Copying iPhoto library to NAS to take weeks

Question

Level 1

4 points

Copying iPhoto library to NAS to take weeks

I am moving an iPhoto library for a friend. It is 230GB. I drag the library from the internal drive to the NAS (LaCie 10TB - Gigabit Ethernet) and the copy time is going to take weeks.

I then made a smaller library of 200MG. It took 14mins to copy (drag in Finder from one iMac to LaCie).
I then compressed that library into a file on the iMac(the size was 198MG so very little compression). I dragged that file to the LaCie and it took only 18 seconds.

Why is a library copy 50 times slower? Same network (single user), NAS iMac.

I then setup a second network, on a different iMac, different NAS (QNAP - gigabit)and re-ran the above test with almost identical times (13:47 for the library, 17 seconds for the file).

So, both NAS can copy 'normal files' at acceptable gigabit speeds, but iPhoto libraries it seems to resort to a 14.4 modem technology!

I have searched the web and there seems to be plenty of reports on slow iPhoto copying on NAS, but no clear resolution. The NAS is fine, the photos are delivered fast, and a Windows box can transfer at the same speed to the NAS (gigabit) but moving the library is mind-numbingly slow.

Clearly, the 230GB library has to be culled, but even an 8GB library is 50x slower to copy.

Any ideas/insight as to why the library copy is sooooo slow?

Thanks,
Steve

iMac, Mac OS X (10.5.6)

Posted on Apr 12, 2010 8:22 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Yer_Man

Level 10

163,788 points

Apr 12, 2010 9:23 AM in response to ledzep.steve

Any ideas/insight as to why the library copy is sooooo slow?

No. But it's a bit moot really:

iPhoto needs to have the Library sitting on disk formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Users with the Library sitting on disks otherwise formatted regularly report issues including, but not limited to, importing, saving edits and sharing the photos.

Basically, a NAS is not a n appropriate environment for an iPhoto Library.

Regards

TD

Reply

Answer 2

ledzep.steve Author

Level 1

4 points

Apr 12, 2010 9:38 AM in response to Yer_Man

HI TD,

The NAS is formatted as HFS+

I have no issues with the operation of iPhoto on the NAS. It performs great, it delivers photos fast enough and I have not had any errors.

My only question is I don't understand why the iPhoto Library copy is so slow. That is what I would like someone to explain to me. I can copy tens of thousands of individual photos and the speed is in line with gigabit ethernet. The iPhoto library copy resembles a dial-up connection.

TIA
Steve

Reply

Answer 3

SMLXL

Level 1

0 points

Apr 25, 2010 12:02 AM in response to ledzep.steve

I'm having the same problem. I already had my iPhoto 09 library stored on an external USB drive. I just bought a Time Capsule so that I could make a copy of my iPhoto library (22Gig). It took 2 hours to drag the library to my MacBook Pro (which is already a ridiculous amount of time), but when I want to copy it to the Time Capsule, it will take 10 hours!!!!

I don't want to store my iPhoto library locally, as I don't use it that often, and I need all the space I can get for my sound files.

It seems to be a problem with the iPhoto Library file. I've been able to drag MUCH bigger files to the Time Capsule without any problem at all.

Reply

Answer 4

Yer_Man

Level 10

163,788 points

Apr 25, 2010 12:47 AM in response to SMLXL

That's not an intended use for the Time Capsule.

Use an external disk formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled).

Regards

TD

Reply

Answer 5

kartesio

Level 1

0 points

Apr 25, 2010 5:18 AM in response to Yer_Man

Hello,

I have a problem related to transferring the library to the NAS, I left the transfer running all night and in the morning the library had been transferred fine. I followed Apple's instructions to do that and it was fairly easy to do (although it did take a few too many hours).

Now my problem is, when i launch iPhoto the events menu does not show the scrolling thumbnails anymore....it just shows black boxes with the event name underneath; also when i go into an event i cannot see the thumbnails of the pictures anymore, all i see are a bunch of squares with dotted lines (kinda ghosts of the pictures lurking behind them), i need to double click on one of these boxes to actually see the photo.

What is strange also, is that if i move the size scroller (bottom right-hand side) the thumbnails show (at least while i'm scrolling the size) but then go back to empty boxes when i let go.

Any Ideas?

Thank you

Reply

Answer 6

LarryHN

Level 10

106,123 points

Apr 25, 2010 9:20 AM in response to kartesio

Is the NAS formatted Mac OS extended (journaled)? very unlikely

iPhoto needs to have the Library sitting on disk formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Users with the Library sitting on disks otherwise formatted regularly report issues including, but not limited to, importing, saving edits and sharing the photos.

Basically, a NAS is not an appropriate environment for an iPhoto Library.

LN

Reply

Answer 7

ledzep.steve Author

Level 1

4 points

Apr 25, 2010 10:10 AM in response to ledzep.steve

I still have not found an answer to why the copy takes so long but I wanted to wade into the 'NAS is not good for iPhoto' posts since it is rather general.

Right now I have about 25,000 photos on my NAS, using 120Gig of space. I predominantly use Lightroom to manage the photos, with the Lightroom catalogue stored locally on my iMac (uses about 250Mg).

I use iPhoto to push pictures to the AppleTV for viewing on the big screen. iPhoto does NOT import the photos, but instead is just updating its catalogue. The photos themselves stay on the NAS. The iPhoto library is stored on the iMac and for the 6k photos in there, it only uses 8.8GB.

Further, there are several laptops and PCs that access the same photos on the NAS through their copies of Lightroom.

My objective was to have a single storage point, on a RAID 1 device with sufficient space for growth (2TB), while allowing multiple devices access to the files.

It works GREAT!

Reply

Answer 8

LarryHN

Level 10

106,123 points

Apr 25, 2010 10:43 AM in response to ledzep.steve

The iPhoto library is stored on the iMac and for the 6k photos in there, it only uses 8.8GB.

Since you do not have your iPhoto library on the NAS and do not actually use iPhoto as a photo manager you will not have any problems.

If you ever change the path to the photos on the NAS you will have an issue and probably have to import again into iPhoto to use them

And if you start using iPhoto as a photo manager you will have issues including iPhoto not updating as you edit anything on the NAS

Since you only use iPhoto to push to your apple TV you are missing the many issues with having a referenced library and since your iPhoto library is in fact on a Mac drive you will not have the problems that people who place their iPhoto library on a non Mac drive report

LN

Reply

Answer 9

ledzep.steve Author

Level 1

4 points

Apr 27, 2010 10:10 AM in response to ledzep.steve

Hi Larry,

thanks for the input. I do use iPhoto to manage the photos that I want on the iMac. Yes, predominantly for Apple TV, but I have numerous albums, events, faces that I use regularly. The only thing I 'think' I'm not doing, is letting iPhoto manage the location.

Thanks,
Steve

Reply

Answer 10

LarryHN

Level 10

106,123 points

Apr 27, 2010 10:28 AM in response to ledzep.steve

The iPhoto library is stored on the iMac and for the 6k photos in there, it only uses 8.8GB.

That is the key - the *iPhoto Library* must be on a Mac formatted disk and yours is

The referenced photos can be on a NAS without problem due to format - although as noted there are many issues with referenced photos using iPhoto not because of the NAS format but because of the way iPhoto handles referenced photos

LN

Reply

Answer 11

Jun 2, 2010 9:57 PM in response to LarryHN

I'm embarrassed to ask this, but how would I go about formatting the NAS hard drive as MAC OS extended? When I go to the set up screen on my NAS (QNAP TS-410), the format option is Ext 3 or Ext 4.

Reply

Answer 12

LarryHN

Level 10

106,123 points

Jun 2, 2010 10:08 PM in response to DeeAndBrown

You typically can not have a NAS formatted Mac OS journaled (extended) - the nature of an NAS is that it must be formatted correctly for the NAS system - if you want to use the drive as an external drive (rather than a NAS) then you may be able to format it using disk utility

LN

Reply

Answer 13

Old Toad

Level 10

210,545 points

Jun 3, 2010 3:57 PM in response to SMLXL

Welcome to the Apple Discussions.

It seems to be a problem with the iPhoto Library file

It may be because the iPhoto library is not a single file but a package that contains many individual files:

Click to view full size

But that shouldn't account for the big difference in copying. It only took me 3 minutes to copy a 6.3GB library to an external FW hard drive. This article on OS X and NAS has some insights as to why: Notes on NAS and Mac OS X. It appears more a system issue than an iPhoto one.

A Google search of OS X and NAS found many topics on the subject, this being one of them: Apple - Support - Discussions - OS X friendly NAS .... The search results are: http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=OSX+andNAS&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

OT

Message was edited by: Old Toad

Reply

Answer 14

Jun 6, 2010 1:27 PM in response to Old Toad

iPhoto 9.0 is the biggest problem!

I now use iPhoto 8.0 (verion 7.1.5 378) and it works very very fine on my ReadyNAS X6 (3TB).
Wireless without any problems at all... starting up my library in just 15 seconds with 26.085 pictures and 69 GB on my wireless (timecapsule n connected) ReadyNAS.

The same configuration: iPhoto 9.0 with the same library after updating tot 9.0 is slowwww...
The updated library takes wireless on the same NAS about 6 minutes to start. ;-( And a clean 9.0 library on the same wireless NAS also does...

Whats happening here?

Douwe-Jan

Reply

Answer 15

Yer_Man

Level 10

163,788 points

Jun 6, 2010 1:30 PM in response to D-J. en S. Bakker Sluijter

You've been lucky, and your luck just ran out. Folks have reported this slowness and other issues with iPhoto on disks not formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled) since v6 at least. Often the library works just fine for years, then one day it doesn't.

Some folks have had success putting their library onto a dmg formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and storing that on a NAS.

Regards

TD

Reply