How do I back up iPhoto to external hard drive

On your Mac?

Drag your iPhoto library from the Pictures folder to the external drive.

Make sure, that your drive is formatted for Mac - the formatting should be MacOS X Extended (Journaled), like here for Aperture: Format external drives to Mac OS Extended before using with Aperture

Most Simple Back Up:

Drag the iPhoto Library from your Pictures Folder to another Disk. This will make a copy on that disk.

Slightly more complex: Use an app that will do incremental back ups. This is a very good way to work. The first time you run the back up the app will make a complete copy of the Library. Thereafter it will update the back up with the changes you have made. That makes subsequent back ups much faster. Many of these apps also have scheduling capabilities: So set it up and it will do the back up automatically.

Example of such apps: Chronosync- but there are many others. Search on MacUpdateor the App Store

Is this similar to using Time Machine? Do you recommend using Time Machine instead of this?

That is a personal choice. I prefer Time Machine plus CarbonCopyCloner giving me an hourly backup plus a daily bootable clone

Having a backup is critical. Which one is personal

If you are only going to have one backup I recommend TM

LN

What is the best external hardrive (as of now) for backing up aprox. 75,000 raw photos from iphoto?

Thanks

There is no "best" but otherworldcomputing.com offers some very good external hard drives. Be sure the size of the drive is about twice the size of the drive(s) you're backing up.

OT

Best is personal -- As I stated I like TimeMachine and for TM I use Apple Time Capsule - for Carbon Copuy Cloner I use Other World Computing

LN

Thanks LarryHN and Old Toad. I am also told that G-Tech and Glyph are good EHDs. Anybody out there have experience with those companies? I am hearing that I should stay away from WD EHDs. I also want to back up in the cloud, but which company to bank on and does anyone use Synology or other NAS technology for photo backup?

there is no known cloud backup that works with iPhoto and no NAS - the library needs to be on a volume formatted Mac OS extended (journaled) 0 a condition not met on the CLoud on on a NAS

LN

Simplicity and automation are key, otherwise the backup probably won't get done. Time Machine is, in my opinion, the simplest. The backbone of my strategy is time machine to several makes/models of external drives. I've had both WD and Seagate brand drives fail (1 each). Knock on wood, that was years ago. Many NAS's and DAS's have Time Machine compatibility. Synology and Drobo, for example.

Just be aware that folks have reported problems with Time Machine and iPhoto back ups made when iPhoto is actually running. So quit it some times.

Many NAS's and DAS's have Time Machine compatibility. Synology and Drobo, for example.

But not iPhoto library compatibility

there is no known cloud backup that works with iPhoto and no NAS - the library needs to be on a volume formatted Mac OS extended (journaled) - a condition not met on the Cloud or on a NAS

LN

I was planning tI follow your "most simple backup" method above on my Synology NAS. Is it as simples as you said (simply for a disaster backup), or are there any specs I need to check on the NAS first?

Thanks in advance.

Yes - you can not have the iphoto library on a NAS - it must always be on a volume formatted Mac OS extended (journaled) - you need a locally connected drive formatted mac OS extended (journaled) - If yu have a drive that TimeMachine will use then TM is a good choice for a basic backjp

LN

Hi,

With regards to a NAS to store the iPhoto library it can be done if the NAS has the capability to create an iSCSI drive. The mac will see it as locally attached iscsi device. It is a bit complex to set up but doable.

1) Create the iscsi volume on your NAS

2) Map and initialise the iSCSI using a 3rd part iSCSI initialiser. I am using GlabalSAN legacy one and it is working fine.

3) format the volume using disk utility

4) Move a copy of your iPhoto library to it and test it out.

It seems to work for me and the data throughput is very fast. I think I read somewhere it is even faster than a SATA internal drive for some operations.

As I am in the process of setting it up I can't give any advice on incremental backups but I am sure it will work as the mac sees it as a locally attached drive like an external USB drive..