My wife just purchased a new MacBook Pro to replace an existing iMac, and I need help with the migration.
The iMac currently has El Capitan and Photos installed, and shows the following two files in the Pictures folder:
“iPhoto Library.migratedphotolibrary” is 277.94 Gb and “Photos Library” is 298.7 Gb
(I believe there are a bunch of large video clips in this which is why the file is so large.)
The new MacBook Pro only has a 512 Gb SSD in it, so I’m thinking that I should clear space by moving her photos onto an external drive. My plan is to use Photos only to access these existing images and I’ll be moving her over to Lightroom for any new photos and video going forward.
I understand that the Photos Library is not really that large, but is actually referencing the iPhoto Library somehow? And as a result I should not delete the iPhoto Library?
What I’m hoping to do is to move the photos temporarily and delete them from the main drive so that I can then update Time Machine and use the backup file to restore the new computer. They I’ll be able to use the new computer to access the photo library.
Any thoughts of how I should step through this process?
You are correct in that a migrated iPhoto library (to Photos) is not taking up much extra space as a majority of the data is shared. You can safely delete the iPhoto library (as long as you never plan to use iPhoto again). The libraries are using hard links to the common data files and the way those work only the last link to the files actually marks the data as deleted and available for use.
One other comment on moving a Photos library from one drive to another… If the library you are moving is the System Photo Library (i.e. you are using iCloud to share it across devices), when you move it to another drive it actually copies it. You then delete the original. After doing the move, you then need to tell Photos that the newly moved library is the System Photo Library. It then goes through a synchronization process that can take many hours depending on size. So if this is your situation, just be ready to wait a long time with your Mac being really busy. I just did this with a 2009 Macbook Pro and it took hours with the fan running at max speed.
Thomas