[OSX] Photos on Nas

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Hi

 

After a year of running OSX and trying to do things "my way" I've given up.  It just seems easier to let Mac's do what Mac's want to do, and a part of that is letting Photos organise my photo library.  I have upped my cloud storage and so far, so good.

 

But I have a sizeable historical library of photos not yet imported.  I don't want to store them all on my Macbook's hard drive, it would eat through the space in no time.  What I would like to accomplish is:

 

1) Import the photos into the library but store them on the NAS

2) Have them available via iCloud as required

 

So say I have my macbook at home, it loads the library from my NAS and all is well.  But if I am out and open Photos, it will look for the NAS and oh, it's not there so then what?  Also, I'd like to be able to browse them (but not store them) on my iPhone.

 

A thought was to buy a cheap old Mac Mini, attach it to the NAS and let that library the photos for me.

 

I dunno, I'm maybe overthinking this, but am a bit lost.  But I definitely want to do this the Apple way.

[+Batfink Subscriber²]

You could try moving the photo's library to the NAS and then importing the historical photos, that should import them straight onto the NAS and not use up the Macbook's drive.  It would also cloud sync them so you could browse them on your iPhone.

 

It's quite simple:  http://www.macworld.com/article/2999846/photography/how-to-move-an-apple-photos-for-os-x-library-to-an-external-drive.html

 

The alternative is to use multiple libraries, which allows more control and you can have some stored on the NAS and others on the Mac: http://www.imore.com/how-create-multiple-libraries-photos-os-x

 

Batfink

[REM2000]

i don't think you would be able to link them via iCloud unless you do it via the iCloud drive (not the photos).

 

I would recommend using another service such as Google Photos or Amazon Photos (free for prime). 

 

Depending on your NAS some offer a cloud like service, i have a Synology NAS server and it offers comprehensive cloud like photo access, albums photo indexing etc.. it's really very good.

 

If money is a problem then i would highly recommend Google Photos, the service is free for photos up to a certain resolution (which i find is good enough), the indexing and general meta-abilities are great, being able to search for say 'Dogs' and it will show you the dog photos etc.. the presentation of the app is also very good and works well on iOS and Android, on your Mac desktop you would need to use the web UI as really the only app they support is the automatic uploader.

 

 

[Mary2]

Thank you so much for your posts. They are so informative.