperture\ Library.aplibrary

Can't show User/Library in external drive

I can set my Mac to show Library in Users on the main drive (terminal or keystroke) but NOT on an external drive...
How can I access User/Library on external drives?

Check that you’re in the correct folder and entering the exact text posted.
If you’re using the Go to Folder command and providing Library, it’ll open the one in the current folder. If you provide ~/Library/, it’ll always open the one in your home folder.
If you’re using the chflags command, the path will look like /Volumes/volumename/Users/username/Library/ and not /Users/username/Library/.
(115061)

My External Drives are locked

dor some reason my external drives are locked and I can read only.
I am the administrator and only user on the computer.
how do I unlock them ?

You can also unlock with a simple Terminal command. Launch Terminal from your Utilities folder, then issue this command:
chflags nouchg /Volumes/"Name of Drive"
If that doesn't clear lock then it may be necessary to run the command as a super user do command:
sudo nouchg /Volumes/"Name of Drive"
That requires you to give your admin password.
Francine
Francine
Schwieder

I cant access my Aperture library on external hard drive

I put my Aperture library on an external hard drive and was able to access it for some time.
I have now tried to access it today after several months of not trying and I keep getting this message:-
"Aperture cannot switch to the selected library because the file system of the library’s volume is not supported."
How can I get this resolved, I have over 4000 images and they are only on that external drive.
I hope someone can help me
Thanks in advance
Jason

What is the format of the volume the library is on? Select the volume in Finder and do a File->Get Info
If the file system is really unsupported then you might be able to copy the library off that volume onto a OS Extended volume and open it then.

If I Move iPhoto Library to External Drive Does It Keep Organized?

Can anyone tell me:
In iPhoto 09 8.2.1 if I take the time to organize, edit, "faces" "events" etc...and I move iPhoto to an External Harddrive, a Western Digital "My Book"...Does moved library stay edited, organized face tagged, etc?
Thanks

See this document how to format a drive for photo libraries: (it explains it for aperture, but it is done the same way for iPhoto)
Format external drives to Mac OS Extended before using with Aperture
Also if I do format the drive how will that effect what is already on there (not just photos but documents, etc)?
I thought you were buying a new drive to use with iPhoto. If there are already documents on the drive, you need to copy them temporarily somewhere else. Reformatting will erase a drive completely.
Disk Utility (it is in the "Utilities" folder in "Applications") will show you, if your drive needs formatting.
The left pane shows your disks and disk partitions, and the right pane lets you do useful things, like reformatting and repairing your drive.
If you select the drive in the left panel, you see the formatting in the footer of the panel.
Is your drive correctly formatted?

Access denied to Aperture backup on external drive. When I hold the comman key adn open aperture to acces a remote drive I receive the message "There was an error opening the database for teh library "/Volumes/VERBATIM HD/Aperture Library BU.aplibrary".

When I attempt to open an Aperture backup on a remote drive using the Command key when opening Aperture., I receive the message-
How do access these files?

How do I copy the libray onto another drive? Drag & drop? Can I put it onto my iMac drive without loosing the Aperture files already there?
yes, you can drag the library to your internal drive. if it has the same name as your current Aperture library rename it or drag it to a different folder.
I followed the instrucitons when formatting the drive, although I would not rule out an operator error
You can see the name of the file system on the drive, when you select the drive in the Finder and press the key combination ⌘I (for File > Get Info). The file system will show in the "General" brick of the Info panel.

Aperture Library on External Drive Keeps Locking Up

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