Slow when opening and showing thumbnails

[yorkiemom]

Lightroom Version

10.4

Operating System

1. Windows 10

Gosh why has LR seemed to be getting slower...when I go to a folder it takes forever to load the photos. Is there something in the catalog settings that must be wrong? It used to be way faster.

 

[Replytoken]

There could be many reasons why LR seems to be running slow or slower, from hardware to software. Are you experiencing this slowness when viewing images in the Library or when loading images in the Development module? And where are your images located? Are they on an internal drive or an external drive? Are are these solid state drives (SSD's) or traditional platter drives? And are the discs full or do they have some free space? Answers to these questions will help to rule out a couple of possible bottlenecks.

--Ken

 

[yorkiemom]

Sorry about the delay...I'm getting the slowness when first starting and my photos are loading into the library...or I should say if I go to a folder and I scroll down to look for a particular photo they take forever to show up and see. They are on an external...and maybe they should be internal.
Its a Seagate Backup Plus Drive with 2 TB...1.31 Free.

 

[Philippe Coudé du Foresto]

I'm getting the slowness when first starting and my photos are loading into the library...or I should say if I go to a folder and I scroll down to look for a particular photo they take forever to show up and see

In both cases, only the previews are accessed by LR, not the original photos. Where is your catalog (and therefore the previews) stored?

 

[yorkiemom]

My backups are on a D drive (internal) but my pictures on on the Seagate (F)...should they both be on the same drive?

 

[Philippe Coudé du Foresto]

No, keep your backups and your pictures on a separate drive. My question was about the location of your catalog (the .lrcat file) not the location of your backups and your pictures.

 

[Replytoken]

In both cases, only the previews are accessed by LR, not the original photos. Where is your catalog (and therefore the previews) stored?

I am also wondering if @yorkiemom may need to regenerate previews (1:1 or Smart Previews). I think selecting the images in a folder and regenerating previews would be a simple check to see if that helps or not.

--Ken

 

[yorkiemom]

Sorry my catalog is under C: users/nkeev/One Drive/Pictures/Lightroom

 

[clee01l]

Sorry my catalog is under C: users/nkeev/One Drive/Pictures/Lightroom

This may explain your problem. One Drive is a cloud based location. Windows will only keep local copies for a short while and downloads a local copy as needed. If Lightroom requests a preview, then OneDrive will download that file from the cloud. If it is not up to date, then Lightroom will regenerate an new preview from the original and the cataloged adjustments. If you store your Previews folder and your original images locally, then your problem might go away.


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[yorkiemom]

So can I move all of these to another drive and not have a problem when opening LR next time. And wonder if it would be better on a hard drive or the external

 

[clee01l]

So can I move all of these to another drive and not have a problem when opening LR next time. And wonder if it would be better on a hard drive or the external

View attachment 17251

As long as these are not in your local OneDrive folder, they can be moved to another folder on the same local drive. You can really move the Pictures folder and all its sub folders anywhere outside of the cloud syncing folder “OneDrive” and probably see an improvement. The Previews folder needs to be in the same folder as your catalog file.


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[Replytoken]

Not to complicate matters, but if you are thinking of buying an external drive, I would recommend a solid state drive (SSD) if your machine has USB-3 or USB-C ports that can handle higher transfer rates. These drives are more expensive, and a bit smaller in size, than platter drives, but their read/write speed gains can be quite noticeable. Samsung makes very nice external SSD's that have a good reputation. Something to consider if you are still experiencing slow performance after moving the files out of OneDrive.

--Ken

 

[yorkiemom]

From the attachment it looks like the files are in the One Drive folder.

 

[clee01l]

From the attachment it looks like the files are in the One Drive folder.

The way Microsoft uses OneDrive is to save space on the local disk by storing the files in the Microsoft Cloud.
“A blue cloud icon next to a OneDrive file or folder indicates that the file is only available online. Online-only files don’t take up space on your computer. You see a cloud icon for each online-only file in File Explorer, but the file doesn’t download to your device until you open it. You can’t open online-only files when your device isn’t connected to the Internet.”


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[yorkiemom]

Well it is faster now but I moved my catalog and now LR wants me to import...that means import all my photos again? I don't want to lose anything, all my keywording etc.

 

[Johan Elzenga]

Well it is faster now but I moved my catalog and now LR wants me to import...that means import all my photos again? I don't want to lose anything, all my keywording etc.

If Lightroom ‘wants you to import’, then I assume that means you do not see any images in the catalog? That means that Lightroom has not opened your existing catalog, but created a new one. Make Lightroom open the existing catalog by opening the catalog folder and then double-clicking the catalog file. That will launch Lightroom with this catalog and from then onwards Lightroom should remember it.

 

[yorkiemom]

I am so messed up...can't find it. I have one that says July but know that isn't it.. one says October but this is what I get. Uggg
I don't know if this is right either...might really screw me up.

 

[Philippe Coudé du Foresto]

If you're getting this dialog box, you're closing LR, not opening it. You can't get this message when opening a catalog.
What steps exactly did you do?

 

[yorkiemom]

I'm going to my C drive where I think this is my latest catalog (according to the Date). My LR is closed at that time. The above is what I get when I double click on the catalog. It keeps telling me to import.

 

[yorkiemom]

When I click on the catalog it still wants me to import. And that is my latest because it's dated october.

 

[Jim Wilde]

With a catalog size of only 1.58 MB it's very likely that it's a newly created empty catalog.

On one of your earlier screenshots, there were TWO catalogs listed with the same 7/9/2021 modification date. The one called simply "Lightroom Catalog.lrcat", which is the one you are trying to use, is probably a new empty catalog. The other, called Lightroom Catalog-v10.lrcat, is an older catalog which was created when you last updated LrC from (presumably) version 9, and is likely the one you should be trying to use.

 

[yorkiemom]

It still isn't working and both folders don't have a big amount in them for size. Now I'm getting that LR wants to upgrade my catalog but I don't want to do that because then I'm stuck probably with nothing. It'll copy my current catalog and I don't even know what that is anymore.

 

[yorkiemom]

I found this but not sure if this is it...it says the size is 100,000+ while the other two only about 1000 in the size.

 

[Philippe Coudé du Foresto]

The date and the size let think this is your current active catalog.

 

[yorkiemom]

I guess I have nothing to lose since I'm getting nothing on the others.

Well now that I try it cannot use it because it is not writable and cannot be opened.

Now I'm stuck because I have no clue where my catalog is...have gone thru them and I have lots of keywords I will lose.