Photos for Mac in Ventura Extremely Slow Loading Photos

For anyone that runs into this, I got it working with much better speeds. I ended up changing how I mounted (connected) the NAS share where my reference photos are located.

For example, I was connecting this way:

afp://<NAS_drive_name>._afpovertcp._tcp.local/

The folder that my photos are in are a level below:

afp://<NAS_drive_name>._afpovertcp._tcp.local/<share_name>

I ended mounting directly to the full path and it was night and day.

Anyway, all working back to original speeds and functionality.

Most of user comments are around the Library being offline and issues there.

I want to add that I imported the Aperture library via normal Photo library import. Meaning, Apple supports importing the Aperture library. I did that and no issues and Photos never complained about reference files.

Again, UI even has it:

But, yes, I see your point. Being there doesn't mean Apple fully supports it. Meaning, as you mentioned, referenced via direct drive.

Photos is awesome when it works. But, fails a lot. I'm constantly fixing family Photos library and they are doing it by the book all locally.

Thanks for the reply. Appreciate the time in responding. But, this worked fine for years. I even spoke to Apple about it. They said I'm not doing anything wrong. But, they just generically said to rebuild the Library. Keep in mind, the library is local. The references are offline. That is supported. Otherwise, the UI would not have support for Reference files management. I know it's not a replacement for Aperture. I have tried many other solutions. They are either very expensive or simply not as friendly to use.

So, not sure if you fully read what I said. Even local files are slow. Again, worked fine before upgrade. I spoke to about it and they said what I'm doing is fine. They believe a problem with library. But, since I already rebuilt a few times, I was seeing if anyone else had ideas.

Thanks. I see your point. Plus this app is poorly maintained as well. So, pushing it slightly out of bounds doesn't work well. Any large libraries seems to cause problems as well. My family all complains about theirs a well. And, they aren't doing anything fancy. Local storage completely. Again, thanks for response.

I don't remember the support agents name. And, I didn't specifically ask if referenced photos are supported because like I said above, the UI clearly shows the option for reference photos. But, we did discuss the photos being on my NAS. He said that is okay (I used the word "fine"). We look at some logs in console around errors in accessing the file. While on the phone, I came up with the idea how I was mounting the folder. He said to try mounting directly. And, like magic, it all work starting working fine.

You need to keep in mind that I'm not talking about the Library location. Which he said I should have located on the NAS. I'm talking about the photo itself. For example, you can easily drag a photo from a folder on a NAS and import in Photos just fine. No warning pops up.

Anyway, it's possible this agent didn't know what he was talking about. Do you have the link/doc that you can post here? Would be good for people to read that as the reference. And, yes, although it's working for me and the Apple support agent didn't tell me different, does it's make it truly supported. I agree. However, if you have that info to post here, I think that would helpful for others.

Called Apple again and they said what I'm doing is fine. What they said they don't support is running the Library itself off the NAS. And, I'm not. For that, they recommend attached storage.