Ok to move managed library to external, keep referenced on internal?

Or is that total silliness, and my Aperture library should always be on my internal drive, and I should instead just move all of my now-managed images to be referenced images on an external drive? I think I'm missing understanding the benefits of keeping images managed as much as possible.

You really have two options, and both work well.

• Keep a managed library on an external drive and a current working library on the external. From time to time merge your wrking set into the managed library. The benefit is to have the security of a managed library.
• But if you want to be able to see all high-rated images at all times in the screensaver and to have the Aperture library on your fastest drive, the internal, go for a mixed library. All favorites plus your recently imported images that still need editing managed on your inernal drive, but the older images with low ratings referenced on the external. You may want to render high quality previews for all referenced images. This way you can still browse them, rate them, access them in the Media Browser, etc.

Regards

Léonie

Mixed Library is what I do. I think it would meet your needs like a body-suit (no reason to have multiple Libraries; avoids the complication of exporting and importing/merging; puts the Library on the only machine that you use, puts the Library in the best location for performance). Here is a sketchy description. Ask about anything that is not clear.

Looking again at your thread title :

Ok to move managed library to external, keep referenced on internal?

The general idea is exactly the other way round - or I am misunderstanding what you are saying.

For a mixed library:

• Keep a partial, managed library on the internal drive
• Move older referenced images to the external.

Kirby's sketchy description says it all!

I had exactly the same situation and question. I kept my "Library" on the laptop and moved all images older than 2012 (about 50,000 if I remember right) to an external drive as "referenced." New images remain "managed" on the laptop. Every year, I will move the two-year-old images off to the external drive. It's working great. (I also moved my pretty massive iTunes media off-board while, again, keeping the iTunes Library on-board.).

I spent months thinking about this, and in the end in took just a couple hours, with no real hassle or problems. (There were some slightly tricky developments with the iTunes stuff, but that's not relevant here!). Good luck!

Can you see any performance differences when editing your referenced files versus managed files?

That will depend on the location of the referenced files. If they are on drive with a fast connection it should not matter much, but if you store them on a etwork drive with slow access you'll have a problem.

For example, I have two internal drives on omy MBP. I do not notice much difference between managed files on the inernal SSD and referenced files on the second internal drive.

You are welcome. 🙂

. From all the above, I think I'll have the library on the internal SSD, then the rest on a Thunderbolt attached RAID0.

Sounds like a good plan.

No, aQor2, I don't see any performance degradation. I've got the referenced files on a Seagate FireWire drive and everything's fine. I moved 2011 and earlier photos to the external drive because I don't work with them as much as the 2012 and 2013. I keep all the "current" photos on the MacBook Pro.