Backup Iphoto Library to External Hard Drive

Hey I have thousands of Photos in Iphoto that I've rated and edited. I would like to backup my Iphoto Library to an external Hard drive incase of a Hard Drive failure. I do have a Time Capsule but I would also like a second backup. Can I just copy the Iphoto Library in my picture folder to my external Hard Drive? Thanks

Yes - just drag the iPhoto library to the external drive intact as a single entity
And you might want to look at an incremental backup program to keep it up to date - I use SuperDuper - http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html - which clones my entire system once a day in addition to TM's hourly backups
LN

Similar Messages

  • Trying to copy iPhoto Library to external hard drive for backup.  Error message:  The Finder can't complete the operation because some data in "iPhoto Library" can't be read or written (Error code -36).

    Trying to copy iPhoto Library to external hard drive for backup.  Error message:  The Finder can't complete the operation because some data in "iPhoto Library" can't be read or written (Error code -36).

    That code is
    -36
    ioErr
    I/O error (bummers)
    Make sure the EHD is formatted OS X Extended (journaled) and run Disk Utilty on the EHD and repair the disk.  If that fails to help I'd try the following:
    Using iPhoto Library Manager  to Rebuild Your iPhoto Library
    Download iPhoto Library Manager and launch.
    Click on the Add Library button,                         
    navigate to your Home/Pictures folder and select your iPhoto Library folder.
    Now that the library is listed in the left hand pane of iPLM, click on your library and go to the Library ➙ Rebuild Library menu option
    In the next  window name the new library and select the external HD as the location of the newly rebild library.
    Click on the Create button.
    Note 1: This creates a new library based on the LIbraryData.xml file in the library and will recover Events, Albums, keywords, titles and comments. However, books, calendars, cards and slideshows will be lost.
    Note 2:  Your current library will be left untouched for further attempts at a fix if so desired.
    OT

  • Iphoto library on external hard drive now does not show all the photos when i access it from macbook

    i backed up iphoto library to an external hard drive.  Deleted photo library on the macbook.  After transferring some new photos to macbook from a camera, when i access the iphoto library on external hard drive only the new photos show up.  Originals are still in files, but don't appear when opening iphoto library on external hard drive.

    Make a temporary, backup copy of your library if you don't already have one (Control-click on the library and select Duplicate from the contextual menu) and  apply the two fixes below in order as needed:
    Fix #1
    Launch iPhoto with the Command+Option keys held down and rebuild the library.
    Select the options identified in the screenshot. 
    Fix #2
    Using iPhoto Library Manager  to Rebuild Your iPhoto Library
    Download iPhoto Library Manager and launch.
    Click on the Add Library button, navigate to your Home/Pictures folder and select your iPhoto Library folder.
    Now that the library is listed in the left hand pane of iPLM, click on your library and go to the File ➙ Rebuild Library menu option
    In the next  window name the new library and select the location you want it to be placed.
    Click on the Create button.
    Note: This creates a new library based on the LIbraryData.xml file in the library and will recover Events, Albums, keywords, titles and comments but not books, calendars or slideshows. The original library will be left untouched for further attempts at fixing the problem or in case the rebuilt library is not satisfactory.
    OT

  • Can't transfer iPhoto Library FROM external hard drive to iMac

    I just bought a new iMac.  Before I said goodbye to my old computer (a MacBook), I dutifully backed up my iPhoto library onto an external hard drive.  Upon setting up my iMac, I easily accessed the iPhoto library on my HD, but I didn't import it.  I was able to see all photos, albums, etc.
    But when I went to import the entire iPhoto library into my iMac's hard drive (into the Pictures folder), it wouldn't import.  A mesage comes up that says "Preparing to copy" and the blue-and-white bar just spins and spins, without actually copying anything.  So, it's weird -- there's clearly communication between iMac and external HD, but I can't take the iPhoto library off the hard drive to make it my new computer's iPhoto library.
    Any hints?  Thanks.

    Have you tried restarting your machine?

  • Need to transfer iphoto library to external hard drive

    need to transfer iphoto library to external passport drive. It will not let me drag and drop

    Welcome to Apple Support Communities
    The external drive is formatted in NTFS, a format that OS X can't write in. You have to erase the external disk.
    First, open Finder, choose the external drive in the sidebar, under "Devices", and copy all the content of your external drive to another folder like Desktop.
    Then, follow these steps to format the external drive in "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)" as Format > http://pondini.org/OSX/DU1.html Finally, drag the iPhoto library to the external drive

  • IPhoto library on external hard drive will no longer open

    I'm hoping that someone will be able to point me to a simple solution to my problem...
    I'm running iPhoto 9.6 on a  MacBook Pro (Retina, 13 inch, mid-2014).  The OS is Yosemite 10.10.1.  Because the flash storage is only 250GB I have my main iPhoto library (146GB) on a partition of an external 1TB Lacie Rugged drive.  The external hard drive also has partitions for Time Machine Backup and SuperDuper Bootable Clone.  I have a separate, much smaller iPhoto library on the MBP which contains recent photos.
    Yesterday I failed to reconnect my MacBook Pro to the power source when I put it back on my desk.  The result was that the battery went below 5% and the MBP turned itself off and also ejected the external hard drive (some time after I reconnected the power cable there were dialog boxes on my screen informing me that each of the three partitions had been ejected incorrectly).  I waited until the MBP was fully charged before I tried to open my 'main' iPhoto library on the external hard drive.  I received a message that the library would have to be upgraded to work with the computer (very odd, because it had already been upgraded last October when I upgraded from Mavericks to Yosemite and has been working without any real problem ever since then).
    After some hours when the only message on the screen was 'Rebuiding Thumbnail Caches' I pressed Cmd+Option+Esc I saw that iPhoto was 'Paused'  - that message subsequently changed to 'Not Responding'.  I 'Force Quit' iPhoto but the iPhoto library will not open at all from the external drive.
    As a test I quit iPhoto and re-started using the Option key and chose to open the iPhoto library which is on the internal drive and it opened without any problem.
    I recall that it used to be possible to fix this sort of thing (perhaps not) by trashing the com.apple.iPhoto.plist file, however, I don't seem to be able to find it :-(
    I'm really at a loss as to how I should approach this problem and I would be very grateful for any suggestions that can be offered.
    Cheers
    Tricia

    Further update ....
    I downloaded and installed iPhoto Library Manager and then chose Library - Rebuild Library.  Unfortunately, when it had finished the result was 0 images in any file or folder.  I checked the log (which is incredibly long) but here's the beginning of it which seems to indicate that the problem is that an essential file is missing -
    2015-01-21 10:49:18.671 iPhoto Library Manager 4.1.11; iPhoto 9.6; OS X 10.10.1; unregistered
    2015-01-21 10:49:19.033 Rebuilding library /Volumes/Pictures/iPhoto Library
    2015-01-21 10:49:19.033 Rebuilt library located at /Users/Tricia 1/Pictures/iPhoto Library (rebuilt).photolibrary
    2015-01-21 10:49:19.035 Building preview…
    2015-01-21 10:49:19.042 Photo transfer settings: source libraries = /Volumes/Pictures/iPhoto Library, copy faces = true, copy places = true, combine album contents = false, photo attributes copied = (comment, date, flagged, hidden, latitude, longitude, name, rating)
    2015-01-21 10:49:19.042 Loading data for library /Volumes/Pictures/iPhoto Library…
    2015-01-21 10:49:19.056 Version number: 9.6
    2015-01-21 10:49:19.057 An error occurred: Trying to load database for library “/Volumes/Pictures/iPhoto Library” failed. Some information such as faces, places, and edit history may not be transferred succesfully. (error = Error Domain=PLDatabaseErrorDomain Code=1 "The SQLite database file could not be found." UserInfo=0x10e9c1c10 {PLDatabaseErrorVendorErrorKey=14, PLDatabaseErrorVendorStringKey=unable to open database file, NSLocalizedDescription=The SQLite database file could not be found.}
    After this each entry has a dialog that basically says the image file is missing from /Volumes/Pictures/iPhoto Library.
    As mentioned in an earlier post I do have another iPhoto Library on my 2008 MacBook.
    Can someone advise the best way to proceed?  I'm thinking that I should erase the partition of my external hard drive that is called Pictures and then connect the external hard drive to my 2008 MacBook and simply drag and drop the iPhoto Library to the Pictures partition.  IIRC, that's the way I moved the iPhoto Library last October when I bought my new MacBook Pro which didn't have enough storage for me to be able to store my iPhoto Library on the MBP.  I could then reconnect the external hard drive to my MBP and the iPhoto Library should reappear, shouldn't it?
    Looking forward to more input ...
    Tricia

  • Using iphoto with iphoto library on external hard drive

    My Imac is running snow leopard with ilife '11. I have imported way too many photos into Iphoto which is really slowing it down. I'd like to put all of my photos on an external hard drive and use that as my iphoto library--which should be possible, as I gather from reading various other related posts. Another reason to put it on an external drive is so that I can use my new macbook air to edit/organize while on the go.
    1. How do I set up my Iphoto library on an external hard drive?
    2. How do I make sure that all future photos go to the library on that external hard drive?
    3. How do I run Iphoto with the library on an external hard drive?
    THANK YOU for your help!

    Hello. I just transferred my iPhoto library to a Western Digital My Book for Mac external hard drive. Do you know if I needed to format this drive even though it says it's for Mac. I did not format it and there were not any instructions with the drive that said I needed to do it. The transfer seems to have worked ok but my backups from Time Machine onto Time Capsule are inconsistent. I already posed a question regarding this problem but I noticed this message regarding formating the external disk and I wonder if that is causing the problem. Thanks.

  • 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.

  • Huge iPhoto Library - 2 External Hard Drive + Time Machine

    I have a massive iPhoto library on my macbook pro and am adding about 10GB in photos per year. I currently have an external hard drive used as a backup only for Time Machine.
    Is it best to purchase an additional hard drive and run iPhoto directly from the external drive? Would this enable me to delete the iPhoto library from my macbook and then do a daily time machine backup for the macbook and for the external drive? Is this possible, or is their a better way to go about this?
    Thanks,

    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 copy iPhoto library to external hard drive?

    I have been trying to copy my iPhoto library to a Seagate external hard drive. I cannot seem to drag and drop the iPhoto library from a Finder box across to the external hard drive. The hard drive has enough space/capacity to hold the library contents but will not allow me to drag and drop. Any tips?

    Not without more information - what happens - what errors do you get - if the external drive formatted Mac OS extended (journaled)?
    This procedure has been used thousands of times successfully
    Moving the iPhoto library is safe and simple - quit iPhoto and drag the iPhoto library intact as a single entity to the external drive - depress the option key and launch iPhoto using the "select library" option to point to the new location on the external drive - fully test it and then trash the old library on the internal drive (test one more time prior to emptying the trash)
    And be sure that the External drive is formatted Mac OS extended (journaled) (iPhoto does not work with drives with other formats) and that it is always available prior to launching iPhoto
    And backup soon and often - having your iPhoto library on an external drive is not a backup and if you are using Time Machine you need to check and be sure that TM is backing up your external drive
    LN

  • Can't set up an iPhoto library on external hard drive: access privileges

    Hi all
    I am trying to set up an extra iPhoto library on an external hard-drive to store some of my photos.
    I get the following message: 'iPhoto cannot create a new library in this location because you do not have enough access privileges.'
    The external hard drive is Formatted: Mac OS Extended (Journaled), is 500g capacity and is empty. Also 'Ignore ownership on this volume' is ticked.
    I am the administrator of this computer (imac) which is running Yosemite 10.10.1
    Any clues as to what I need to do to make this happen? I'm not much of a techie!
    Cheers
    Finella

    Once you've confirmed that the EHD is formatted correctly and all is well (run Disk Utility and repair the disk) try the following to create an almost "duplicate"  library on the EHD:
    Using iPhoto Library Manager  to Rebuild Your iPhoto Library
    1 - download iPhoto Library Manager and launch.>Click on the Add Library button,
    2 -  select the library you want to add from those in the selection window.
    3 - make sure that in the rebuild window the checkbox  "Scavange orphaned photos" is checked.
    4 - now that the library is listed in the left hand pane of iPLM, click on your library and go to the Library ➙ Rebuild Library menu option
    5 - in the next  window name the new library and select the EHD as the location where you want it to be placed. Click on the Create button.
    Note 1: This creates a new library based on the LIbraryData.xml file in the library and will recover Events, Albums, keywords, titles and comments. However, books, calendars, cards and slideshows will be lost.
    Note 2:  Your current library will be left untouched for further attempts at a fix if so desired.

  • 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)  

  • Tried to reinstall iPhoto library from external hard drive, it shows that the photos and events are there but there are no thumbnails and if you click on an image or video nothing comes up.

    My hard drive crashed recently and we took it to apple to get repaired. The apple employees said that they would have to replace the hard drive but they didn't have the equipment to get the data off my hard drive. So I took it to a computer store who had the right equipment after a month and a half of waiting they finally got all the data off my hard drive and put it on an external hard drive (Seagate Expansion Portable Drive). I then took it back to apple who replaced the hard drive. Now I'm in the process of reinstalling everything. I have never done a Time Machine back up or backed my laptop up to . Which I now will do very often once I've reinstalled everything. I have reinstalled all of my desktop images and folders as well as my iTunes library with no issues. However when i went to reinstall my iPhoto library it came up blank. I then Rebuilt the library several times and this was the result.
    It shows that the photos and events are there but there are no thumbnails and if you click on an image or video nothing comes up.
    Please help i have three years worth of images from holidays on here and would be devastated if i lost them.

    iPhoto cannot find the thumbnails or the original pictures.
    Go to your iPhoto Library in the Pictures Folder.
    Right-click on it and from the resulting menu, choose 'Show Package Contents'.
    This will bring you inside the iPhoto Library package. There you should see a Folder called Masters. Within that, there should be folder containing your actual photos.
    Are they there?

  • Copying saved iphoto library from external hard drive back to Macbook Pro

    Please help, I have accidentally managed to permanently delete my iphoto library and by this I mean that I somehow dragged my library into trash and then emptied it.  I don't know how this happend but I quite quickly found out I had done it and shut my computer down.  I have since done a recovery with disk drill and have hopefully recovered most of my photos though I havent had time to look through all the 1000's of photos yet.  I do have a copied version of my library on an external hard drive that I did in 2012 and I have tried to copy this library back to my pictures folder so i at least have my photos up to 2012 back but it is not working.  I have read through some of the threads on here regarding iphoto library back ups and I think the issue might be that the external hard drive is formatted Fat32 and not os extended.
    I am hoping someone can help me get this working.  Here are the facts.
    1.  I am running iphoto 11, version 9.2.3 on a macbook pro running os x 10.6.8
    2. The copied iphoto library is on an external hard drive that is fat32 formatted.  I can open the package contents and see the originals folder with all the yearly folders inside and all the numbered folders inside that with the pictures in them, so I know the pictures are there.
    3.  If I try to copy the library folder over to the pictures folder on the macbook i just get a pop up window saying 'preparing to copy iphoto library' and the scrolling bar but the copy doesn't actually start.
    4.  If I try to open the library through iphoto by holidng down the option key, iphoto tells me that the library has to be upgraded but i am reluctant to upgrade the original copy of the library.  I would prefer to copy it first in case anything goes wrong but then i have the problem above that the copy doesn't work
    Thank you in advance for any help.

    The copied iphoto library is on an external hard drive that is fat32 formatted.
    Therein lies the problem.  iPhoto libraries need to be stored, placed on a disk formatted OS X Extended (journaled).  The FAT format doesn't support the complexity of an iPhoto library and can, and more often than not, corrupt a library.
    Try the following:
    Using iPhoto Library Manager  to Rebuild Your iPhoto Library
    1 - download the free version of iPhoto Library Manager and launch.>Click on the Add Library button,
    2 -  select the library you want to add from those in the selection window.
    3 - make sure that in the rebuild window the checkbox  "Scavange orphaned photos" is checked.
    4 - now that the library is listed in the left hand pane of iPLM, click on your library and go to the Library ➙ Rebuild Library menu option
    5 - in the next  window name the new library and select the location you want it to be placed, i.e. in the Pictures folder of your MBP. Click on the Create button.
    Note 1: This creates a new library based on the LIbraryData.xml file in the library and will recover Events, Albums, keywords, titles and comments. However, books, calendars, cards and slideshows will be lost.
    Note 2:  Your current library will be left untouched for further attempts at a fix if so desired.
    OT

  • Can't open iphoto library from external hard drive

    I'm backing up my enormous iPhoto library to two external hard drives in order to free up space on my computer. Before deleting the photos permanently from the laptop, I wanted to double-check that the copies of the library I made on the two externals would actually work on another computer, should something happen to my laptop. When I plug my external hard drive into my laptop and use option+click on iPhoto to choose which library I want to use, it opens up the library from the external just fine, no problems. However, when I plug the same external into a different Mac computer and do the same process, I get the immensely frustrating message of "You can't open photo library blah blah blah changes have been made using newer version of iPhoto". However, both my laptop and the second computer are running the exact same version of iPhoto (the most recent), so that can't (or at least shouldn't) be the problem. I found suggestions to rebuild the library, which I did, but the same result occurs. I double-checked to be sure that neither computer needed updates (they didn't).
    When I plug one of the externals into the second computer, though, I can open up the package contents of iPhoto library and all the photos are visible, so I know the information is all there. But I don't want to lose my albums, etc.
    So do I just delete the copies of my library from the externals and try it all over again? I'd prefer not to, since I have 40,000+ photos, and that takes a while.

    To reinforce what Larry pointed out both Macs must be running the same version of iPhoto.  And the external HD must be formatted as shown in this screenshot:
    and don't forget the ignore ownership.
    OT

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