Trying to Solve All My Problems At Once

[Adam007]

Greetings from Pentax-land! I could use your help.

I have a Late 2015 27 inch iMac, 3.3 GHz 15. 3TB HD. I added some RAM, so I'm at 32. This has done nothing for my LR performance. Importing a large number of files drags on interminably, and there are irritating delays in rendering working files in full-screen mode. I have a 4GB Time Machine Drive, and an 8GB external HD, where my LR Catalog currently lives.

This computer is only about two years old, but it is getting full and has been running slowly under the weight of 50,000 RAW files, sized 45MB and up. I have been patching things now and then, but it's time for me to fix them once and for all. The issues are:

1) Performance. I've read that I should add a Thunderbolt enclosure with an SSD drive, then make that new drive my boot disk. True? If so, what should I buy, and how do I do it?

2) Local Storage. I know I need some kind of NAS system. How hard is this to do?

3) Cloud Backup. I have tried a couple services, but they were appallingly slow. I'd set things to backup, check in a couple days, and progress was minimal. I will be switching to FIOS soon, and hmm willing to give something another try. Ideally, this service would backup all my RAW files and LR catalog automatically, without me having to do anything. I add about 2,000 files/month. Recommendations?

Thanks for any pointers you can provide. Please let me know if you need more information.

Adam

 

[PSGimages]

Greetings from Pentax-land! I could use your help.

I have a Late 2015 27 inch iMac, 3.3 GHz 15. 3TB HD. I added some RAM, so I'm at 32. This has done nothing for my LR performance. Importing a large number of files drags on interminably, and there are irritating delays in rendering working files in full-screen mode. I have a 4GB Time Machine Drive, and an 8GB external HD, where my LR Catalog currently lives.

There are two ways pieces to LR storage , if not more. The Catalog is the database that stores all the information about your raw files and adjustments. However, if you store your files in 'referenced' mode, the actual RAW files themselves could be in a different place (e.g a different drive).

I'm not a LR guru as I've been off it for three years or so, but the question remains, are raw images located IN the catalog, or or they referenced?

The goal would be to separate them, and put the catalog on an SSD drive. With the catalog itself on SSD, it will run faster. The question then becomes, where do I put the SSD? There are some thunderbolt SSD options now that are quite fast and it wouldn't need to be that big (512GB perhaps) if it only contained the catalog.

This computer is only about two years old, but it is getting full and has been running slowly under the weight of 50,000 RAW files, sized 45MB and up. I have been patching things now and then, but it's time for me to fix them once and for all. The issues are:

1) Performance. I've read that I should add a Thunderbolt enclosure with an SSD drive, then make that new drive my boot disk. True? If so, what should I buy, and how do I do it?

Not sure it needs to be the boot drive. Yes, you'd boot faster but once up and running it may not make that much difference. Question: what is on the current 3TB drive? In my case, I have only the OS and applications on my boot drive and I've kept it around 256GB. Can you get a new internal boot drive in the iMac that is SSD? (e.g at apple store)?

But an internal SSD is your fastest solution. If you could replace your 3TB boot drive with a 1TB SSD boot drive, you could concievably put your LR catalog (not the images) on that drive and your reference raw files on your 8tb existing drive.

2) Local Storage. I know I need some kind of NAS system. How hard is this to do?

NAS isn't hard, but it is slower than "direct attach storage" or DAS. You're issue is slowness so I don't think a NAS is part of your solution except as a backup destination.

3) Cloud Backup. I have tried a couple services, but they were appallingly slow. I'd set things to backup, check in a couple days, and progress was minimal. I will be switching to FIOS soon, and hmm willing to give something another try. Ideally, this service would backup all my RAW files and LR catalog automatically, without me having to do anything. I add about 2,000 files/month. Recommendations?

The slowness is dependent on your internet pipe. With FIOS you will probably be able to reconsider cloud backup and have much better time of it. I currently have 5.5TB on a cloud backup solution, but I started it 8 years ago when I had 1.5TB.

Thanks for any pointers you can provide. Please let me know if you need more information.

Adam

My opinion here only, but I'd probably do this

1) see if you can replace the boot drive with an SSD . The difficulty here is that I don't know what's on your boot drive at this point, other than OS and apps. But if you do this, (perhaps through an apple store), then your internal SSD is going to help speedwise. I don't know how big your actual LR catalog is, so I can't help you size it. As a reference, I have about 100k images in a Capture One catalog and my catalog is 300GB. I believe LR catalogs tend to be smaller, more compact. But if you could swing a 1TB boot drive, then I bet you could easily free up 700GB for the catalog there (and your catalog may only be 70GB). Yes, you can alternatively buy a thunderbolt enclosure (do you have TB2 or TB3?). Lots of fast options.

2) assuming you have your raws in referenced mode. Put (keep?) them on the 8TB drive. The speed of the drive your raw files live on is way less important than the speed of the drive your catalog is on.

3) Is your timemachine drive big enough? I can't tell from your description how much you really need but you have an 8tb external drive and a 3TB internal drive and you are backing up that (potential) 11tTB to a 4TB timemachine. Seems like you have free space somewhere or your TM drive is tight.

4) I subscribe to (and recommend) a "3-2-1" backup plan which means you need three copies of your files at all times with one offsite. If you have your 8TB drive with raws and your boot drive SSD (new) with the LR catalog, your second copy of those files is on the TimeMachine drive and your cloud solution (backblaze or Crashplan seem like a good fit) would hold the 3rd copy. My gut says you would need a bigger TM drive though. I use a cheap 8TB usb 3.1 drive I got for under $200.

But to clarify , we'd need more detail (size of catalog, size of raw files, how full the boot drive is and what else is on there - like music - and such).

 

[Andy Hewitt]

Greetings from Pentax-land! I could use your help.

I have a Late 2015 27 inch iMac, 3.3 GHz 15. 3TB HD. I added some RAM, so I'm at 32. This has done nothing for my LR performance. Importing a large number of files drags on interminably, and there are irritating delays in rendering working files in full-screen mode. I have a 4GB Time Machine Drive, and an 8GB external HD, where my LR Catalog currently lives.

There are two ways pieces to LR storage , if not more. The Catalog is the database that stores all the information about your raw files and adjustments. However, if you store your files in 'referenced' mode, the actual RAW files themselves could be in a different place (e.g a different drive).

I'm not a LR guru as I've been off it for three years or so, but the question remains, are raw images located IN the catalog, or or they referenced?

Sorry, that's wrong, LR Classic stores all images as referenced in a standard file structure., and that's it. It's the Apple photo apps that use referenced or managed as options (probably others too).

You can store them both together in a parent folder, or separately in different folders or different volumes.

Lightroom CC is slightly different, where it only uses managed files, but they are stored in the Cloud, or optionally on a local drive as well, which can be either the boot volume or an external location (but it not necessary for normal use).

The goal would be to separate them, and put the catalog on an SSD drive. With the catalog itself on SSD, it will run faster. The question then becomes, where do I put the SSD? There are some thunderbolt SSD options now that are quite fast and it wouldn't need to be that big (512GB perhaps) if it only contained the catalog.

I think I'd put the SSD internally, and put the catalogue there, and put the image files on the external drive (in fact it's what I'm planning on with my iMac).

LR is good at locating folders if you move them, so you can simply install onto the SSD, copy the catalogue across, leave the images on an external drive, and relink the folder later.

This computer is only about two years old, but it is getting full and has been running slowly under the weight of 50,000 RAW files, sized 45MB and up. I have been patching things now and then, but it's time for me to fix them once and for all. The issues are:

1) Performance. I've read that I should add a Thunderbolt enclosure with an SSD drive, then make that new drive my boot disk. True? If so, what should I buy, and how do I do it?

Not sure it needs to be the boot drive. Yes, you'd boot faster but once up and running it may not make that much difference. Question: what is on the current 3TB drive? In my case, I have only the OS and applications on my boot drive and I've kept it around 256GB. Can you get a new internal boot drive in the iMac that is SSD? (e.g at apple store)?

But an internal SSD is your fastest solution. If you could replace your 3TB boot drive with a 1TB SSD boot drive, you could concievably put your LR catalog (not the images) on that drive and your reference raw files on your 8tb existing drive.

I'd also add that it seems that certain configurations of Mac don't perform well with LR for unknown reasons. My old 2013 iMac actually performs OK, and seemingly better than many newer, 'better', machines too.

Throwing cash at the problem may not necessarily improve things much. It can be a bit of a black art.

2) Local Storage. I know I need some kind of NAS system. How hard is this to do?

NAS isn't hard, but it is slower than "direct attach storage" or DAS. You're issue is slowness so I don't think a NAS is part of your solution except as a backup destination.

3) Cloud Backup. I have tried a couple services, but they were appallingly slow. I'd set things to backup, check in a couple days, and progress was minimal. I will be switching to FIOS soon, and hmm willing to give something another try. Ideally, this service would backup all my RAW files and LR catalog automatically, without me having to do anything. I add about 2,000 files/month. Recommendations?

The slowness is dependent on your internet pipe. With FIOS you will probably be able to reconsider cloud backup and have much better time of it. I currently have 5.5TB on a cloud backup solution, but I started it 8 years ago when I had 1.5TB.

I'm using the LR CC 1TB plan on a 10/40meg fibre broadband here, and the 0.5TB I have on there (58,000 images) works pretty well.

Thanks for any pointers you can provide. Please let me know if you need more information.

Adam

My opinion here only, but I'd probably do this

1) see if you can replace the boot drive with an SSD . The difficulty here is that I don't know what's on your boot drive at this point, other than OS and apps. But if you do this, (perhaps through an apple store), then your internal SSD is going to help speedwise. I don't know how big your actual LR catalog is, so I can't help you size it. As a reference, I have about 100k images in a Capture One catalog and my catalog is 300GB. I believe LR catalogs tend to be smaller, more compact. But if you could swing a 1TB boot drive, then I bet you could easily free up 700GB for the catalog there (and your catalog may only be 70GB). Yes, you can alternatively buy a thunderbolt enclosure (do you have TB2 or TB3?). Lots of fast options.

2) assuming you have your raws in referenced mode. Put (keep?) them on the 8TB drive. The speed of the drive your raw files live on is way less important than the speed of the drive your catalog is on.

3) Is your timemachine drive big enough? I can't tell from your description how much you really need but you have an 8tb external drive and a 3TB internal drive and you are backing up that (potential) 11tTB to a 4TB timemachine. Seems like you have free space somewhere or your TM drive is tight.

4) I subscribe to (and recommend) a "3-2-1" backup plan which means you need three copies of your files at all times with one offsite. If you have your 8TB drive with raws and your boot drive SSD (new) with the LR catalog, your second copy of those files is on the TimeMachine drive and your cloud solution (backblaze or Crashplan seem like a good fit) would hold the 3rd copy. My gut says you would need a bigger TM drive though. I use a cheap 8TB usb 3.1 drive I got for under $200.

But to clarify , we'd need more detail (size of catalog, size of raw files, how full the boot drive is and what else is on there - like music - and such).

I guess it all depends on budget and storage needs, as you say.

 

[Adam007]

Thanks for these detailed and helpful responses. I'll try to answer your questions.

Yes, the RAW files are stored separately from the LR Catalog.

Fool that I am, my pictures are spread between my Mac and my external HD; they are at least 2TB. I have 250GB remaining on my iMac HD. Finder says the catalog itself is only 800MB.

I agree that the NAS would be for local backup only.

So, I think the recommendations made by Cogset would apply here - get a 1TB SSD via a Thunderbolt enclosure, put the boot drive and Catalog on that. I would store the photos on the external HDD (some would be on the iMac itself), and a larger Time Machine Drive (I'm at 4TB, and it's getting full).

If I do these things, would I still benefit from a NAS?

And yes, I'm hoping that FIOS speeds things up for cloud backup. What service do you use?

I wish iCloud would let me store photos apart from storing them in Photos, but I've never figured out how to do that.

Thanks for the help!

Adam

Greetings from Pentax-land! I could use your help.

I have a Late 2015 27 inch iMac, 3.3 GHz 15. 3TB HD. I added some RAM, so I'm at 32. This has done nothing for my LR performance. Importing a large number of files drags on interminably, and there are irritating delays in rendering working files in full-screen mode. I have a 4GB Time Machine Drive, and an 8GB external HD, where my LR Catalog currently lives.

There are two ways pieces to LR storage , if not more. The Catalog is the database that stores all the information about your raw files and adjustments. However, if you store your files in 'referenced' mode, the actual RAW files themselves could be in a different place (e.g a different drive).

I'm not a LR guru as I've been off it for three years or so, but the question remains, are raw images located IN the catalog, or or they referenced?

Sorry, that's wrong, LR Classic stores all images as referenced in a standard file structure., and that's it. It's the Apple photo apps that use referenced or managed as options (probably others too).

You can store them both together in a parent folder, or separately in different folders or different volumes.

Lightroom CC is slightly different, where it only uses managed files, but they are stored in the Cloud, or optionally on a local drive as well, which can be either the boot volume or an external location (but it not necessary for normal use).

The goal would be to separate them, and put the catalog on an SSD drive. With the catalog itself on SSD, it will run faster. The question then becomes, where do I put the SSD? There are some thunderbolt SSD options now that are quite fast and it wouldn't need to be that big (512GB perhaps) if it only contained the catalog.

I think I'd put the SSD internally, and put the catalogue there, and put the image files on the external drive (in fact it's what I'm planning on with my iMac).

LR is good at locating folders if you move them, so you can simply install onto the SSD, copy the catalogue across, leave the images on an external drive, and relink the folder later.

This computer is only about two years old, but it is getting full and has been running slowly under the weight of 50,000 RAW files, sized 45MB and up. I have been patching things now and then, but it's time for me to fix them once and for all. The issues are:

1) Performance. I've read that I should add a Thunderbolt enclosure with an SSD drive, then make that new drive my boot disk. True? If so, what should I buy, and how do I do it?

Not sure it needs to be the boot drive. Yes, you'd boot faster but once up and running it may not make that much difference. Question: what is on the current 3TB drive? In my case, I have only the OS and applications on my boot drive and I've kept it around 256GB. Can you get a new internal boot drive in the iMac that is SSD? (e.g at apple store)?

But an internal SSD is your fastest solution. If you could replace your 3TB boot drive with a 1TB SSD boot drive, you could concievably put your LR catalog (not the images) on that drive and your reference raw files on your 8tb existing drive.

I'd also add that it seems that certain configurations of Mac don't perform well with LR for unknown reasons. My old 2013 iMac actually performs OK, and seemingly better than many newer, 'better', machines too.

Throwing cash at the problem may not necessarily improve things much. It can be a bit of a black art.

2) Local Storage. I know I need some kind of NAS system. How hard is this to do?

NAS isn't hard, but it is slower than "direct attach storage" or DAS. You're issue is slowness so I don't think a NAS is part of your solution except as a backup destination.

3) Cloud Backup. I have tried a couple services, but they were appallingly slow. I'd set things to backup, check in a couple days, and progress was minimal. I will be switching to FIOS soon, and hmm willing to give something another try. Ideally, this service would backup all my RAW files and LR catalog automatically, without me having to do anything. I add about 2,000 files/month. Recommendations?

The slowness is dependent on your internet pipe. With FIOS you will probably be able to reconsider cloud backup and have much better time of it. I currently have 5.5TB on a cloud backup solution, but I started it 8 years ago when I had 1.5TB.

I'm using the LR CC 1TB plan on a 10/40meg fibre broadband here, and the 0.5TB I have on there (58,000 images) works pretty well.

Thanks for any pointers you can provide. Please let me know if you need more information.

Adam

My opinion here only, but I'd probably do this

1) see if you can replace the boot drive with an SSD . The difficulty here is that I don't know what's on your boot drive at this point, other than OS and apps. But if you do this, (perhaps through an apple store), then your internal SSD is going to help speedwise. I don't know how big your actual LR catalog is, so I can't help you size it. As a reference, I have about 100k images in a Capture One catalog and my catalog is 300GB. I believe LR catalogs tend to be smaller, more compact. But if you could swing a 1TB boot drive, then I bet you could easily free up 700GB for the catalog there (and your catalog may only be 70GB). Yes, you can alternatively buy a thunderbolt enclosure (do you have TB2 or TB3?). Lots of fast options.

2) assuming you have your raws in referenced mode. Put (keep?) them on the 8TB drive. The speed of the drive your raw files live on is way less important than the speed of the drive your catalog is on.

3) Is your timemachine drive big enough? I can't tell from your description how much you really need but you have an 8tb external drive and a 3TB internal drive and you are backing up that (potential) 11tTB to a 4TB timemachine. Seems like you have free space somewhere or your TM drive is tight.

4) I subscribe to (and recommend) a "3-2-1" backup plan which means you need three copies of your files at all times with one offsite. If you have your 8TB drive with raws and your boot drive SSD (new) with the LR catalog, your second copy of those files is on the TimeMachine drive and your cloud solution (backblaze or Crashplan seem like a good fit) would hold the 3rd copy. My gut says you would need a bigger TM drive though. I use a cheap 8TB usb 3.1 drive I got for under $200.

But to clarify , we'd need more detail (size of catalog, size of raw files, how full the boot drive is and what else is on there - like music - and such).

I guess it all depends on budget and storage needs, as you say.

 

[Peter in Milton]

Greetings from Pentax-land! I could use your help.

I have a Late 2015 27 inch iMac, 3.3 GHz 15. 3TB HD. I added some RAM, so I'm at 32. This has done nothing for my LR performance. Importing a large number of files drags on interminably, and there are irritating delays in rendering working files in full-screen mode. I have a 4GB Time Machine Drive, and an 8GB external HD, where my LR Catalog currently lives.

This computer is only about two years old, but it is getting full and has been running slowly under the weight of 50,000 RAW files, sized 45MB and up. I have been patching things now and then, but it's time for me to fix them once and for all. The issues are:

1) Performance. I've read that I should add a Thunderbolt enclosure with an SSD drive, then make that new drive my boot disk. True? If so, what should I buy, and how do I do it?

I would suggest replacing the internal HDD with an internal SSD. A Mac repair person would be able to do this for you if you are not comfortable with dissecting you machine. Put the LR catalog and preview files on the SSD, and keep the actual picture files on an external HDD. That should be easily fast enough, but you could have the pictures from you last shoot on the SSD as well, (LR will handle this with no problems) and relocate the folder when you are done culling/processing. The catalog file will be very small for the numbers you are indicating, so you could get a 256GB SSD and be fine. Keep in mind that ingesting is one of the weak points of LR. Throwing more RAM at it will certainly not work, as you have discovered.

2) Local Storage. I know I need some kind of NAS system. How hard is this to do?

Why do you think this would help? I would think that this solves none of your described issues.

3) Cloud Backup. I have tried a couple services, but they were appallingly slow. I'd set things to backup, check in a couple days, and progress was minimal. I will be switching to FIOS soon, and hmm willing to give something another try. Ideally, this service would backup all my RAW files and LR catalog automatically, without me having to do anything. I add about 2,000 files/month. Recommendations?

I add about a third this amount of files, and prefer an external drive for my files. I also have a back up HDD on my desk, and a second back up HDD off site (the two backups swap places periodically, depending on how much I have been doing.) I believe the main advantage of using cloud storage is being able to access files from anywhere and on different devices, and I don't need that.

Thanks for any pointers you can provide. Please let me know if you need more information.

Adam

 

[Schrodingers_cat]

I have a 4GB Time Machine Drive, and an 8GB external HD, where my LR Catalog currently lives.

A common installation would have your programs and LR catalog on the internal (boot) drive, which would be more enjoyable if it were an SSD. Your data then goes on an external drive of your choice.

This computer is only about two years old, but it is getting full and has been running slowly under the weight of 50,000 RAW files, sized 45MB and up.

A single external SSD of appropriate size, assuming growth of your image collection, might be pretty expensive. Perhaps consider a HDD depending on your estimation of your future space requirements.

add a Thunderbolt enclosure with an SSD drive, then make that new drive my boot disk. ................... how do I do it?

Here's one way. It's an old Buffalo enclosure with an SSD stuck in it. You could just clone your existing boot drive to it using Super Duper or something like that. Plug it to the computer rather than an external enclosure as shown.

I know I need some kind of NAS system.

Net Access Storage is an excellent solution if you have multiple devices accessing the same files or have some sort of location issues. From what you have described it sounds to me like you want DAS (Direct Access Storage, a plug in enclosure on your desktop)

3) Cloud Backup. I have tried a couple services, but they were appallingly slow.

Yep.

Recommendations?

DAS . But many do indeed prefer cloud backup.

Find a place that services Apple machines and have them install the SSD internally.

 

[JPAlbert]

Your 3tb drive is a platter-based hard drive, is this correct?

If that's the case, that's what's slowing you down -- not the other specs of the iMac.

The solution is easy:
Plug in a USB3 SSD, set it up to be the boot drive (with apps and your accounts, MINUS the photo libraries).

Leave the large libraries on the internal drive.

The computer will boot and run much faster, once the OS has been "liberated" from all that other stuff.

Something like the Samsung t5 would do you well.
Just use some velcro and attach it to the back of the iMac's stand.

Re cloud backup:
I don't see how that's going to speed things up.
Same for NAS.

Again, your core problem may be the platter-based internal drive (if that's what's there).
Shift booting and apps to an external USB3 SSD and I think you'll be VERY pleased at the performance increase -- and particularly so with how little it costs...

 

[PSGimages]

Thanks for these detailed and helpful responses. I'll try to answer your questions.

Yes, the RAW files are stored separately from the LR Catalog.

Fool that I am, my pictures are spread between my Mac and my external HD; they are at least 2TB. I have 250GB remaining on my iMac HD. Finder says the catalog itself is only 800MB.

I agree that the NAS would be for local backup only.

So, I think the recommendations made by Cogset would apply here - get a 1TB SSD via a Thunderbolt enclosure, put the boot drive and Catalog on that. I would store the photos on the external HDD (some would be on the iMac itself), and a larger Time Machine Drive (I'm at 4TB, and it's getting full).

If I do these things, would I still benefit from a NAS?

And yes, I'm hoping that FIOS speeds things up for cloud backup. What service do you use?

I wish iCloud would let me store photos apart from storing them in Photos, but I've never figured out how to do that.

Thanks for the help!

Adam

I'm personally on Crashplan, but if I were signing-up now, Backblaze is roughly half the price and would be tough to beat. The advantage of Crashplan is that it doesn't remove deleted files after 30 days (or whatever the period is under Backblaze). But if you have a separate timemachine running, you've sort of got that covered. Crashplan "small business" provides unlimited storage, like Backblaze at $120/year.

Given the size of your stash, an unlimited plan may make sense for you. There are others that charge by the terabyte that make sense at smaller storage amounts (like https://www.idrive.com/ for instance)


NAS is great when you want to share across computers or you want a large backup destination. Synology makes a ton of great units and they have a strong OS. You can setup a Synology NAS as a massive Timemachine destination, if that works for you. I know of one guy with 40TB of images and video who does just that. His NAS is broken up into a TImemachine destination (essentially a Timecapsule) and another partition for other storage use which he shares across three or four computers. You can also get really large NAS arrays and run RAID 10 and some more exotic redundant RAID levels.

But in my experience, If you stick pretty much to a single Mac, then a local RAID (DAS) is usually simpler/faster than a NAS. I've also hear of instances when a macOS update/upgrade has broken the TimeMachine functionality in 3rd party NAS devices, until they patch their systems. Usually not a huge problem but it happens. I'm sure some NAS users will set me straight if I misstated anything. But Synology , Promise and Qnap all seem to have really strong NAS options.

In your case, I'd certainly consolidate my images into a single location and get your catalog on fast SSD (getting the boot drive on SSD wouldn't hurt either).

Good luck!

 

[Tom_N]

Your 3tb drive is a platter-based hard drive, is this correct?

There will definitely be a 3 TB HDD. There may also be a 128 GB SSD (to support a Fusion Drive). Even in that case, the bulk of the storage will be platter-based.

If that's the case, that's what's slowing you down -- not the other specs of the iMac.

 

[Adam007]

Thanks, Everyone! I'll look into this over the next few days. Agree with a couple comments that NAS may not be the storage solution I need, since I only run one computer, but I may explore that option if I get a laptop for travel. But first, I'll deal with my most pressing issue - speed, followed by cloud backup.

Thanks again, and I'll check back in if something blows up!

Adam

 

[PhilDunn]

Greetings from Pentax-land! I could use your help.

I have a Late 2015 27 inch iMac, 3.3 GHz 15. 3TB HD. I added some RAM, so I'm at 32. This has done nothing for my LR performance. Importing a large number of files drags on interminably, and there are irritating delays in rendering working files in full-screen mode. I have a 4GB Time Machine Drive, and an 8GB external HD, where my LR Catalog currently lives.

Your catalog should be on your fastest drive, both in sustained speed and initial access. An external hard drive is not a good place to have it.

Lightroom has never been known for making the importing process feel fast. What you are experiencing may be normal.

This computer is only about two years old, but it is getting full and has been running slowly under the weight of 50,000 RAW files, sized 45MB and up. I have been patching things now and then, but it's time for me to fix them once and for all. The issues are:

1) Performance. I've read that I should add a Thunderbolt enclosure with an SSD drive, then make that new drive my boot disk. True? If so, what should I buy, and how do I do it?

You could do that but I would just replace the internal drive with an SSD. Find an experienced Mac shop to do it or consider doing it yourself. I've done the work myself on my iMac. It's not hard if you are good with working with your hands and delicate wiring. I recommend Crucial's latest MX500. If you are interested in doing it yourself then you should reference the OWC site. They show you how to do it step by step and provide all the parts you will need.

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eshop.macsales.com

Your catalog should also be on that fast internal drive, not a slow external hard drive that is also slow to wake up. Then you could have large externals for storing your images. Ideally they should be images you are not currently working on. Those should stay on the fast internal SSD. I now have an internal 1TB SSD in my late 2012 iMac, replacing the Fusion Drive it came with, and an 8TB external. My iMac runs much better today than it did when I bought it, to include Lightroom use.

2) Local Storage. I know I need some kind of NAS system. How hard is this to do?

I'll let others with more experience adddress that. In my case I'm very happy with my 8TB USB3 drive plugged into my iMac. Simple and fast.

3) Cloud Backup. I have tried a couple services, but they were appallingly slow. I'd set things to backup, check in a couple days, and progress was minimal. I will be switching to FIOS soon, and hmm willing to give something another try. Ideally, this service would backup all my RAW files and LR catalog automatically, without me having to do anything. I add about 2,000 files/month. Recommendations?

You probably have slow upload speed with your Internet provider or the particular plan you are on.

Thanks for any pointers you can provide. Please let me know if you need more information.

Adam

 

[Adam007]

Phil,

Thanks for the advice. There's one thing I don't quite follow.

Along with several others, you recommend replacing the internal drive, rather than using a Thunderbolt or USB 3 SSD. How much faster would the internal route be? Also, my current internal HDD is 3TB. It seems awfully expensive to get a 3TB SSD, when I actually need 1/3 or less of that capacity to be running at the highest speed. Am I missing something? Maybe the idea is, "Adam, you don't need 3TB internal, if you move things to nice big external HDD." ?

Thanks.

 

[nbirkett]

Phil,

Thanks for the advice. There's one thing I don't quite follow.

Along with several others, you recommend replacing the internal drive, rather than using a Thunderbolt or USB 3 SSD. How much faster would the internal route be? Also, my current internal HDD is 3TB. It seems awfully expensive to get a 3TB SSD, when I actually need 1/3 or less of that capacity to be running at the highest speed. Am I missing something? Maybe the idea is, "Adam, you don't need 3TB internal, if you move things to nice big external HDD." ?

I think that the suggestion is to get a 1TB internal SSD (or, maybe a 550GB SSD). Move files like the OS and LR catalog to the SSD. Then, move the rest of your stuff to external drives.

In terms of speed, I tested my 2017 iMac with 1TB internal SSD. I get write speeds of around 1,900 MB/s and read speeds of 2,500 MB/s. I then tested a 500GB SSD connected through the USB-3 port on the iMac. The speeds for both read and write were around 300 MB/s. So, a very big difference in read/write performance. Your computer/experience may differ depending on how the 2015 SSD works. But, the internal SSD can use higher capacity transfer paths and many other speed up options.

 

[Tom_N]

Phil,

Thanks for the advice. There's one thing I don't quite follow.

Along with several others, you recommend replacing the internal drive, rather than using a Thunderbolt or USB 3 SSD. How much faster would the internal route be?

It depends on the SSDs. PCI-e SSDs installed in an internal slot, or connected externally via Thunderbolt 2, will be faster than SATA ones.

The iMac has a SATA drive bay. If you purchased a Fusion Drive, there might be a usable internal connector for an aftermarket PCI-e SSD. Most external enclosures are for SATA drives, but you may run across a few Thunderbolt enclosures for M.2 PCI-e SSDs.

SATA 3 has a nominal speed of 6 Gbps. USB 3.0 has a nominal speed of 5 Gbps. Thus a SATA SSD installed internally MAY have a slight advantage over an external USB 3.0 one.

Also, my current internal HDD is 3TB. It seems awfully expensive to get a 3TB SSD, when I actually need 1/3 or less of that capacity to be running at the highest speed. Am I missing something? Maybe the idea is, "Adam, you don't need 3TB internal, if you move things to nice big external HDD." ?

I don't think he was suggesting getting a 3 TB internal SSD.

 

[Tom_N]

In terms of speed, I tested my 2017 iMac with 1TB internal SSD. I get write speeds of around 1,900 MB/s and read speeds of 2,500 MB/s. I then tested a 500GB SSD connected through the USB-3 port on the iMac. The speeds for both read and write were around 300 MB/s. So, a very big difference in read/write performance. Your computer/experience may differ depending on how the 2015 SSD works.

Even if SATA-3 had no overhead, its bandwidth would top out at 750 MB/s. Your PCI-e SSD easily outperforms the best that a SATA-3 SSD could ever hope to do.

 

[PhilDunn]

Phil,

Thanks for the advice. There's one thing I don't quite follow.

Along with several others, you recommend replacing the internal drive, rather than using a Thunderbolt or USB 3 SSD. How much faster would the internal route be? Also, my current internal HDD is 3TB. It seems awfully expensive to get a 3TB SSD, when I actually need 1/3 or less of that capacity to be running at the highest speed. Am I missing something? Maybe the idea is, "Adam, you don't need 3TB internal, if you move things to nice big external HDD." ?

Thanks.

There shouldn’t be any difference in speed when using Thunderbolt to drive a SATA SSD, but running the same SSD through USB 3 is usually about 20% or so slower than the max possible, or around 400Mbps. I only recommend the internal SSD over Thunderbolt to eliminate the visual pollution of an external enclosure and because it could be cheaper, if you have someone do the job for you, and will be dramatically cheaper if you do it yourself.

That said a Thunderbolt enclosure could be more attractive to you for expandabilty and for less hassle for you in trying to get someone competent to do the internal SSD installation or in doing it yourself. * It can also be much faster than an internal SATA SSD if you get an enclosure that allows for the installation of faster than SATA SSDs.*

Correct, you don't really need to match your current hard drive size with the new SSD if you are mostly dealing with still images. Consider how you work. Think of the very worst case scenario of the number of files and their collective size that you are working with at any one time. Even for professional photographers the demand simply isn’t there to justify very large SSDs to cover fast access to current photos that are being accessed and worked on. After that they can be moved over to your large external drive.1TB SATA SSDs are cheap, but again Thunderbolt may be the better option for you.

Remember also to have your catalog on the fastest drive along with the files you are currently working on. The files can the latter be moved to the external spinning drive but the catalog should always reside on your fastest drive.

 

[Adam007]

Thanks, everyone. I have a much clearer handle on this now.

Adam

 

[Jacques Cornell]

Greetings from Pentax-land! I could use your help.

I have a Late 2015 27 inch iMac, 3.3 GHz 15. 3TB HD.

HD as boot drive. Ugh. Is it at least a Fusion Drive?

I added some RAM, so I'm at 32. This has done nothing for my LR performance. Importing a large number of files drags on interminably, and there are irritating delays in rendering working files in full-screen mode. I have a 4GB Time Machine Drive, and an 8GB external HD, where my LR Catalog currently lives.

Bingo! Put your LR catalogs and the master image files for your active projects on an external USB 3.0 SSD. WAY faster than a spinning HD. 500GB or 1TB oughta do it for about $100/$200.

This computer is only about two years old, but it is getting full and has been running slowly under the weight of 50,000 RAW files, sized 45MB and up. I have been patching things now and then, but it's time for me to fix them once and for all. The issues are:

1) Performance. I've read that I should add a Thunderbolt enclosure with an SSD drive, then make that new drive my boot disk. True? If so, what should I buy, and how do I do it?

I used an off-the-shelf 2.5" SSD in a $10 USB 3.0 enclosure and got great results. When I moved the files to my Mac Pro's much faster internal SSD, it made almost no difference, so there's probably not much advantage to using a faster and more expensive Thunderbolt enclosure.

2) Local Storage. I know I need some kind of NAS system. How hard is this to do?

Why not just use single HDs for your archive? Speed doesn't really matter for the files you're not actively working on.

3) Cloud Backup. I have tried a couple services, but they were appallingly slow. I'd set things to backup, check in a couple days, and progress was minimal. I will be switching to FIOS soon, and hmm willing to give something another try. Ideally, this service would backup all my RAW files and LR catalog automatically, without me having to do anything. I add about 2,000 files/month. Recommendations?

Thanks for any pointers you can provide. Please let me know if you need more information.