What is the best thing to do - use an external hard drive and open a vault or just copy aperture and iphoto libraries to an external hard drive? Can I also ask if I just copy Aperture library does that mean that iphoto transfers automatically? Thanks
iMac, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.4), I am learning about aperture
you are not in iMac forum, and it depends on what your fastest storage and how much capacity and free space.
Aperture on a new 2013 Mac Pro is best placed on the 1TB internal SSD,
When you copy it, open from the Finder and t he program remember s which and where the library is. For other programs you may need to use the apps perferences.
And no you can have multiple libraries for each, and same rule applies to iPhoto, open in Finder when you move and change its location.
I would only use an external if it will always be ready and on, and is fast. And with 500GB SSD (Samsung 840 EVO) going for $279, that is what I would use. On a suitable Thunderbolt2 or USB3 interface.
You'd better make backup the libraries first. Copying the libraries to external drive is a good idea to make free space on internal disk.
As far As I know, if you unified or merged Aperture library and iPhoto library, the answer is yes.
Using unified photo library with iPhoto and Aperture:
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht5260
How to use Aperture to merge iPhoto libraries:
Vault v external hard drive
