will aperture scan and combine multiple photo libraries

You can combine libraries but it is not automatic. You need to be in one library then you can select another library and tell Aperture to merge it into the current library. You can do this as many times as you have libraries.

One note however Aperture is not very good and duplicate detection so if the libraries have common images then those will possibly be duplicated in the final library.

I'm not sure what you mean by "scan all devices and bring all photos into one new library."

Aperture CAN import another Aperture or iPhoto library into its own library, as long as they are the right versions (current version is 3.4.5 of Aperture, and I believe iPhoto 9.4.5). If the libraries are the same version, then you can open one Aperture library, and then do File->Import->Library to import another library into your mail library.

So you should start with one library, then import the other two, then archive off the iPhoto libraries for a while until you're convinced all is working as it should.

Oh, and have up-to-date backups of EVERYTHING before you do this. It has worked perfectly for me in all cases, backups are always a good idea when doing something as large as this with something as valuable as your photo libraries!

Aperture libraries need to be on locally mounted Mac OS Extended formatted drive. Putting the library on anything else is asking for trouble,

The creating, locating and merging of libraries is a manual operation.

Will this software scan all devices and bring all photos to one new library?

Aperture is very different from Picasa (if that is what have you been using previously) in this respect. It will manage your image files in its own database, not only search and index them.

So landing it on a drobo directly connected to I mac is not a good idea?

Check the file system, see: Use locally mounted Mac OS X Extended volumes for your Aperture library

(current version is 3.4.5 of Aperture, and I believe iPhoto 9.4.5)

The current iPhoto Release at the AppStore is 9.4.3.

Aperture 3.4.5 cannot open iPhoto Libraries that have been updated with iPhoto 9.4.5 or later.

cbarger41 wrote:

So landing it on a drobo directly connected to I mac is not a good idea?

In your previous post you referred to the Drobo as a NAS, now here you write that it is directly connected. As a NAS it is definitely going to be a problem, directly connected things get a bit murkier, some users seem to be able to use it some have problems.

I strongly recommend you follow Apple's recommendations and keep the library on a locally mounted OS X Extended formatted volume. If you go with referenced originals you have more latitude as to where those get stored.

regards