Not able to view all photos after Big Sur update (previous photos library stores on an external HD)

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Level 1

6 points

Not able to view all photos after Big Sur update (previous photos library stores on an external HD)

After updating to Big Sur on a Macbook Air (Early 2013 or 2014), I now am unable to view all my photos which were perfectly sorted into albums etc. on Sierra.

All the albums appear in the photos app on my Macbook, and some of the photos (6,000 or so) but not the other 30,000 or so that were previously in my library. What is going on? Looking at my external HD, the photo library seems to take over 300 GB so I believe all my photos are still on there somewhere, but don't seem to appear in the Masters (when going into show package contents) or in the photo app library itself.

Please help! Will I need to revert back to the previous software to see my photos again or?

Cheers

Sarah

MacBook Air 13″, macOS 11.7

Posted on Nov 27, 2023 12:12 AM

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Answer 1

Nov 27, 2023 7:53 AM in response to Sarahrich92

Thankfully you have backups! This is Photos, not the discontinued iPhoto, is that correct?

Have you tried re-building the library? Photos is a database program, and rebuilding may re-connect the database with the files. To do this, Close Photos and re-launch by option-command-clicking the app icon.

If that doesn't work, we may be able to come up with ways to find the pictures. Let us know...

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Answer 2

Sarahrich92 Author

Level 1

6 points

Nov 28, 2023 2:02 PM in response to Sarahrich92

Hi Richard

Thanks for your reply. Yes, you are correct this is with photos not the discontinued iphoto. I believe the software I had before was Sierra.

I actually have a copy of the old photos app on my HD as well and it says created 2016 (and I think version 1.5) compared with the current which was created 2020 (version 6.0) if that helps?

I have also just rebuilt/restored the library following your instructions and now all my photos are showing in the library but haven’t connected to all the albums I had created to sort them. If not some seem (less than 1/4) to have connected.

Any other neat tricks up your sleeve to help me reconnect them to the folders as this has taken me ages to sort them into albums (as the metadata on a fair few photos has been inconsistent over the years and doesn’t always show the correct date/year etc. and therefore shows up in strange places in the library.

Thanks again for your help!

cheers

Sarah

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Not able to view all photos after Big Sur update (previous photos library stores on an external HD)

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