Lightroom Catalog cannot open - Connect PC external NTFS hard drive to new MAC

[GaryPhotomd]

Lightroom Version

Lightroom Classic version: 10.4

Operating System

1. Windows 10
2. iOS

Just got a New iMac desktop . Have been using lightroom on a PC for the last 10 yrs All my images are on an external hard drive formatted to NTFS.. when i connect to the drive to the new mac i get this Lightroom cannot open the catalog named “Lightroom Catalog-2-v10” located on volume “Blue WD 3T” because Lightroom cannot save changes to this location.
On my PC I just plug in my external drive and the lightroom cat and images are there. I can see the hard drive on the mac but it is not opening my LIghtoom cat and I am afraid to import my images since i dont want to lose all my edits
any help will be appreciated

 

[Replytoken]

Welcome to the forum and congratulations on your new iMac. Does the machine have rights to write to the drive, or is the drive in a read-only mode? And, have you tried to copy the catalog to the internal drive of your iMac and try opening it there?

--Ken

 

[johnrellis]

Mac OS proper can read but not write NTFS-formatted drives. To write them, you'll need third-party software:
https://www.google.com/search?q=mac...rome..69i57.3510j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

 

[GaryPhotomd]

Just got a New iMac desktop . Have been using lightroom on a PC for the last 10 yrs All my images are on an external hard drive formatted to NTFS.. when i connect to the drive to the new mac i get this Lightroom cannot open the catalog named “Lightroom Catalog-2-v10” located on volume “Blue WD 3T” because Lightroom cannot save changes to this location.
On my PC I just plug in my external drive and the lightroom cat and images are there. I can see the hard drive on the mac but it is not opening my LIghtoom cat and I am afraid to import my images since i dont want to lose all my edits
any help will be appreciated

Welcome to the forum and congratulations on your new iMac. Does the machine have rights to write to the drive, or is the drive in a read-only mode? And, have you tried to copy the catalog to the internal drive of your iMac and try opening it there?

--Ken

I did copy the catalog to the Mac, but I get the same error message. i am sure I’m not the first person to do this I’m surprised on the trouble I’m having. i am sure I can import the photos, but my catalog is the issue.

 

[GaryPhotomd]

Mac OS proper can read but not write NTFS-formatted drives. To write them, you'll need third-party software:
https://www.google.com/search?q=mac...rome..69i57.3510j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

thanks, most of these suggest the reformat…which will wipe out my images, however one suggestion was to upload the files to iCloud…that may work. If I upload just the catalo and a few images and it works, will the i then be able to import all the rest of my images and the edits still be there?

 

[Jim Wilde]

thanks, most of these suggest the reformat…which will wipe out my images, however one suggestion was to upload the files to iCloud…that may work. If I upload just the catalo and a few images and it works, will the i then be able to import all the rest of my images and the edits still be there?

None of that should be necessary as there are some Mac apps, such as Paragon or Tuxera, that enable read/write access to NTFS-formatted drives on Mac. Both of those appear in that Google Search that John Ellis provided, and neither of them should require the drive to be re-formatted. An alternative approach would be to copy the data from the NTFS drive to another drive which is formatted as exFAT, which would then be readable and writeable on both platforms.

 

[GaryPhotomd]

None of that should be necessary as there are some Mac apps, such as Paragon or Tuxera, that enable read/write access to NTFS-formatted drives on Mac. Both of those appear in that Google Search that John Ellis provided, and neither of them should require the drive to be re-formatted. An alternative approach would be to copy the data from the NTFS drive to another drive which is formatted as exFAT, which would then be readable and writeable on both platforms.

Jim thanks for your help. I went to the talk Tuxera site. On the opening page says download now. Should I be downloading that to my external hard drive should I be installing that on my Mac or my PC. Also is that free because I don’t understand what their pricing is for

 

[Hal P Anderson]

It's an app, so you have to install it on your Mac. The PC already knows how to write to that disk format.

 

[Gnits]

I suggest .....

1. if you are going to retain and use the NTFS disk buy something like the Paragon option .... Paragon Software - Online Shop

Double check in advance if it will work for your version of your o/s or hardware. They may have a trial version.

2. If the disk is approaching end of life or slow, consider this as an opportunity to purchase a replacement and consider also if you should go for SSD. Format this as exFat and copy your catalog and data to this drive using your PC.

3. You should be able to copy the Catalog from your PC onto a USB fob and copy that to your folder of choice. on the Mac but you will still have the issue of getting your images from an NTFS disk to something that is compatible with Apple. exFat is compatible with Mac and Windows..

 

[GaryPhotomd]

I suggest .....

1. if you are going to retain and use the NTFS disk buy something like the Paragon option .... Paragon Software - Online Shop

Double check in advance if it will work for your version of your o/s or hardware. They may have a trial version.

2. If the disk is approaching end of life or slow, consider this as an opportunity to purchase a replacement and consider also if you should go for SSD. Format this as exFat and copy your catalog and data to this drive using your PC.

3. You should be able to copy the Catalog from your PC onto a USB fob and copy that to your folder of choice. on the Mac but you will still have the issue of getting your images from an NTFS disk to something that is compatible with Apple. exFat is compatible with Mac and Windows..

Thanks…I think I’m just going to go ahead and buy a new external hard drive and format head to exfat. I’m assuming that if I copy my current hard drive to the new one that’s an X fat there should be no issue when I plug the new hard drive into my new Mac and all the images will come up with all the edits. Is that correct. Thanks again for all your help

 

[clee01l]

Thanks…I think I’m just going to go ahead and buy a new external hard drive and format head to exfat. I’m assuming that if I copy my current hard drive to the new one that’s an X fat there should be no issue when I plug the new hard drive into my new Mac and all the images will come up with all the edits. Is that correct. Thanks again for all your help

If you are going to buy a new disk and this will be exclusively used by MacOS, then you should format it as APFS. exFAT is a portable filesystem for use with several operating systems but it does not have the security built in to APFS of NTFS.

It is difficult trying to live in both a Mac and Windows world. You will be happier if you just adopt one or the other. You can sync your catalog to the Adobe Cloud and run Lightroom Classic on one machine and Lightroom Cloudy on the other.

 

[johnrellis]

Mac OS proper can read but not write NTFS-formatted drives. To write them, you'll need third-party software:
https://www.google.com/search?q=mac...rome..69i57.3510j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

thanks, most of these suggest the reformat…

Hmmm, the first 10 results of that google search are all about enabling NTFS write support for Mac via paid, free, or built-in drivers.

 

[GaryPhotomd]

If you are going to buy a new disk and this will be exclusively used by MacOS, then you should format it as APFS. exFAT is a portable filesystem for use with several operating systems but it does not have the security built in to APFS of NTFS.

It is difficult trying to live in both a Mac and Windows world. You will be happier if you just adopt one or the other. You can sync your catalog to the Adobe Cloud and run Lightroom Classic on one machine and Lightroom Cloudy on the other.

Last question promise...I have a wd 2tb ext hard drive that i am able to reformat to exFAT. if i do that will it be as simple as copying the files from my other ntfs WD drive to the new exFAT drive....then plug it into my new Mac....open lightroom and import thanks again

 

[clee01l]

Last question promise...I have a wd 2tb ext hard drive that i am able to reformat to exFAT. if i do that will it be as simple as copying the files from my other ntfs WD drive to the new exFAT drive....then plug it into my new Mac....open lightroom and import thanks again

Yes, you can format it to any filesystem that MacOS can read and write to. Since MacOS can read the NTFS drive, you can copy the files and folder from the NTFS disk to the new formatted disk.

Keep in mind that the Lightroom Catalog will store the absolute path to your image files using the OS conventions. Catalogs originating in Windows will have an absolutePath value that begins with a drive letter and when opened in MacOS will not recognize the drive letter. There are a solutions that use the relativePath field when resolvable in Windows.


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