Photos and Albums on iMac not syncing properly -- Big Sur issue?

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Level 1

4 points

Photos and Albums on iMac not syncing properly -- Big Sur issue?

I access Photos on my iMac, (27", Late 2014, Big Sur 11.6.2 -- not eligible g for OS Monterey) ) MacBook (now running OS Monterey), iPhone and iPad (iOS 15.2). All are connected to the same iCloud account, which I use for photo storage, and have purchased more than enough storage capacity. On my 1TB iMac I have settings set to keep originals on the iMac. On the other devices I have selected optimization using iCloud.

A week ago I created a new album of 30 images on the iMac. A few days later I noticed that while the new album appeared on my other devices, it had just 16 of the 30 images. I looked in the "All Photos" for each device and saw that the images appeared there; they just do not appear in the album.

I have also noticed that sometimes images created with the iPhone or iPad do not show up on my iMac, although they do appear on my other devices.

I have tried a variety of fixes with my iMac: Forced Quits of the Photos app; restarted the iMac: shut down and restarted the iMac; ran the Library Repair tool a few times; Went to Photos > Preferences > iCloud, and unchecked and then checked the "iCloud Photos" box. Nothing has fixed the problem.

As a test I did four things to see if the issue might be with one of the other devices:

on my iMac I created a small album of 10 images. The new album and all images appear in iCloud Photos accessed via the web, on my iPhone and iPad, but NOT on the iMac (even a full day later.)

2. I created two new albums of 10 images on the iMac. Initially, they did not appear in iCloud (via the web) or any of my other devices. Then today, when I checked in iCloud Photos accessed via the web, both of the albums were there but they are empty. Now, the albums are filled with the images and they also appear on the other devices. [So, is this fixed or just chance?]

3 & 4. I created a new album on my iPhone and a new album on my iPad. They both synced to iCloud and appeared on my MacBook and the other iOS device. As of this moment, however, those two iOs created albums have not appeared in Photos on my iMac, despite my quitting Photos and re-opening it a couple of times.

Thoughts? Solutions? Is this an issue with my iMac or (more likely?) a Big Sur issue?

Thanks.

iMac Line (2012 and Later)

Posted on Jan 6, 2022 9:37 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

muguy

Level 10

82,111 points

Jan 6, 2022 9:44 AM in response to applemap

While anything is possible, it's unlikely to be a Big Sur issue (if you were running far older software I might think about that as an issue), but it might be your photo library -- just speculating. The images are uploading but somehow they are not tagged for the specific album.

I've had issues with shared albums in the past where images would not display. My workaround has always been to add one image using a different device. That has always "forced a sync" and within minutes, the albums had all images. So, you could try that on one of the devices on which you did not create the album.

If the albums all appear in sync at iCloud.com I would probably create a new system library on my Mac and have everything download again (hold Option key while opening Photos). This will also retain the previous library. You need to set it as system library (Preferences > General) and enable iCloud (preferences > iCloud)

Or, you could try repairing your Photo Library (could be an issue there).

If you experience problems with photos in a library, you can try to repair it. If problems persist, you can also restore your libraryfrom a Time Machine backup.

Important: You should back up your photo library before repairing it.

If the Photos app on your Mac is open, choose Photos > Quit Photos.
Press Option-Command and double-click the Photos icon in the Applications folder (or click the Photos icon in the Dock).
In the Repair Library window, click Repair to rebuild your photo library.

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Answer 2

léonie

Level 10

197,273 points

Jan 8, 2022 7:45 AM in response to applemap

You have first to solve the problem with the images that failed to upload.

Repeated repairs and turning iCloud off and on will just slow things down. Every time you disable iCloud Photos in Photos and turn it on again or repair the library, it will result in a new, lengthy upload to iCloud Photos. For 54000 photos and videos it may take two weeks until new photos will download to the Mac. New downloads will only appear once the new upload has been completed.

Is there a folder or album called "Unable to upload" in the sidebar of your Big Sur Mac?

If not, try to search for these photos with a smart album with the rule "Photo is unable to upload". If there are such items in the album, export them with "File > Export > Export unmodified original" and delete these items from the library.

Then try to reimport the exported items. If you get an error message, convert these items to a different, more compatible format.

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Answer 3

Jan 6, 2022 10:10 AM in response to muguy

Hi

What does your sync status say on the imac? Bottom of all photos view.

Every time you've done a library repair, or switched off iCloud, you have initiated a complete sync of your whole library. Depending on the size of your library, that could take days or weeks. While it is syncing, your iMac and devices won't be fully in sync.

How big is your library?

Also - how much free space in iCloud?

How much free space on your imac?

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Answer 4

applemap Author

Level 1

4 points

Jan 8, 2022 7:37 AM in response to applemap

I did some further detective work.

In the album I created on iMac, there are 56 images. The album does show up on my MacBook and iOS devices, but only 16 images appear.

So in iMac, I started to open and attempt to edit the images not appearing on the other devices. In every instance I got the following message "Cannot Start Editing." I have searched for a fix for that and nothing seems to work. I suspect that whatever is prohibiting editing the subject images is also preventing them form appearing in the album on the other devices.

To further complicate things, when I go to my MacBook and pull up an image I could not edit on the iMac, there is no problem editing it.

To again note, I store originals of all images in the Mac Photos app on the iMac (i TB storage), but on the MacBook and iOS devices I use the "Optimize" option.

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Answer 5

applemap Author

Level 1

4 points

Jan 6, 2022 10:28 AM in response to applemap

UPDATE:

Correction: In Test Item 1 above I should have said I created the two small test albums on my macBook (not on the iMac)

Also, as for Item 2, I spoke too soon. While the albums I created on my iMac each had 54 images )not 10, do nto know why I said that!) , and while the albums fo show up in iCloud an on my McBook and iOS devices, those albums contain just 16 of the 54 images.

One possible reason: When I was trying to edit the images in the initial album that got this issue going, on a number of the images I got a pop-up saying "Cannot Start Editing. Photos cannot load adjustments for this image." Is it possible that for some reason those images once in the album cannot sync? The images do appear in the All Photos seciton on all devices, including those where the images are not in the new albums.

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Answer 6

applemap Author

Level 1

4 points

Jan 8, 2022 7:26 AM in response to TonyCollinet

It has variously said Updated or Updating. Right now it says that more than 1,000 images failed to uplaod (this musyt have been during a repair or resync with iCloud?). As for that, I viewed the photos in the Unable to Upload folder, and a random chek with my Library shows that some of them are showing in my Library. So not sure what is up with that.

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Answer 7

applemap Author

Level 1

4 points

Jan 10, 2022 11:16 AM in response to léonie

Thanks for that reply.

The issue seems to focus on the corrupt images that cannot be edited. I realized that all of the missing images in new albums on the other devices were that type. Somehow I ended up with many duplicate images in this batch of travel photos from a few years ago. It is possible that I ran some program to batch correct time zones (I uploaded images from my Nikon to my laptop when I got home and did not realize doing that in another time zone would result in accurate time zones and times. It was an issue because I also took pics with my iPhone and I needed the pics to be in correct date and time order. I take a lot of pics, maybe 1200 on a two week trip, so there was a lot to deal with.) and maybe that created corrupt duplicates. So when I sort and find the good images they seem to upload to iCloud and my other devices with no problem. I had probably a long time ago started to discard some of the duplicates before I realized some were good and some bad, and deleted some good ones. So for any I really wanted to have available, I did screenshots, then imported the new screenshot images, referred back to the corrupt copies and manually adjusted time and date for each one. It took a s while but I got it done.

Might be mice for Apple to tell us whey we get those Cannot Start Editing messages as I am not the only one.

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