Terrance Devlin answered a question about iPhoto (4-2012) re:copying iPhoto Library to an ExHD, and losing all the albums. I can't locate the "Choose Library" when I open iPhoto with the opt button. Can anyone help?

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Terrance Devlin answered a question about iPhoto (4-2012) re:copying iPhoto Library to an ExHD, and losing all the albums. I can't locate the "Choose Library" when I open iPhoto with the opt button. Can anyone help?

I tried to move my images (over 25,000) to an External Hard drive to open up some memory, hoping to make my computer run faster. It took three hours to move the images and I see them all in the mac's menus. However when I try to open them with iPhoto now, none appeared. and when I tried to import them back to the main HD they come in to iPhoto just fine, but not with the albums nor any of the massive organization i'd created in the original. this represents years of images, and I can't imagine that I'd have to recopy them into folders/albums again.

Terrance Devlin answered a similar question back in April of last year. He said to make sure the ExHD is formatted to MAC OS Extended (Journaled) and to move the library to the ExHD and then open iPhoto with the option button and select "Choose Library" from the resulting menu.

Command "I" tells me that the new drive is formatted correctly. I can't locate the "Choose Library" when I open iPhoto with the opt button.

First, I wondered if the application needs to be on the same drive as the Library. I sure would like to know if I can find out how to restore all the folders I had them in. Terrance's advice helped the user that had asked the question.

Here's the url for that archived discussion: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3849933?start=0&tstart=0

Can anyone help? I'm using iPhoto 5. My MAC is an OS X version 10.4.11.

thanks, brokenlom

iPhoto 5-OTHER, Mac OS X (10.4.11)

Posted on Jan 6, 2013 7:02 PM

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Answer 1

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steve626

Level 6

9,977 points

Jan 6, 2013 8:54 PM in response to brokenlom

Here are Apple's instructions:

If you are using iPhoto ’06 or earlier, you will need to follow these steps to tell iPhoto where the Library is now located:

Hold down the Option key on the keyboard and open iPhoto. Keep the Option key held down until you are prompted to create or choose an iPhoto Library.

Click Choose Library.

Locate and select the iPhoto Library in its new location.

(from http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1229 )

Below (in the link below) is what you should see when holding down the option key and opening iPhoto. Keep holding down the option key until this dialogue comes up. You want to select the Choose Library button.

http://appleclinic.wordpress.com/2008/04/06/change-default-dir-iphoto/

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Answer 2

LarryHN

Level 10

106,110 points

Jan 6, 2013 8:57 PM in response to brokenlom

Moving the iPhoto library is safe and simple - quit iPhoto and drag the iPhoto library intact as a single entity to the external drive - depress the option key and launch iPhoto using the "select library" option to point to the new location on the external drive - fully test it and then trash the old library on the internal drive (test one more time prior to emptying the trash)

And be sure that the External drive is formatted Mac OS extended (journaled) (iPhoto does not work with drives with other formats) and that it is always available prior to launching iPhoto

And backup soon and often - having your iPhoto library on an external drive is not a backup and if you are using Time Machine you need to check and be sure that TM is backing up your external drive

The location of the iPhoto application must not be changed - just the iPhoto library

LN

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Answer 3

brokenlom Author

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Jan 6, 2013 10:04 PM in response to brokenlom

Hallelujah! thanks steve626 (the response I received first) I had moved the application AND all the photos to the Ext. drive and holding down the option key worked like a charm. what a relief.

One other question: A while ago my daughter downloaded some of her cameras images to my iPhoto, an din doing so about 1/4 of my preview thumbnail images for older photos aren't the thumbs for the actual photos. for instance, I'll se a thumbnail preview image for a dog and when I click it to see it large, it's actually a photo of the family. the image in the folders in the Library is indeed the family. Now at a certain point down the page, they begin to represent properly. HAve you ever run in to this?

thanks for your help. Brokenlom

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Answer 4

LarryHN

Level 10

106,110 points

Jan 6, 2013 10:07 PM in response to brokenlom

Back up your iPhoto library, Depress and hold the option (alt) and command keys and launch iPhoto - rebuild your thumbnails - you may have to do this several times

LN

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Answer 5

Oct 3, 2015 11:47 AM in response to LarryHN

Im wondering if anyone can help me move a bunch of photos from my desktop to a particular iphoto album? I know there will be diplicates but I still want to move or import them all together to be added to my new album instead of searchinh my entire iPhoto library for each of the 300 Photos

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Answer 6

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,290 points

Oct 3, 2015 3:09 PM in response to denisefromtemecula

Import the photos. They'll all be in the same Last Import album. Command-a will select them all then add them to your album.

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