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Import Add & Move disabled for importing from a USB stick

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murali

Member
Joined
Feb 23, 2019
Messages
99
Location
Redmond, WA
Lightroom Experience
Intermediate
Lightroom Version
Classic
Lightroom Version Number
v9.2
Operating System
  1. Windows 10
I am traveling and before I left I copied a bunch of images into my 256GB USB stick. I want to keep the images where they are but when I tried to import, LR 9.2 only allows me to Copy. Move and Add are disabled. I understand why Copy is the only option for SD cards but not sure why the rule is being enforced on USB sticks. Is there a way to enable Add for importing from USB sticks? Thanks.

Murali
 
I am traveling and before I left I copied a bunch of images into my 256GB USB stick. I want to keep the images where they are but when I tried to import, LR 9.2 only allows me to Copy. Move and Add are disabled. I understand why Copy is the only option for SD cards but not sure why the rule is being enforced on USB sticks. Is there a way to enable Add for importing from USB sticks? Thanks.

Murali
Murali,

Consider if you remove that USB stick, which is normal behaviour. At that point, Lightroom can't find the image files. Imagine that you always had to have this USB stick plugged in to your system AND using the same Windows-assigned drive letter, before starting Lightroom.

Phil
 
Phil: what u say makes a lot of sense. Unfortunately, my laptop has only a 512GB SSD drive and I have already used up 500GB for Windows, apps, and non image data. Don't have a lot of space for importing images into the SSD. I imported the images into the same USB stick and deleted the originals. The "real originals" are in a RAID drive back home :)
 
LR does not permit the "permanent" storage location for image files to be on highly volatile devices which users tend to format and "delete all" from on a regular basis. These are devices such as memory cards and USB thumb/stick flash memory. I know a memory stick is quite convenient (small light, etc) and now can have quite a lot of memory in it, but for the purposes of LR you will need to get yourself a Portable Hard Drive which LR considers a more stable storage device. Be a bit cautious with SSD external drives as there have been reports of LR treating them like thumb drives but that issue may have been fixed by now. Better to ask before you buy.
 
I am traveling and before I left I copied a bunch of images into my 256GB USB stick. I want to keep the images where they are but when I tried to import, LR 9.2 only allows me to Copy. Move and Add are disabled. I understand why Copy is the only option for SD cards but not sure why the rule is being enforced on USB sticks. Is there a way to enable Add for importing from USB sticks? Thanks.

Murali
You should be able to use Copy and then select the USB stick as destination. After you have copied the images and added them to the catalog this way, you can delete the originals from the USB stick in order not to have duplicates.
 
You should be able to use Copy and then select the USB stick as destination. After you have copied the images and added them to the catalog this way, you can delete the originals from the USB stick in order not to have duplicates.
IMO, still not a good idea. The USB Stick is subject to the drive letter snafu of Windows and too easily lost when traveling. Especially if the pocket is often the storage location. USB EHDs are cheap and not much bigger than a USB stick, but big enough to make you think about it when it comes to packing.
 
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