Hard Drive Management and Lightroom: When I first started getting pretty serious about photography..shooting in RAW, editing in Lightroom, etc..I worked exclusively on my computers...

JJS Loc: SE Michigan & SW Florida

When I first started getting pretty serious about photography..shooting in RAW, editing in Lightroom, etc..I worked exclusively on my computers internal hard drive. I soon saw that I was rapidly using up disc space so I started to load all my new photos on an external D drive. I would like to copy all of the photos from the C drive to the D drive and then delete the photos from the C drive to free up disc space. My question is can this be done without Lightroom losing track of the photos that used to be on the C drive or otherwise screwing things up?

asaya Loc: Syracuse, NY

Pretty sure this can be handled I have attached a link to site that give you a couple of options.

https://www.lightroomqueen.com/move-photos-another-hard-drive-leaving-catalog/

bsprague Loc: Lacey, WA, USA

Yes. The Lightroom Queen link explains the two dependable methods. Although slower, I prefer the "drag and drop" version inside the Lightroom Classic Library module. If you also make smart previews, you can work the images without having the external drive plugged in.

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

Yes, drag and drop from within LR. Set it up for an overnight session. And, it's not LR that is usually at fault for "screwing things up." The fault normally lies with the user who fails to understand the program or to educate his or herself on how the program works. LR is not a mindreader nor does it contain a crystal ball to see and know all. Use the LR help manual online and read a good book on the software.

bleirer

The above is correct and it is easier to do it within Lightroom, but if you move using file explorer or any other way, as long as you know where you put the files you can go into lightroom and click the picture with the exclamation point and browse to tell Lightroom where it is located. It will find the neighbors in the same folder also.

JJS Loc: SE Michigan & SW Florida

asaya wrote:

Pretty sure this can be handled I have attached a link to site that give you a couple of options.

https://www.lightroomqueen.com/move-photos-another-hard-drive-leaving-catalog/

The link answers all my questions. Thanks.

JJS Loc: SE Michigan & SW Florida

via the lens wrote:

Yes, drag and drop from within LR. Set it up for an overnight session. And, it's not LR that is usually at fault for "screwing things up." The fault normally lies with the user who fails to understand the program or to educate his or herself on how the program works. LR is not a mindreader nor does it contain a crystal ball to see and know all. Use the LR help manual online and read a good book on the software.

Thanks. Yes, I'm very cautious when moving files around because of past bad experiences within lightroom. That's why I asked the question before proceeding blindly.

gvarner Loc: Central Oregon Coast

Be sure you do everything within LR or it won’t know where the photos are.

frankraney Loc: Clovis, Ca.

JJS wrote:

When I first started getting pretty serious about ... (show quote)

Move them with light room, no problems. You can move the with explorer also, then point light room to the new spot.

Joexx

via the lens wrote:

Yes, drag and drop from within LR. Set it up for an overnight session. And, it's not LR that is usually at fault for "screwing things up." The fault normally lies with the user who fails to understand the program or to educate his or herself on how the program works. LR is not a mindreader nor does it contain a crystal ball to see and know all. Use the LR help manual online and read a good book on the software.

Be carefull if you do many folders at the same time. I have a high end setup and when moving large numbers of folders I have had LR hang up. This operation should be very easy to do, but somehow Adobe has managed to screw it up. Even if it works, it is unacceptably slow. To move large numbers of photos to another drive export and import functions may be a better and faster solution .

AzPicLady Loc: Behind the camera!

I'm not a LR purist. I had never used the "move" feature until recently. It hung up, ruining a hard drive in the process. I'm not saying it was the fault of LR, only that it occurred while using LR. It is so easy to to the copy feature in Windows. You can compare the files before deleting the old ones. And it's a 1-click to tell LR the new location. I have to do that task frequently anyway because I have LOTS of hard drives and they don't always get plugged into the same slot.

photoman43

This issue is one reason why I do not use Lightroom. I am anal about copying and moving images, but I still screwed up a LR catalogue one time and that was it for me.

frankraney Loc: Clovis, Ca.

AzPicLady wrote:

I'm not a LR purist. I had never used the "move" feature until recently. It hung up, ruining a hard drive in the process. I'm not saying it was the fault of LR, only that it occurred while using LR. It is so easy to to the copy feature in Windows. You can compare the files before deleting the old ones. And it's a 1-click to tell LR the new location. I have to do that task frequently anyway because I have LOTS of hard drives and they don't always get plugged into the same slot.

You can set your hard drives to be the same letter each time.

Right-click the drive you want to assign a permanent letter to and then choose Change Drive Letter and Paths from the menu. 4. A dialog box will open up and here you just need to click the Change button. Then make sure that Assign the following drive letter is selected and choose the letter you want to give it

https://www.groovypost.com/howto/assign-permanent-letter-removable-usb-drive-windows/

You can also name your drives.... Working, first bu, second bu, etc.

AzPicLady Loc: Behind the camera!

frankraney wrote:

You can set your hard drives to be the same letter... (show quote)

I do name the drives. I don't assign letters. What happens when two or more have the same letter assigned?

frankraney Loc: Clovis, Ca.

AzPicLady wrote:

I do name the drives. I don't assign letters. What happens when two or more have the same letter assigned?

I don't have two with the same letter.

I don't think there would be a problem unless both were attached at the same time, as far as recognition goes. But it would definitely cause confusion.