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Move Photos from NAS to external hard drive

I made the mistake of moving my Photos library to my NAS. (I didn't know at the time I could not access it that way.) When I go to open the Photos with the library on the NAS it tries to repair the library but goes to 200%+ and just keeps going. In searching how to fix that here I read that it's not possible to store them there and access them properly. :( My first thought was to move the Photos library from the NAS back to my external HD. When I started that copy process it ran for over 24 hours but never got past the "preparing" stage.


How can I move/copy that Photo library to an external hard drive so that I can access it and use it from there going forward? I'm on my Mac mini 2018 (but can use any of my MacBooks as well if needed). mac OS is Ventura 13.3.1. The library is almost 500 GB. I can't tell which version of Photos I am on because when I try to open Photos it won't open any of my photo libraries on my NAS, hard drive or external HD. I get this error.




Any help is greatly appreciated.



Posted on Apr 28, 2023 6:19 AM

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Posted on May 2, 2023 12:58 AM

One of the reasons not to have a library on a NAS is that it can damage the library, and this may be the case here. The images may not have actually been copied into the library on import, or the links to them may have been lost. So let's see if we can find them in the library on the NAS.


Right click on the library icon and choose 'Show Package Contents'. A finder window will open inside the library package. Go to the originals folder and within that you'll find a lot of other folders nested. Open each one in turn and sort on date. Can you find the missing images this way?


If you can, drag them out of there and import them to the new library on the external.


I stress you do this only on the library on the NAS. It's not worth anything anyway. If you can't find the missing images there then I'm afraid I would be pessimistic unless you have a back up somewhere else.

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May 2, 2023 12:58 AM in response to Pearljamluvr

One of the reasons not to have a library on a NAS is that it can damage the library, and this may be the case here. The images may not have actually been copied into the library on import, or the links to them may have been lost. So let's see if we can find them in the library on the NAS.


Right click on the library icon and choose 'Show Package Contents'. A finder window will open inside the library package. Go to the originals folder and within that you'll find a lot of other folders nested. Open each one in turn and sort on date. Can you find the missing images this way?


If you can, drag them out of there and import them to the new library on the external.


I stress you do this only on the library on the NAS. It's not worth anything anyway. If you can't find the missing images there then I'm afraid I would be pessimistic unless you have a back up somewhere else.

Apr 28, 2023 8:04 AM in response to Pearljamluvr

Wow-- That's some problem!


I think the first thing that I would do, just to make sure the Photos app is OK, is to create a new Library on the internal drive and import a few pictures to see if everything is behaving normally. You can create a new Library by option clicking the Photos icon.


A Photos Library has the extension ".photoslibrary" -- the default name is "Photos Library.photoslibrary" That name causes the Library to be treated differently than a regular folder of files. One thing you might try is removing the extension. This makes the Mac think that this is just your usual ordinary folder, and you may find it easier to move. If that works, you can just drag it to your external drive and add the extension, so Photos will recognize it as a Library.


Be sure your external drive is properly formatted! To get full functionality (and to avoid damaging the Photos Library) an external drive must be formatted in either APFS format or Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format. Additionally, the drive can not have had Time Machine on it since it was formatted.


If you haven't already, check this reference:

Move your Photos library to save space on your Mac - Apple Support



May 2, 2023 7:53 AM in response to Pearljamluvr

Here's an example of a Photos Library Package contents:


This is a Library that has just a few files and which I use to mess around with. Changing anything inside the package could permanently destroy your ability to access the database!


Probably the only folder of interest is "Originals." These should be completely unchanged files of the imported pictures. They have weird, unique names, because original file names like "img_0012.jpg" could occur many times, maybe from different cameras. The original file names, keyed to these unique names, are stored in the database which is inaccessible because. as Yer_Man says, the database has apparently lost contact with them. The dates should be the dates that the files were imported.


If your pictures are anywhere, this is the place to find them.

Apr 28, 2023 11:26 AM in response to Pearljamluvr

Try using a back up utility that stores the data without changing it (so, not Time Machine) like SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner. These apps might help with whatever glitch is impeding the copy to the HD. Therefore the process is basically tell the app to "back up" the library to the HD - and remember that HD must be formatted Mac OS X Extended, Journaled or apfs.

May 1, 2023 3:49 PM in response to Richard.Taylor

Thank you for your response and help @Richard.Taylor. I created a new library in Photos with no problem. I removed the extension of the library on my server. I reformatted one of my external hard drives to Mac OS Extended format. And I wiped it clean so it was not a Time Machine back up drive. I did the drag and drop from the server folder to the hard drive. I added the .photoslibrary extension back. Then I opened Photos while holding option and chose the hard drive library. It did a repair and a restore and came up almost perfectly. The only thing that is off, as far as I can tell, is that it is missing the past 2 months of photos and videos. I don't know why they aren't there. And I'm not sure if there is a way to find them. I removed the extension again so that I could look inside the folder (is there a different way to view the albums or pictures without doing that?) However, when I look in the photos library folder there are a bunch of different folders and as I look through them it's very difficult to tell how to see what was added chronologically so that I can see if they are hiding somewhere. I really don't want to lose the last 2 months (although it's better than all of it of course). Any suggestions?

May 1, 2023 3:50 PM in response to Yer_Man

I also did as you suggested @Yer_Man and used CCC and cloned the photos folder onto a new properly formatted hard drive. This time when I opened the library from this new hard drive it is also missing the last couple months. I'm not sure how to find them or where to look. Any suggestions? I'm trying everything I can to get this 100% fixed. Thanks again for your help! It is greatly appreciated.

May 2, 2023 9:17 AM in response to Yer_Man

I am looking in these folders and hope to find them there. I do have 2 other back ups. However, they don't have the last couple months. It's ok, better than none of it. When I try to access my back up photo library it says "Updating Library" gets to 5% and then stalls. It's been stuck for ~25 minutes on 5%. Should I force quit and try again or would that make it worse?

Move Photos from NAS to external hard drive

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