Clearing laptop hard drive

[Andrew Teakle]

Hi All,

I am travelling around Australia and have all but filled the TB available to me on my laptop hard drive. I have just bought a 2TB drive with an eSATA connection and want to export all my photos from the laptop onto that drive. I want to keep them in their native format with LR2 development left as metadata so I can change them later as desired. I will then delete the originals from the laptop to free up working space. I already have all the files backed up on yet another hard drive which I keep separate from the laptop.

I have tried to Export as Catalog, but then they are not visible in LR unless I import them again...and then they don't have all my corrections attached. I have ticked Export Negative Files and Include Available Previews.

I know this has to be a relatively simple task, but so far it is eluding me.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Andrew Teakle

[Chris_Brown]

If you're using a Macintosh, use the utility program "Migration Assistant" with the program Time Machine for the fastest, easiest solution. Both programs are included in all Macs and OS upgrades.

[john beardsworth]

In Lightroom, simply move the files onto the external drive. ie don't export.

John

[CatOne]

No need to export anything.  Just move your catalog and all the RAW files, and keep the relationship between them the same (hopefully they're both in the same folder) and when you open the catalog on the new disk it should just see things.

[john beardsworth]

Only move the pictures, and do it in Lightroom. You will then have your catalogue on your laptop, listing and holding the adjustment data for any images that are on the laptop and also those on the external drive (whether it is switched on or not)

[Andrew Teakle]

Well that was easy

Thank you all for your prompt replies.

Andrew