HELP! Can't get iphoto library to copy to external hard drive!!!

Have read countless directions online about how to copy my iphoto'09 library to an external hard drive. Despite following the directions, opening 2 finder windows and trying to copy the iphoto library to the hard drive, it continues to show a little symbol (a circle with a slash thru it) when I try to drop the library into the hard drive. I have a signature mini hard drive 250GB with lots of storage space left. Any advice? My first Mac and I am having so much trouble getting used to how everything works. This, I cannot figure out no matter what I try. Any help is greatly appreciated!

Welcome to the Apple Discussions. Do you have ownership on the external HD set to be ignored?
Click to view full size
If not do so and try again. If it still won't, download and run BatChmod on the library with the setting shown below and then try again:
Click to view full size
OT

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If I upgarde my iPhoto on my computer..can I open my iPhoto library stored on an external hard drive?

I have all my photos saved on an external hard drive..if I upgrade to the latest version of iPhoto..will I be able to access my library?

Greetings,
The current version of iPhoto can read libraries on external drives (just double-click the Library).
It is always advisable to have a backup of your data before you make changes to it (like upgrading) so make a backup of that library just in case.
Finally, make sure the drive is Mac Formated.
Hope that helps.

My iPhoto library lives on an external hard drive. iTunes can't find the library, so I can't sync photos to my iPhone. Why?

Like I said. . .
I recently migrated from an old MacBook to a new MacBook Air. I decided that since I have many tens of thousands of photos, I would keep them all on an external hard drive in the dedicated "iPhoto Library" (which I was very careful to migrate intact then move to the EHD). Now, when I go to the "Photos" tab in iTunes, all I get is a thinking wheel and no interface with which to choose which photos I want to sync to my iPhone (5s).
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Thanks!

Hello Sandra,
The article linked below details how to go about restoring items from Time Machine in Snow Leopard.
Mac OS X 10.6: Recovering items using Time Machine and Spotlight
http://support.apple.com/kb/PH6379
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Can't drag and drop my iPhoto library on to an external hard drive (Seagate Go Flex).

I am trying to move my iPhoto library to an external hard drive (Seagate Go Flex wireless) but it won't let me drag and drop. When I drag the iphoto icon over the 'drop files here' it just disappears. No error message. I am running mountain lion. What can I do?

Susie,
(Seagate Go Flex wireless)
What is your iPhoto version? And your Mac OS X version?
With iPhoto '11 your iPhoto library needs to be on a drive formatted Mac OS X Extended (Journaled). Is your external drive formatted this way? If your drive is formatted differently, iPhoto will not be able to open the iPhoto library there.
When I drag the iphoto icon
And are you really trying to drag your photo library (from your "Pictures" folder) or your iPhoto application from the "Applications" folder? On MAcoS X 10.7 or later you will not be able to drag the application from the Applications folder.
Regards
Léonie

My iphoto library (located on an external hard drive) was open when the hard drive was accidentally disconnected. We plugged it back in, but the library is frozen. Any suggestions on what I can do without corrupting/losing my iphoto library?

The cable to the external hard drive that houses my iphoto library was accidentally disconnected while the library was open and up on the screen. We plugged it back in, but now the screen is frozen. Has anyone experienced this before? If I force quit, will I corrupt and lose access to the library on the external hard drive?

Shutdown the Mac. Disconnect and power off the external drive (if it has its own power supply). Reconnect the external drive and power on (if applicable). Boot Mac. If the external drive is not reading properly, open Disk Utility, select external drive, run Repair Disk.

How do I get itunes library to move to external hard drive automatically?

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On the copying issue, if the drive was used with a PC initially it is quite possible it is formatted to NTFS. Macs can read NTFS drives but not write to them You could try to use a utility such as NTFS-3G to enable read-write, or you could use Disk Utility to reformat the drive to FAT (probably FAT32) which can be read by both PCs and Macs. FAT has certain disadvantages too, such as not being repairable by Macs, and there is a limit on single file sizes (2GB or 4GB depending upon the FAT version).
Once you get your whole iTunes folder (not just media) onto the external drive, start iTunes with the option key held down and show it the new location.
iTunes: How to move your music to a new computer - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4527
do not confuse moving your whole folder and library with just storing media on another drive:
iTunes for Mac: Moving your iTunes Media folder - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1449

I backed up my iPhoto library manually to an external hard drive. How do I restore it?

I backed up select portions of my hard drive to an external hard drive. At the time, I didn't realize that it was going to be so hard to recover the original photos from the iPhoto library. The backup is basically just a command-line "cp" of the iPhoto Library directory. What's the best way to either recover the original photos or restore the iPhoto library to a new computer?

OK, sorry for the delay. Holidays and whatnot.
Sooooo... the backup was basically a command line "cp -r", however the partition that I backed up to on the external drive was FAT32. So that explains why it's no longer a package. Clearly a mistake on my part, but still need to find a way to recover.
I tried to rebuild the library DB, but it just bails out with the same exact message ("You can't open your current photo library using this version of iPhoto. You have made changes to your photo library using a newer version of iPhoto. Please quit and use the latest version of iPhoto.").
So crap. Should I keep trying to find a way to get iPhoto to recognize my backed up library, or should I give up on that approach and just try to manually get my photos out of the backup? If the latter, what's the best way to do that? I see an "Originals" subfolder, does that have all my photos in it (I only care about originals, don't care about edits)? What about the "Data" subfolder, which also seems to have some photos?

Can I setup iPhoto to save photos to external hard drive?

My Macbook Air has run out of memory and I want to save all my photos in an external hard drive going forward. How can I set that up? Can I do the same thing for Music, Movies etc.?

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 can do similar with iTunes but best to ask on that forum for details.
Regards
TD

Can my whole iTunes library be moved to external hard drive?

I am needing to free up space on my laptop and am wanting to move my library to an external hard drive. I have copied it to my hard drive but am unsure of what to do next... Do I just delete items from library or is there a way just to take the file over with out deleteing? Any help on this matter would be greatly appriceated.
Thanks Jason

This article was quite helpful and by following the steps I was able to move content to the external hard drive the only thing I wished that I had done, was to make this move alot sooner waiting for everything to copy is quite boring.
THANKS FOR THE HELP!!!

Using Time Machine to back up an iphoto library located on an external hard drive.

I'd like to back up my primary iphoto library that currently exists on an external Simpletech hard-drive. I have a separate WD Passport external hard drive also attached to my iMAC. When I turn on Time Machine, it only seems to allow me to choose one of the two hard-drives to receive the back-up, and automatically excludes the Simpletech where my iphoto library is located from the back-up. Am I missing something?

This is normal. If you wish to back up your Hard Drive with the iPhoto library follow these steps:
Open the time maching preferences in system prferences,
Click options,
Choose the hard drive with your iPhoto library,
Click the - button to remove it frok the list. T
Time machine will now back up all the information on this disk as well as that on your hard drive in the computer to your Time Maching Hard Drive.
Hope this helps!!!

Why are my photos from iPhoto library deleted from my external hard drive when I am only deleting them from my internal drive?

I did a backup of photos (iPhoto library) from my internal to an external hard drive. I have started to delete photos from my internal hard drive. It seems that when I delete from the internal drive, photos also delete from the external. I did a test and deleted one photo from iPhoto internal drive. When I plugged in the new backup (external drive) and clicked on iPhoto library, it opened iPhoto in the exact place I was working and that one photo was gone. What do I do? I do not want to delete the photos off of my external hard drive.

When I plugged in the new backup (external drive) and clicked on iPhoto library, it opened iPhoto in the exact place I was working and that one photo was gone.
When you clicked on the library iPhoto on the EHD iPhoto is op;ending the last library that was previously opened. To change libraries launch iPhoto with the Option key held down to get this window:
Then select the library that is on the EHD if it's in the window. If it isn't, click on the Other Library button, navigate to the EHD and select the library there.

Can I syn my new iphone to my itunes library on my PC even if it is already registered to my ipod? If so will it delete the library on my computer? And can I back my library up to my external hard drive instead of CDs?

Can I add my iphone to an exising itunes account which is registered to my ipod without wiping my computer library? Also is it poss to back up my library onto a external hard drive instead of CDs?

"am I still able to register another phone to the same ID?"
Yes.
") that I do end up creating a new apple ID "
This will cause complications. i do not recommend this.

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Hi,
I own a 500GB Toshiba external hard drive, and I've been using it for months now, and up until today it's worked flawlessly. I never formatted it, I just used it as a mass storage device so that I wouldn't have compatibility issues with PC's because of the formatting. For some unknown reason, today the hard drive decided it didn't want to work; I can't see it in the Finder. However, I tried it on a PC today and it's just fine there. I've never disconnected it without ejecting it first or anything else that I can think of that might damage the drive. I'm at a total loss, though admittedly I'm a novice, so maybe there's something I'm overlooking here. What can I do to fix this problem?
Another thing: I just upgraded from 10.5.7 to 10.5.8... could that cause issues?
Thanks! If this is a topic that's already been discussed, please link me to the thread or article.

Does it appear in Disk Utility? (located in utilities folder of applications)
If so is it mountable from there?
And just to check- you are using the same connection (USB or firewire) to connect the PCs and the Mac?

I can't get Time Machine to recognize my external hard drive.

I bought a new hard drive when we moved last September and it backed up my files once or twice. Now I cannot get Time Machine to recognize it at all.
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Is the drive showing up in finder?
Did you have it working then upgraded to Yosemite??
Amongst the many many bug in yosemite is a bug/s to do with no longer being able to use USB drive.
Did you try the fixes here.
OS X Yosemite: If a USB device isn’t working
Personally I would plug it into a computer running anything except Yosemite and you might find it works perfectly.. the issue then is not the drive.

Can't See Files in Folder Copied from External Hard Drive to Desktop

I recently purchased a Jobo Spectator (portable image tank for storing photos). When I connect it (USB) to my iMac I see it and can copy files to my desktop. If I copy an entire folder from the device to my desktop, Finder tells me it contains 0 files and I can't see any files in it. However, if I try to recopy one of the copied files from the Jobo to the folder, Finder tells me the file already exists there and asks if I want to replace it. If I then cancel the copy, all of my copied files show up in the folder. This behavior seems to be consistent. There is no Mac driver for the device. It doesn't look like I'm going to lose any files from this behavior but I find it frustrating.
Does anyone have a clue? Thanks.

A warm welcome to the forums Sue!
The Finder is a bit lackadaisical about updating itself, you can click back & forth enough times, closing folders, opening folders and eventually it'll be in touch, or you can try something like "A Better Finder Attributes", for it's "force the Finder to update stale information about your files" feature.
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/18736
Possibly this would help too, but haven't tried it...
http://www.finderpop.com/

HELP! Can't get iphoto library to copy to external hard drive!!!

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