New MacBook LrC & Ps issues: I’m living my worst nightmare. Just replaced my 10-year old MacBook Pro with a new one with the M2 chip. Did the data migration from my backup drive. I...

mizzee Loc: Boston,Ma

I’m living my worst nightmare. Just replaced my 10-year old MacBook Pro with a new one with the M2 chip. Did the data migration from my backup drive. I plugged in my external drive that has all my files and folders. i could see the images, there were no exclamation points, but I couldn’t get to them. I uninstalled and re-installed LrC and Ps. Still no joy and all my folders had disappeared. Finally got LrC to work but it appears that I’ll have to reimport all my files and folders? That’s question #1. Question #2 After importing my most recent folders, I opened up one of the images in Develop and wanted to try removing an item from it. I went to photo/edit in/photoshop 2023 and… nothing. Ps opened but my image wasn’t there. Ps was asking me to drop in a file. It’s like Ps doesn’t know that either LrC or my drive exist. I suspect I’ll have to do the reimportation of folders, but I’m hoping there’s a quick fix to the Ps problem. Thanks in advance for any help/advice you can offer! (P.S. I am not a hugely technical person.)

jcwall396 Loc: Roswell, GA

So sorry to hear you're having this problem. I am getting a new MacBook Air with the M2 chip delivered tomorrow, so following this post. I have LR two systems and my images and catalogs on an external drive. Never had a problem opening the catalog and modifying the images when I swapped the drive between systems, so I don't really have any advice to offer. I know someone on this forum posted that they had a system with an M2 chip that worked great, however, so I know it does work.

Just Fred Loc: Darwin's Waiting Room

How did you do the data migration? Did you use Migration Assistant or some other product? Did you check to see if there were any updates to LR and PS? Your ten year-old Mac's programs are not written for the M2 chip, so you should make sure you have the correct versions in place before you migrate your data.

tcthome Loc: NJ

mizzee wrote:

I’m living my worst nightmare. Just replaced my 10... (show quote)

I think you need to import the catalog being a new LR/PS install on a new computer. The backup doesn't actually back up your photos. Only the files/meta data files related to them. You might want to make another copy of your actual photos also. (maybe on another/2nd & 3rd external drive or/and the cloud)

Nalu Loc: Southern Arizona

I’ll be watching this post as well in that I am planning on getting a new MacBook. But, I do not use Lightroom for managing my files. Just never learned it. But it sounds like this is a Lightroom issue than a Mac issue.

bsprague Loc: Lacey, WA, USA

Was your ten year old computer using a current Lightroom Classic? Did you install the Adobe programs from the Creative Cloud App on the new computer?

Victoria, the Lightroom Queen, has a reasonable instruction on moving to a new computer: https://www.lightroomqueen.com/how-move-lightroom-to-new-computer/

mizzee Loc: Boston,Ma

Both LR and PS were current and I used the Migration Assistant from a 7-day old backup on an external drive. I had also updated my old Mac.

JD750 Loc: SoCal

mizzee wrote:

I’m living my worst nightmare. Just replaced my 10... (show quote)

I think your questions are “do I have to reimport all my files?” Answer: No you should not have to do that.

I’m unclear on question 2. Something about opening a file in PS but was that opening from LR or opening it stand alone from PS?

JD750 Loc: SoCal

Nalu wrote:

I’ll be watching this post as well in that I am planning on getting a new MacBook. But, I do not use Lightroom for managing my files. Just never learned it. But it sounds like this is a Lightroom issue than a Mac issue.

I recently bought a new Mac and I did not have any problems using Lightroom or Photoshop on the new machine. Just a datapoint. YMMV.

mizzee Loc: Boston,Ma

After spending a lot of quality time with Adobe, I won’t need to reimport all my folders— thank heavens! But I get a disc error when I try to move from LrC to Ps to perform an edit in Ps.

mizzee Loc: Boston,Ma

After spending a lot of quality time with Adobe, I won’t need to reimport all my folders— thank heavens! But I get a disc error when I try to move from LrC to Ps to perform an edit in Ps.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

mizzee wrote:

I’m living my worst nightmare. Just replaced my 10... (show quote)

Open a chat with Adobe. Chances are high that the issues are all related to configuration, i.e.; Settings. So long as Lightroom Classic knows where the catalog is located, and knows where you have stored your images, it should work. But you have to tell it! It's easy to relink images if you know where they are located.

The Settings panels let you set up the connection to Photoshop...

mizzee Loc: Boston,Ma

Update! The reason I won’t have to reimport all files/folders is that instead of launching LrC from the dock on my Home Screen, I must now launch by clicking on my most recent .lrcat file. On to the “edit in” issue. After 2 hours with Adobe, my agent figured out the compatibility workaround. After uninstalling and reinstalling Ps (for the fourth time) the solution is as follows. After clicking “edit in” you’re given a choice to edit with Lightroom edits or to edit a copy. If you choose the top option to keep LrC edits, you’ll get the dreaded “disc not found” error. BUT if you choose “edit a copy” then everything works as they should. It is a bug in Ps because when I used “edit in” with my Topaz apps there was no problem. I will have to change my workflow a little but now all is mostly right in my world. Peace out!

Machinedoc Loc: Yorktown Heights, NY

I recently upgraded my desktop machine to a Mac mini M2. No problem with LR or PS. You must be able to "point " LR to the location of the catalog and your image files. Once you have done that, and it appears you have, you should be able to simply launch LR using the icon in the dock

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Machinedoc wrote:

I recently upgraded my desktop machine to a Mac mini M2. No problem with LR or PS. You must be able to "point " LR to the location of the catalog and your image files. Once you have done that, and it appears you have, you should be able to simply launch LR using the icon in the dock

I use multiple catalogs — one for each large project. All the images and catalog files are in one directory (with image subdirectories) on an external SSD or hard drive. To load a given project, all I have to do is double click on its .lrcat file. The NEXT time I just click the LrC icon in the dock to open the same catalog and all files are linked.