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Moving Lightroom Classic to a different partition on the same disk

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rohaninpittsburgh

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Joined
Dec 5, 2021
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8
Lightroom Experience
Intermediate
Lightroom Version
Classic
Lightroom Version Number
11.0.1
Operating System
  1. Windows 10
Hi, Appealing for some advice and guidance. I set up my Windows 10 computer, which has a 2 TB SSD hard drive with two partitions: "C" drive with 200 G and "D" drive with 1.8 TB. I thought this would allow me to keep operating system and program file on the C drive and data on the D drive. Unfortunately I am running out of space on the C drive (less than 20 G free) while the D drive has 1.3 TB of space!

Lightroom itself takes up quite a bit of space on the C drive, and I was wondering about uninstalling it from the C drive and re-installing it on the D drive. I have a monthly subscription with Adobe for LR, and Photoshop, so I assume I can do the above from my Adobe account.

Is this a good idea? And what are the pitfalls?

Any help from experts would be appreciated.
 
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This sounds like a great idea. You might want to Move the pictures folder. Windows will still expect the system pictures folder to be on C: but there is no harm in having a non system folder named Pictures on D:

You can even move the system Pictures folder to D: but this requires some “under the hood” tinkering.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
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You don't need to uninstall/ reinstall the LrC app. What's, probably, taking space in your C: drive is:
  • The catalog folder, containing the main catalog .lrcat file and the previews subfolder(s) and backups of your catalog. By default it's called Lightroom and is stored inside the Pictures folder. Go to Catalog Settings to confirm its actual name and location.
  • The photos that LrC has imported into the C: drive. By default it stores them, again, inside the Pictures folder, but you may have changed it.
  • Any photos you may have imported in a Lr (cloud) app on your smartphone/ iPad and have downloaded via sync into LrC. By default LRC stores them into a special folder called: Mobile Downloads. lrdata inside your pictures folder
So here are the steps:
  • First of all, run the Find All Missing Photos command from the Library menu. If any are found either locate them or remove them from the catalog.
  • In windows file explorer, create an empty folder, called LR on your d: drive and inside it a folder LRsync
  • If you have synced enabled in LrC, go to Preferences, Lightroom Sync, and check Specify Location for Lightroom's Synced images. Also check Use subfolders formatted by capture date and choose the 2021/2021-12-09 template. From the choose button navigate to D:\LR\LRsync and, when asked, allow LrC to move any synced photos from Mobile Downloads. lrdata to D:\LR\LRsync.
  • Exit LrC and move the whole Lightroom catalog folder (or whatever your actual catalog folder is called) from Pictures to D:\LR. Then double click on the D:\LR\Lightroom\Lightroom<whatever>.lrcat file so that LRC uses the catalog from the new location.
  • Go to the folders panel and from the + menu choose Add Folder: navigate to D:\LR and create there a new empty folder called MyPhotos.
  • See what's listed under the C: drive. Drag every Top Level folder you find there into the MyPhotos folder, shown under the D: drive. This way LRC will move any photos previously imported into C: drive and put them under D:\LR:\MyPhotos
  • Next time you import new files into this catalog, make sure you select D:\LR:\MyPhotos as the destination.
 
Last edited:
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Many thanks Y.K. I will try that. I am printing out your instructions so I can check off the steps as I complete them.
clee01l said:
This sounds like a great idea. You might want to Move the pictures folder. Windows will still expect the system pictures folder to be on C: but there is no harm in having a non system folder named Pictures on D:

You can even move the system Pictures folder to D: but this requires some “under the hood” tinkering.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Many thanks R
 
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Y.K said:
You don't need to uninstall/ reinstall the LrC app. What's, probably, taking space in your C: drive is:
  • The catalog folder, containing the main catalog .lrcat file and the previews subfolder(s) and backups of your catalog. By default it's called Lightroom and is stored inside the Pictures folder. Go to Catalog Settings to confirm its actual name and location.
  • The photos that LrC has imported into the C: drive. By default it stores them, again, inside the Pictures folder, but you may have changed it.
  • Any photos you may have imported in a Lr (cloud) app on your smartphone/ iPad and have downloaded via sync into LrC. By default LRC stores them into a special folder called: Mobile Downloads. lrdata inside your pictures folder
So here are the steps:
  • First of all, run the Find All Missing Photos command from the Library menu. If any are found either locate them or remove them from the catalog.
  • In windows file explorer, create an empty folder, called LR on your d: drive and inside it a folder LRsync
  • If you have synced enabled in LrC, go to Preferences, Lightroom Sync, and check Specify Location for Lightroom's Synced images. Also check Use subfolders formatted by capture date and choose the 2021/2021-12-09 template. From the choose button navigate to D:\LR\LRsync and, when asked, allow LrC to move any synced photos from Mobile Downloads. lrdata to D:\LR\LRsync.
  • Exit LrC and move the whole Lightroom catalog folder (or whatever your actual catalog folder is called) from Pictures to D:\LR. Then double click on the D:\LR\Lightroom\Lightroom<whatever>.lrcat file so that LRC uses the catalog from the new location.
  • Go to the folders panel and from the + menu choose Add Folder: navigate to D:\LR and create there a new empty folder called MyPhotos.
  • See what's listed under the C: drive. Drag every Top Level folder you find there into the MyPhotos folder, shown under the D: drive. This way LRC will move any photos previously imported into C: drive and put them under D:\LR:\MyPhotos
  • Next time you import new files into this catalog, make sure you select D:\LR:\MyPhotos as the destination.
Click to expand...
Many thanks Y.K. I will try that. I am printing out your instructions so I can check off the steps as I complete them.
 
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rohaninpittsburgh said:
Hi, Appealing for some advice and guidance. I set up my Windows 10 computer, which has a 2 TB SSD hard drive with two partitions: "C" drive with 200 G and "D" drive with 1.8 TB. I thought this would allow me to keep operating system and program file on the C drive and data on the D drive. Unfortunately I am running out of space on the C drive (less than 20 G free) while the D drive has 1.3 TB of space!

Lightroom itself takes up quite a bit of space on the C drive, and I was wondering about uninstalling it from the C drive and re-installing it on the D drive. I have a monthly subscription with Adobe for LR, and Photoshop, so I assume I can do the above from my Adobe account.

Is this a good idea? And what are the pitfalls?

Any help from experts would be appreciated.
Click to expand...
Your idea is a good one. It just needs to be done properly.

You can use a "partition editor" if you have confidence in your technical chops to reallocate space between the partitions. My suggestion for a good, free partition editor is https://www.partitionwizard.com/ If you take this approach, you don't need to move any programs or data files, etc.

Before anything else, do a backup of your D drive.

First reduce the size of your D partition, leaving free space before the start of the resized D partition. How about 100 GB? Select the D partition, then right-click to bring up this window:

1639258844843.png


Be sure to click the Apply button, then wait while the operation runs.

Then select the C partition and right-click to again select Move/Resize, this time extending the C partition to use all the free space.

Phil Burton
 
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PhilBurton said:
Your idea is a good one. It just needs to be done properly.

You can use a "partition editor" if you have confidence in your technical chops to reallocate space between the partitions. My suggestion for a good, free partition editor is https://www.partitionwizard.com/ If you take this approach, you don't need to move any programs or data files, etc.

Before anything else, do a backup of your D drive.

First reduce the size of your D partition, leaving free space before the start of the resized D partition. How about 100 GB? Select the D partition, then right-click to bring up this window:

View attachment 17703

Be sure to click the Apply button, then wait while the operation runs.

Then select the C partition and right-click to again select Move/Resize, this time extending the C partition to use all the free space.

Phil Burton
Click to expand...
Many thanks Phil.

Sounds like a plan.
 
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