jmarotta
Level 1
(4 points)
Q: Use as system photos library won't work on library migrated to external drive
I migrated my photos library to an external drive to free up space. I launch photos while holding the option key. Photos does not "see" the library on the external drive so "Choose Library" is grayed out. I select "Other Library" and point it to the photos library that has been copied to the external drive. It opens and I can see all my photos. I then go to preferences and select "Use as System Library". That becomes grayed out. I then exit photos. When I renter photos it still does not recognize that I chose the external library as my system library and I have to repeat the whole process again to no avail. My external drives are Seagate 4 TB that came preformatted as OS X Journal (Extended). The photos album was upgraded from iPhoto and now I am also copying the iPhoto album to the same external drive in case that has some data that allows photos to designate my external drive photos album as my system photo album. I would prefer to delete it however because that takes up 500 GB of harddrive space too. I have searched the internet and other forums to no avail -- seems to just work for everyone else. Please help!
iMac, OS X Yosemite (10.10.5)
léonie
Level 10
(108,693 points)
Now test, if Photos can remember a system photo Library, if it is on your system drive on the Desktop. This way you can see, if it is really the external drive, or if Photos cannot write the preferences files where it is storing the location of the system library.
If Photos cannot remember the location of the system photo library at all, you may need to delete the Photos preferences files and restart the Mac.
