Mitrix
Level 1 (0 points)

Q: Damaged iPhoto library after iPhoto update

Hi there fellow Apple-users!

 

I currently encounter the following issue, which hopefully will not result in losing all my pictures ever made...

 

Last Sunday, the Apple store notified me that there was a new software version for iPhoto available, futher to which I agreed to update it. So far so good. When opening iPhoto again, it said my library needed to be updated. Again, I agreed (I didn't have any other choice). I didn't really monitor this process, as it was taking very long time (my library amounts to +100 GB), so I don't know if it finished with that (and maybe the process was interrupted for some reason). For as far as I can remember, the next time I tried to open iPhoto, the program said that it would update thumbnails and that's where it went wrong. Immediately after starting with this process, the program said "Your photo library is damaged or unreadable and cannot be opened. Please restore from a backup." I now always get the message when I try to start-up iPhoto.

 

I'm currently restoring my first back up since I returned from holidays (via Time Capsule), but I'm afraid that this library will already be corrupted as well. The backup before that dates back from before my holidays, which would mean that I would lose all my holiday pics. If that won't work neither, I'm afraid all my pictures would be gone.

 

Pretty bad thus... Did anyone of you encounters/ed the same problem and/or knows a solution for that (except from relying on a backup)? I really hope that this gets solved, I'm a huge Apple fan, and I always trusted iPhoto with my whole photo library, knowing that everything 'just works'. In that way, I'm already a bit disappointed... I didn't do anything wrong, just clicked yes if Apple asked me something...

 

Anyway, will keep you all posted, but as a good word of advice, wait a bit before updating your iPhoto, and maybe it's a good time to make a separate back-up, a part from the Time Capsule backup, just to be sure...

 

I welcome any tips/suggestions you may have!

 

Thx + regards,

 

Dimitri

MBP 13", Mac OS X (10.6.4)

Posted on Jun 26, 2012 1:37 PM

by ykebert,Solvedanswer
ykebert ykebert
Level 1 (15 points)
A:

This solutions worked for me! http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2638, I hope it will also work for you.

Posted on Jun 27, 2012 3:00 PM

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Mitrix

Q: Damaged iPhoto library after iPhoto update

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  • Helpful answers

  • by gggt,Helpful

    gggt gggt Jun 26, 2012 3:57 PM in response to Mitrix
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Jun 26, 2012 3:57 PM in response to Mitrix

    Similar thing just happened to me with a 100GB library and only <5GB of free space while iPhoto was "upgrading" the iPhoto library. It seemed to be regenerating thumbnails when the error occured.

     

    I have suffered the same symptom a couple of times previously when disk space was exhausted while importing photos from a camera. Rebuilding the library from within iPhoto did not help, but making a copy and rebuilding using iPhoto Library Manager (IPLM) fixed things. Note that this rebuilding works without limitation in the free version of IPLM.

    http://www.fatcatsoftware.com/iplm/Help/rebuilding%20a%20corrupted%20iphoto%20li brary.html

     

    I'm just doing the rebuild now using the above  with the latest IPLM v3.8.1 which is claimed to be compatible with the new iPhoto 9.3. Fingers crossed.

     

    Remember, make a backup copy of your library before rebuilding anything! But note that when you make a copy of a huge library the first few GB generates massive disk activity but this calms down later. Must be lots of small files at the front of the library.

     

    I'm sure you'll agree it's pretty poor that iPhoto doesn't check for sufficient disk space before importing etc. However, we probably should be using Aperture and/or splitting such large libraries. I wouldn't go overboard as a fan: they're  a business, not a charity ...

     

    Hope this helps.

  • by Mitrix,

    Mitrix Mitrix Jun 27, 2012 5:08 AM in response to gggt
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 27, 2012 5:08 AM in response to gggt

    Thx Gggt! I really hope this helps (also for you), at first sight this seems like a workable solution.

     

    Regarding what causes the problem, I'm not sure if it's indeed a lack of hard disk space. Didn't check it at that time, but normally, I have some 50GB of free space on my hard drive. Unless it really needs the full +100GB free space... Anyway, whatever the cause is, I indeed think this should absolutely not occur.

     

    Also, this could indeed be the driver to shift to Aperture... Didn't do it at my last iPhoto-crash (when I lost hours of work on a photo album), due to the fact that I loved the simplicity of use and GI of iPhoto. But this latter does not weight against the time I lose and stress I have when it crashes!

     

    Keep you all posted!

  • by ykebert,Helpful

    ykebert ykebert Jun 27, 2012 9:07 AM in response to Mitrix
    Level 1 (15 points)
    Jun 27, 2012 9:07 AM in response to Mitrix

    I've got the same problem. When I open iPhoto the error massage appears. ("Your photo library is damaged or unreadable and cannot be opened. Please restore from a backup.") But lack of diskspace shouldn't be the problem. My iPhoto library is something like 30gb, And I have 160gb free disk space remaining.

     

    Is there an solution that Apple provide? Another update?

  • by ykebert,Solvedanswer

    ykebert ykebert Jun 27, 2012 3:00 PM in response to Mitrix
    Level 1 (15 points)
    Jun 27, 2012 3:00 PM in response to Mitrix

    This solutions worked for me! http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2638, I hope it will also work for you.

  • by Mitrix,

    Mitrix Mitrix Jun 29, 2012 5:57 AM in response to ykebert
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 29, 2012 5:57 AM in response to ykebert

    @gggt: There should be something really wrong with my library, 'cause IPLM crashed two times half away... Also, hidden pictures were not copied and my edits to my pictures were gone (ratings remained). I was happy to see my most of my pictures back though, the older pictures were copied in another library as well, the hidden pictures were generally the bad ones and edits can be re-done...

     

    But then I tried ykebert's solution (actually Apple's solution), actually as a last resort, 'cause didn't think it would work (considering that even IPLM crashed). But suprisingly, I worked perfectly! Everything is back, just as before (hidden pictures and edits) and think the process didn't take more than an hour to complete...

     

    So I'm happy that this could be fixed in a rather simple way, by not using external programs... Only recommendation to Apple would be to add a link to the process as soon as the crash occurs. Anyway, I'm switching to Aperture!

     

    Thx to all!

  • by gggt,

    gggt gggt Jun 29, 2012 12:54 PM in response to Mitrix
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Jun 29, 2012 12:54 PM in response to Mitrix

    I had similar couple of crashes with IPLM, so I also tried Apple's rebuild. It has never worked for me before but this time I'm also happy to report that it worked. Note that I had more than free space on the volume than the size of the library, just in case. All's well that ends well!

  • by LeeMDuffy,

    LeeMDuffy LeeMDuffy Dec 29, 2012 6:13 AM in response to Mitrix
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Dec 29, 2012 6:13 AM in response to Mitrix

    I have this same problem, and I can restore all of my libraries using the direcitons above, but it happens EVERY time I open iPhoto, so I have to restore all of my photos each and every time.   Is there something I can do to permanently fix the problem?  It's getting rather annoying.  Thanks for all your help.

  • by LeeMDuffy,

    LeeMDuffy LeeMDuffy Dec 29, 2012 6:27 AM in response to LeeMDuffy
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Dec 29, 2012 6:27 AM in response to LeeMDuffy

    I just tried a last ditch effort and emptied my iPhoto trash.  For some reason that seems to have fixed the problem.  Who knew?