# Moving all photos to an external hard drive



## SoulfulRecover (Jan 17, 2017)

Is there an easy way through Lightroom to move all the photos off my computer (Lightroom) onto an external hard drive? I have ~4 years of photos on my computer I would like to move off if possible.


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## astroNikon (Jan 17, 2017)

If you go into the Library module, you can drag and drop into another drive/directory structure.  Then wait for it to move everything as it updates it's Library data.


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## JustBen (Jan 17, 2017)

I agree with astroNikon, but before you do that you might consider a backup if you don't do that on a regular basis already! You never know what happens while moving such a large amount of files to an external drive!


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## SoulfulRecover (Jan 18, 2017)

Awesome thanks! I backup the files every time lightroom closes.

I guess another question I have is how does the backup work? does it save an additional file of the image everytime? so say I have 1 photo, I back it up, now do I have 2 files of the folder? and if I back it up again do I now have 3 files?

The reason I want to move everything off is to help speed things up. Lightroom and Photoshop have been a bit slow lately and I have nothing else on my comp other than photos.


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## JustBen (Jan 18, 2017)

Hm, as far as I know (correct me if i am wrong) Lightroom only does a backup of its catalog. Meaning only whatever you do to your photos in Lightroom but NOT the photos themself. 

In order to speed Lightroom up you could also split up your photos in different cataloges. I don't know what you shoot but for example Wildlife in one catalog and Landscapes in a different one. 
Another way would be to check and increase the size of Lightroom's cache. Edit --> Preferences --> File Handling. If you have enough space on your hard drive you can try to increase the cache and see if that brings a performance improvement.


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## astroNikon (Jan 18, 2017)

The catalog backups are "standard install" located in
C:\Users\[user name]\Pictures\Lightroom\Backups\[date and time of backup]\Lightroom Catalog.lrcat

Edit, Catalog Settings - will show you the location of the catalog and contents.
If you use an eternal device then that device letter.
it only backs up the Catalog, no images.


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## astroNikon (Jan 18, 2017)

Also, as you use lightroom, do not forget to mark for deletion images which are worthless.  Then delete them from the disk (not just from the catalog / collection).

Also, if you export them to the same disk (the export process will be slower compared to another disk) but you'll have all those export files too, thus a duplicate processed image.
You import options too could create duplicate copies assuming you changed it.


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## SoulfulRecover (Jan 18, 2017)

lots of great info. Thank you.

I shoot portraits and maybe a flower or cat here or there. My computer has 1TB built in and Im not anywhere near filling it. I took off ~500 gigs of music my friend gave me and it helped for a while


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## KmH (Jan 18, 2017)

Lightroom does not contain any of your photos.
Lightroom just keeps track of the path through your computers memory of where your photos are. Lr puts the XML edit files adjacent to the image file you edited, so the edits you make in Lr don't stay in Lr either.

Using Lr's Library module to move any of your image files is needed so Lr knows the new path through your computer's memory to the new location of an image file.
People often make the mistake of moving an image file on their computer using the computers file management application rather than Lr's Library module.
When someone does that, Lr doesn't know where the file got moved to.


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## SoulfulRecover (Jan 18, 2017)

Good to know!


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## DGMPhotography (Jan 19, 2017)

I'm in the minority, but I don't even keep my photos in my catalog in Lightroom. I use Lightroom for editing and exporting, and that's about it. I keep my photos organized via folders on an external drive, backed up to another external drive.

So for me, I would just export all the photos from Lightroom onto your external drive. But I'm guessing you want to maintain your catalog, so I'd follow what the other guys here said.


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