moving images from one external hard drive to another

[yurkot]

I have a Microsoft Surface studio with PSE 19 and not enough storage I moved my photos to a wd external hard drive to free up some space. That wasn't all that fast. I bought a samsung ssd external hard drive to speed things up. how do I copy all the images to the new external hard drive and tell PSE that the images are there. I guess I can keep the images on the older external hard drive for backup.

[pontiac1940]

Hi yurkot
From your comment, I assume you are using Organizer. Yes? Just wanted to clarify. 
If so, this is your key question: how do I copy all the images to the new external hard drive and tell PSE that the images are there?
You need Organizer to know where photos are after the move, right?  

Sorry, I can't help as I have never used it...just wanted to clarify. Others will know. 

Clive 

[Sepiana]

I believe the OP is talking about using the Organizer. This thread seems to be a follow-up to a previous thread of his.

Photoshop elements conversion and consolidations with NAS

[yurkot]

yes its all part of the same nightmare. Should i try to consolidate all photos into PSE 19 before upgrading to PSE 2020 or can i try to import all photos in a new catalogue in pse 19? how do i tell pse that the images are now on the new ssd drive. By my questions you can tell I am not very proficient with this. please explain even if it sounds very basic to you.thanks for all help

[michelb]

Mar 14, 2020 15:31:14 GMT yurkot said:

yes its all part of the same nightmare. Should i try to consolidate all photos into PSE 19 before upgrading to PSE 2020 or can i try to import all photos in a new catalogue in pse 19? how do i tell pse that the images are now on the new ssd drive. By my questions you can tell I am not very proficient with this. please explain even if it sounds very basic to you.thanks for all help

I have a Microsoft Surface studio with PSE 19 and not enough storage I moved my photos to a wd external hard drive to free up some space. That wasn't all that fast. I bought a samsung ssd external hard drive to speed things up. how do I copy all the images to the new external hard drive and tell PSE that the images are there. I guess I can keep the images on the older external hard drive for backup.

Before using your SSD drive, I highly recommend doing a full backup from the organizer on a different external drive. It's not only a safety step before a very important reorganization, it's also a possible way to perform that reorganization.
Before considering the upgrade to PSE2020 concentrate on the task of moving your media files from the old drive (or several old drives) to the SSD. I insist on the word moving, not copying. If you move your media files from the organizer, the catalog does know the new location. If you copy them from the organizer or from the explorer/finder, the new location would be ignored. So, first move the files from the organizer to the new external file (SSD or conventional, no difference). Have a look at your previous post.
The simplest way is to move the files (all the files or only folders by folders) by drag and drop from the left folder panel (see previous discussion).
Your present catalog could manage files scattered in several different drives. In such a case, instead of moving files from each different drive to the target SSD drive, the good solution would be to use the full backup created for safety in the first step to restore everything on the destination SSD drive. The restored library will replace each drive with a new master folder in the SSD drive. Everything will be consolidated. And another important result of the restore would be that the catalog folder itself would be restored on the new SSD drive. The SSD drive will be an important factor of speed for a catalog folder.

Now, about upgrading from PSE2019 to PSE2020: Both above solutions will work before installing PSE2020. You can test the result from PSE2019. If you have installed PSE2020 before the library move, it will have its own (empty) catalog ready after the installation. Then, you'll have to use it to convert the catalog created in PSE2019 format by the 'restore' process made frop PSE2019. The PSE2019 catalog will continue to work with PSE2019. The converted catalog will work with PSE2020.
Alternatively, instead of using PSE2019 to restore the backup, you can use PSE2020. In that case, you'll be prompted automatically to convert the catalog to the new version.

A significant difference between using the drag and drop move option or the backup/restore one is that the backup/restore has the result of storing the catalog folder on the destination drive instead of the default location in your system drive. It's your choice, you can move the catalog folder to and from the default/destination location from the explorer. I would recommend storing it in the SSD for better performance.

[yurkot]

thank you so much will try that

[TB]

yurkot, seems you are confused as am I. But consider this. You did two backups correct. Then you want to return photos from one backup to organizer, am I seeing it right? First, does the backup actually remove the images from the catalog? If not all are still where you left them. Second, organizer would recognize the first backup correct, so return images using that ex hd and keep the one organizer does not recognize as you security back up. Does this sound good? TB

[TB]

yurkot, further thought. Do you have a 'pictures library' in the device you are using? I am considering how a windows 10 system works, so bear with me. In my experience everything is in windows control, downloading etc. Pictures library being what we are discussing. The confusing part is that you did the backup from organizer. But in my understanding all images still are in pictures library. So if you were to download a new version of PSE you would need to go to import (last I looked) in upper left corner of organizer and import what's in pictures library into the new PSE version. Does it still work that way or not. Does your organizing in the PSE versions not carry back to be so organized in pictures library? This is just a thought as I never organize in organizer. Too many time what mess you are in occurs. I only organize in pictures library and can therefore import images into and out of any PSE version I wish to be working in. Does this in any way help you? TB

[michelb]

TB,
We do not have feedback from yurkot.
I take it that yurkot has been satisfied with my answer and if not, I am ready to help if necessary.
Let's examine some points in how you are seeing the problem.

Do you have a 'pictures library' in the device you are using? I am considering how a windows 10 system works, so bear with me. In my experience everything is in windows control, downloading etc. Pictures library being what we are discussing.

This is not relevant to the issue, which is not to simply move folders from one disk to another, which is very basic with Windows Explorer. It's to keep all the organization stored in the catalog.

helpx.adobe.com/elements-organizer/using/creating-editing-catalogs.html
As you can see, there is a tremendous amount of useful information to manage catalogs, add tags, captions, notes, ratings, grouping files into albums, version sets, stacks, creating a lot of indexes for immediate retrieval of files with multicriteria searches. Neither Elements Organizer nor catalogs do contain any file, only links to their real location which may be on any kind of internal or external drives. The organizer is your tool to manage your media library, which means much more than moving files from the Explorer. The organizer manages the tasks done usually by the Explorer: moving, deleting, renaming and does what the Explorer can't do, grouping, finding, displaying, creating albums, slideshows, managing face recognition or geotagging ets.
So the problem is to have all or part of the media library moved from the original (small) drive to an external drive while keeping all the organization. That simply means doing the physical move from drive to drive and to update the links in the catalog to the new destination of the file.
This is a simple job for the organizer if you understand that you should never move, delete or rename files from outside the organizer (from the Explorer, which is a catastrophe).

Side note about the 'Pictures' library. In my experience, it's the worst choice to store your photo library and manage it with your organizer. You are much better by creating your own, custom master folder.

The confusing part is that you did the backup from organizer. But in my understanding all images still are in pictures library. So if you were to download a new version of PSE you would need to go to import (last I looked) in upper left corner of organizer and import what's in pictures library into the new PSE version.

There does not seem to be any confusion here, yurkot did the wrong choice by moving files outside of the organizer (as mentionned by Pontiac) instead of using the organizer to move the files to the external drive.

Two confusing circumstances here require more explanations.
- The new computer is supposed to be upgraded from version 2019 to 2020.
- there is a choice for the user to store the catalog folder (the database and its associated tools) eiter on the internal drive or in the external drive.
That's what my answer was dealing with.

[TB]

michelb, I understood the paragraph you began with the reference to: helpx. adobe. And I think I understand your point. Where yurkot messed up was trying to restore the organizer with the backup disk the organizer did not recognize. Had he done it with the correct backup device (the one the organizer did recognize) he would have been successful. Is that your point? I understand entirely the workings of organizer and why I never organize in it. All you work can be lost in the blink of an update. I gave up on organizer back with version 6 when I backed up my organizer, then tried to do a follow up backup. The aggravation just was not worth it, so I have never organized or labeled images in organizer ever since. I guess my organization style serves my purposes using organization in pictures library. I also used to label in Photo Gallery until recently when that became corrupted in some manner. Therefore I have given up on specialized organizing and create specific folders in pictures library that suit my purposes. I import images into any of the PSE versions for whatever edit I desire and either leave them unorganized in the PSE version, or I might add a label. Ultimately all images are on the hard drive of the device, and can be imported into the edit program as you mentioned. Where you mention that you should never change an image outside of the organizer is true, but they can be reconnected using the organizer's reconnect tool. Tedious, but effective.

I am completely confused by your last paragraph. Did I comment in error on it or you were just further explaining? Pleasure discussing PSE versions. I wish more who use the edit program more fully understood that the images they move into their versions do still remain on the device hard drive. And only in Organizer for the purpose of being accessible to edit. Thank you, TB

[BuckSkin]

Mar 31, 2020 20:44:42 GMT TB said:

 I gave up on organizer back with version 6 when I backed up my organizer, then tried to do a follow up backup. The aggravation just was not worth it, so I have never organized or labeled images in organizer ever since. Thank you, TB

Same for me; I quit the organizer quite some time ago and my life has since been a lot better organized and a lot less troubled.
I would be all for surgically removing the entire Organizer from my Elements; I love Elements and abhor the Organizer.

I have Lightroom installed and don't much care for it either.

I use FastStone and digiKam sort of in combination; I have tens of thousands of images and can find the one I want in a matter of seconds; it is no big nightmare to change or add drives and my images do not get strange things done to the date-taken stamp nor extra suffixes added to the filenames like the Organizer was bad for.
I have all of our machines seamlessly networked together and often jump back and forth between machines = no problem; nothing gets lost and nothing gets confused.

Way ever once in a while, something will go haywire with the Editor, requiring me to "delete the preferences" ; I always forget and the first few images I edit will then get "included in the Organizer" and "Saved in a version set", causing me to have to put the EXIF data back to rights and reset the date-taken back to the correct time.