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Author Topic: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)  (Read 5320 times)

N80

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Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« on: July 20, 2016, 09:22:26 am »

Former Aperture user. Avid amateur. 3 weeks into COP9 demo. Love it.

On new 27" iMac 5K Retina. El Capitan.

Imported modest Aperture library (4000 images) into COP9. Images imported into CO Catalog package. Backed CO catalog up on external drive. All originals remain safe in Aperture on my laptop.Was extremely pleased with the ease of this process. Really like CO. Just about ready to purchase individual license. Since the import I have used all major features including import from Nikon D750. Heavy image editing. Printing. Processing and exporting. Everything is great for several days.

Yesterday CO froze while I was editing key commands.

I had to force quit CO. Then I restarted iMac. RE-opened CO. Dialog box says something like catalog database corrupted and metadata missing from many images.. Gives option for repair. Unable to repair. I close CO. Re-open. Opens normally. Shows the right number of images in the catalog file but no images in Browser, just question marks. In Viewer it says something like images unavailable, either gone, corrupted or wrong format. I checked in the Catalog package, all images still there. They had not been moved and the Catalog package had not even been opened prior to this.

So, I go to File menu and click on verify catalog. Dialog box indicates this was successful. Now some images present in Browser but only 760 out of 4000+. The 760 are from two or three import events. All the other import events are shown in Recent Imports but have no images in them.

Next, I shut down CO. Restart with option key held down and open back-up Capture One Catalog. It opens exactly like the corrupted catalog with only 760 images shown. (There was no backup done after the initial crash.)

So now I'm stuck.

Very uneasy about purchasing CO now even though I like it very much. Sent a tech support request. Not sure if they will help since this is a demo.

Noticed that 9.2.1 might address some of these issues. Still not sure what to do. Maybe try the 9.2.1 upgrade to see what happens. Certainly hesitant to spend $300 because this is a pretty significant malfunction. I'm not a pro and no originals lost but still wouldn't want this to happen down the road. Originals are safe but since the backup catalog failed, all editing/processing would be lost.

I think whether I purchase or not will depend on response I get from tech support. Otherwise I'm stuck with LightRoom.

Any advice or help much appreciated. Sorry about long post.
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David Grover / Capture One

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Re: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« Reply #1 on: July 20, 2016, 10:45:21 am »

Former Aperture user. Avid amateur. 3 weeks into COP9 demo. Love it.

On new 27" iMac 5K Retina. El Capitan.

Imported modest Aperture library (4000 images) into COP9. Images imported into CO Catalog package. Backed CO catalog up on external drive. All originals remain safe in Aperture on my laptop.Was extremely pleased with the ease of this process. Really like CO. Just about ready to purchase individual license. Since the import I have used all major features including import from Nikon D750. Heavy image editing. Printing. Processing and exporting. Everything is great for several days.

Yesterday CO froze while I was editing key commands.

I had to force quit CO. Then I restarted iMac. RE-opened CO. Dialog box says something like catalog database corrupted and metadata missing from many images.. Gives option for repair. Unable to repair. I close CO. Re-open. Opens normally. Shows the right number of images in the catalog file but no images in Browser, just question marks. In Viewer it says something like images unavailable, either gone, corrupted or wrong format. I checked in the Catalog package, all images still there. They had not been moved and the Catalog package had not even been opened prior to this.

So, I go to File menu and click on verify catalog. Dialog box indicates this was successful. Now some images present in Browser but only 760 out of 4000+. The 760 are from two or three import events. All the other import events are shown in Recent Imports but have no images in them.

Next, I shut down CO. Restart with option key held down and open back-up Capture One Catalog. It opens exactly like the corrupted catalog with only 760 images shown. (There was no backup done after the initial crash.)

So now I'm stuck.

Very uneasy about purchasing CO now even though I like it very much. Sent a tech support request. Not sure if they will help since this is a demo.

Noticed that 9.2.1 might address some of these issues. Still not sure what to do. Maybe try the 9.2.1 upgrade to see what happens. Certainly hesitant to spend $300 because this is a pretty significant malfunction. I'm not a pro and no originals lost but still wouldn't want this to happen down the road. Originals are safe but since the backup catalog failed, all editing/processing would be lost.

I think whether I purchase or not will depend on response I get from tech support. Otherwise I'm stuck with LightRoom.

Any advice or help much appreciated. Sorry about long post.

Hey N80,

Sorry to hear of the issue.

Holding down option on opening doesn't opening a backup catalog.  Just gives you a list of your most recent.

I would contact support, they will help you restore from the actual backup.

But what about your own backup routine?  You don't have a replica of the database on that?

David
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N80

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Re: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« Reply #2 on: July 20, 2016, 03:00:31 pm »

David, thanks for the response. Holding the option key gave me the option of opening the back-up catalog from a pick list, so that is how did that. As mentioned, same results.

I did contact tech and they replied very promptly. They suggested deleting the writelock file in the catalog package, deleting preferences in user library and repairing disc permissions then rebooting. I am at work and have not tried this yet but truly appreciate the quick response. I'll try this at home tonight.

If this works, I'll do the upgrade to 9.2.1 afterwards. If it does not work I will start over from scratch and delete everything, re-install with 9.2.1 and re-import catalogs from Aperture which I already have ready to go on another external drive.

Current back up strategy is COP9 catalog backed up on external hard drive and original images backed up using Time Machine in a different partition of the same drive. (So the answer is yes, there should be a copy of the Capture One Catalog database in Time Machine also. I have not tried that angle yet.)
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George

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N80

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Re: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« Reply #3 on: July 21, 2016, 09:34:15 am »

Update: The steps recommended by tech support did not help. Upgrading to 9.2.1 did not help.

I also found that when I went back to the source external drive with the exported Aperture catalogs, most of the images were no longer in the catalog packages. This leads me to believe that there was something flawed in the Aperture 'Export As Library' process since images were lost or corrupted on the external drive _and_ in the Capture One Catalog on the iMac hard drive. The files on the external drive never interfaced with Capture One except during the 'Import As Catalog' process.

I just can't figure out why everything worked normally for several days. The images within the Aperture library file must have been susceptible to degradation, possibly due to some routine process. Who knows? In any case, I am inclined to think that this was an Aperture export issue and not a Capture One issue at all.

So, last night I just exported my 4000 Aperture images as originals and imported them into Capture One. I'm about halfway through sorting them into albums. Metadata came with them of course but no edits (or file structure since for some reason the import did not bring in sub-folders) and no key words or ratings. I did not have a lot of key words or ratings anyway and probably less than half had been edited. So not the smoothest transition but the best I could do under the circumstances.

If I were a professional or if I had 20k images this would have been a disaster. (But I still put the blame for that right on Apple.)
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BobShaw

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Re: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« Reply #4 on: July 22, 2016, 03:14:00 am »

I have tried on two occasions to migrate from Aperture to Capture One. Both failed. Still using Aperture.
However the process was to open Capture One and Import from (closed) Aperture, not open Aperture and export.

If you have a Time Machine backup just trash the Catalog and drag a backup copy across.
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N80

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Re: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« Reply #5 on: July 22, 2016, 09:35:19 am »

Since it seems like it was the image files themselves (if this is possible) were getting corrupted then going to the back up catalog would have probably led to the same problems eventually. Just guessing. But, I've started over now anyway with originals. Again, my library is small so not a big deal.

As for continuing to use Aperture I have not explored whether or not it will work in El Capitan on my new iMac. For me it is time to move on. I miss Aperture but still bitter with Apple about pulling the rug out from under professional level software. Not cool. Not okay.

I also hate spending $300 USD on Capture One. It is not as robust as LR and I don't (yet) like it as much as Aperture. But, I like it way better than LR and it just seems to fit my style and preferences.

And, even though Phase One support could not fix this issue (which I don't think was a CO issue anyway), the support staff was prompt, knowledgeable and really tried to help. That is encouraging and will make spending $300 a little less painful. There is also currently a 10% discount available.
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BobShaw

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Re: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« Reply #6 on: July 22, 2016, 07:00:34 pm »

As for continuing to use Aperture I have not explored whether or not it will work in El Capitan on my new iMac. For me it is time to move on.
Aperture works fine under El Capitan, in fact it runs faster. You should probably update to El Capitan now as there is a no OS called Siera coming out soon.
Have you checked the Aperture database for errors? That may cause problems in migrating.
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ChrisMroz

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Re: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« Reply #7 on: July 24, 2016, 05:46:39 pm »

N80- I had the same issue a couple of months ago; migrating Aperture catalog to Capture One. No images were shown, just question marks over blank images in the browser. Tech support did not have any solution. After much agonizing all was restored when I imported my saved images from Time Machine. Thus far it has not happened again,thankfully.  As a result I have been VERY fastidious about backing up my images both in Time Machine and a separate external hard drive! BTW I'm using a Mac Book Pro w El Cap. version 10.11.5.
Other than that incident I have been very satisfied with CO.
Chris
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N80

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Re: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« Reply #8 on: July 25, 2016, 11:03:06 am »

Thanks for the replies Bob and Chris. As mentioned I just exported the originals and them imported them into CO. So far no problems. All edits lost but somehow a lot of key words made it over.

Anyway, I probably will not install Aperture on my new iMac. Not even sure how I would do so. I just bought a single user CO license. I have all my Aperture originals in one CO catalog but I'm starting a new CO catalog for new images from this point forward.

Backing up via Time Machine and backing up the CO catalog database separately, both on an external drive.

 
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BobShaw

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Re: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« Reply #9 on: July 26, 2016, 08:15:16 pm »

Anyway, I probably will not install Aperture on my new iMac. Not even sure how I would do so. I just bought a single user CO license. I have all my Aperture originals in one CO catalog but I'm starting a new CO catalog for new images from this point forward.
Backing up via Time Machine and backing up the CO catalog database separately, both on an external drive.
If you get a new Mac then import whatever you want using a TimeMachine backup of the old one. That way everything is the same. You can choose which users and applications etc by ticking. Just go Cmd-R on boot and select import Time Machine or similar.

I would instal Aperture just for Smart Albums if nothing else. You will miss those.

I don't understand why anyone has more than one catalogue. Just more to back up an maintain. Good luck.
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N80

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Re: Crash and Corrupted Database (Long Post)
« Reply #10 on: August 01, 2016, 02:56:18 pm »

I don't understand why anyone has more than one catalogue. Just more to back up an maintain. Good luck.

In general I don't use multiple catalogs but some software, LR notoriously, takes forever to open if you have a large catalog. Aperture also but not as bad. The jury is out on CO but in my brief experience it opens a tiny catalog a lot faster than an average sized one. So, if you have photos you rarely need to access you can keep your main catalog smaller and leaner by keeping them in a separate catalog. CO seems to handle catalog switching fairly well.
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