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User profile for user: wattsdt
wattsdt Author
User level: Level 1
12 points

Retrieving Photos

I originally had 8 photos libraries working well from a external hard drive on iMac Catalina after the last up date I cannot get Photos to open any of the libraries is there a fix

iMac 21.5″, macOS 10.15

Posted on May 7, 2021 11:43 PM

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User profile for user: TonyCollinet
TonyCollinet
User level: Level 7
23,972 points

Posted on May 7, 2021 11:52 PM

What format is the external drive? It has always been necessary to store photos libraries on a macos extended, or APFS formatted drive in order to avoid data loss. However, later versions of MacOS have become more sensitive to this.


Check by selecting the drive in finder and hitting CMD-i


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User profile for user: léonie
léonie
User level: Level 10
197,735 points

May 8, 2021 1:48 AM in response to wattsdt

How is the external hard drive connected to your Mac?

Try to plug it directly in, if you have been accessing it over the network. In addition to the file system format pointed out by Tony, an external volume needs a wired connection and must not have been used for Time Machine backups or have any backup software installed, if you want to use it with Photos.

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


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Retrieving Photos

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