iMac Photos external HD failed

Question

Level 1

8 points

iMac Photos external HD failed

I Had all my photos on on my a hard drive connected to my iMac Then apple invented iCloud and literally within days of uploading all my photos all 10,355 of them my HD attached to mi iMac failed so a big thank you to iCloud

I now open the photos app on my iMac and the app says Photos can't find the system photo library named "Photos Library2.photoslibrary

All the pictures are safe on my phone my ipad and macbook pro however i think the iMac was the main source library and i dont want to wipe everything I could be wrong `i dont know so im asking you guys

The question is how do i get all my photos back to the new hd i have for the iMac I like to keep a local copy of all my pictures too

many thanks in advance

iMac, OS X El Capitan (10.11.4), null

Posted on Apr 27, 2016 1:51 AM

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Answer 1

léonie

Level 10

200,795 points

Apr 27, 2016 3:17 AM in response to craig4569

Then apple invented iCloud and literally within days of uploading all my photos all 10,355 of them my HD attached to mi iMac failed so a big thank you to iCloud

How did you upload your Photos to iCloud? Did you enable iCloud Photo Library for your Photos Library and waited for the photos to upload?

If yes, check if your Photos are now all visible on the web interface at www.icloud.com. Sign in with your iCloud AppleID and open the Photos.app there. Are all photos in this library in iCloud? Then you can download your photos back from iCloud, if you create a new, empty Photos Library on your Mac and enable it as your System Photo Library and iCloud Library.

Do you have another drive with enough storage to hold the Photos Library?

In what way did your drive fail? Does your Mac it not see any longer as connected?

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Answer 2

craig4569 Author

Level 1

8 points

Apr 27, 2016 3:35 AM in response to léonie

Hi Leonie

How did you upload your Photos to iCloud? I Uploaded all my photos to iCloud from the iMac hd drive before it failed

Did you enable iCloud Photo Library for your Photos Library and waited for the photos to upload? YES

If yes, check if your Photos are now all visible on the web interface at www.icloud.com. Sign in with your iCloud AppleID and open the Photos.app there. Are all photos in this library in iCloud? YES THEY ARE ALL IN PLACE

Then you can download your photos back from iCloud, if you create a new, empty Photos Library on your Mac and enable it as your System Photo Library and iCloud Library.HOW DO I DO THIS ?

Do you have another drive with enough storage to hold the Photos Library? YES

In what way did your drive fail? Does your Mac it not see any longer as connected? Exactly it just stopped showing up one day

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Answer 3

léonie

Level 10

200,795 points

Apr 27, 2016 3:41 AM in response to craig4569

I Uploaded all my photos to iCloud from the iMac hd drive before it failed

But how? Did you enable the Photos Library as iCloud Photo Library in the Photos Preferences > iCloud ? If yes, did the sync complete? I can take more than a week for a large library.

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Answer 4

craig4569 Author

Level 1

8 points

Apr 27, 2016 3:47 AM in response to léonie

Yes i took about three weeks they are all there its cool

I need to know how to get them all back on a new hd too i can move forward with two copies of each going forward one on thew cloud and one on the spare hd

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Answer 5

léonie

Level 10

200,795 points

Apr 27, 2016 3:50 AM in response to craig4569

Then you can download your photos back from iCloud, if you create a new, empty Photos Library on your Mac and enable it as your System Photo Library and iCloud Library.HOW DO I DO THIS ?

Launch Photos while holding down the Options key ⌥ . This will show the Library Chooser panel. Select to create a new library from the panel. As the location select a folder on the new Hard Disk.

When Photos opens, open the Photos Preferences.

In the General tab enable "Use as System Photo Library". The option should be dimmed.
In the iCloud tab enable "ICloud Photo Library".

Now wait for the photos to download back from iCloud.

The external drive with new library needs to have the file system MacOS Extended (journaled) and directly connected, or you cannot use it with iCloud Photo Library.

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