Restoring a catalogue to a new computer

Hi ChrisAnn,
If I understand well, your problem is:
- not enough space on your computer drive - part of your library is kept on an external drive
- you have only one port available
- for the backup you are using another external drive.

Could you specify the size in GB of each of your external files? The total size of your library (roughly equal to the sum of your full backup + incremental one)? If the external drives are big enough there should be no problem.

I would absolutely avoid incremental backups to prepare for a migration on another computer.
(On my present setup, I have a USB hub powered externally for 5 slots, that might be helpful in your situation)

If you have some photos 'missing' during a full backup, the backup will restore anyway, but obviously not the missing files. It's better to try to reconnect them before, but you can reconnect after as well.

You know that you can drag and drop folders with all their subfolders from one drive to another? That means you could migrate the files on your computer to the hard disk holding the other part of your library? That's something you can do with a single slot available. Maybe not as safe as the backup and restore process, but the incremental backup has risks...
The big advantage is that when you get a new computer, you simply have to copy your whole catalog folder from the computer to the same hard drive and store it in the same external drive than your library of photo files. Your new computer will be able to use the copy of the catalog with all files connected.

To keep it simple, forget incremental backups.
If you can find the USB hub, do a full backup. You'll be safe until you want to upgrade.
If not, moving the part of the library from your computer to the external drive with the other part is the solution.
What may be problematic after the move is how to create full backups periodically with a single slot? If your external drive is big enough, it can hold both the library and the backup. Not ideal if your external hard drive crashes. Maybe you could find some relative or friend willing to copy the backup folder on your second external hard drive?

Hi bailey and Sepiana,

We are absolutely on the same line .

An historical comment about incremental backups in the organizer:
The way they have been implemented in the organizer is typical of the time they have been programmed. We should keep in mind that the common storing physical medias at that time were CDs, not yet DVDs and certainly not external USB drives (more than fifteen years now!). It was common to store our photo library to several CD/DVDs with a single catalog on the main drive. For backups we had to use several CD/DVDs even for a full backup.
So, we had to be 'organized' to name the series of backup CDs. Typically, we could store the photo files both on the computer itself and on various CDs, hence the necessity to implement how to manage 'offline' media with 'previews' stored in the computer (another legacy feature). Today, we can ignore incremental backups and 'offline' media... well not quite . For instance the distinction for importing from 'camera or card reader' or importing from 'files and folders' is no longer totally obvious. Photo files on a NAS are considered "offline". You can use a USB stick or a card reader and choose either way (downloading or keeping "offline" with optional previews...) External USB drives are always considered just like internal ones. It's now common to 'import' photos from your smartphone by syncing to Google Photos or using Dropbox. No cables, no card reader, there should be another category "import from the Cloud"!
So to "keep it simple", let us ignore the "legacy features" and follow bailey's advice .

Comparison between incremental backups and full ones:
- They all contain a copy of the database; they contain new and changed files: smaller size
- Since they all contain the database, that seems redundant, but it's not. The big advantage is that you are able to restore to the situation of any of the incremental backup.
- The backup time is still long. Using other syncing utilities is often much faster (I do use Windows Synctoy) but they only keep the latest situation.
- The big problem is that many (most?) users don't understand and test the restore process and it fails when you absolutely need it. The backup folders should be named clearly; you should always start with the latest one and follow the prompted order, newest to oldest (full backup). The idea is very smart but not understood. The latest backup contains the correct database and backup.tly management file. What's new or changed is restored and marked 'done' in the last list of files in the database. You process the next newer backup: only new and changed files in the remaining list are present. They will be restored if the previous step has not yet restored them. Files not in the list and present in the incremental backup will be ignored: that means that they have been deleted. Then same process with the next older backup. This explains why you have to start with the newest backup to ignore deleted files and avoid restoring the same file several times.

I agree with the prior posters, but want to add to the discussion of backups - always factor in the potential of catastrophic loss at your residence. A USB hard drive backup isn't going to save you in the event of a fire/flood/etc. I highly recommend doing what Michel and Bailey recommend and then go an additional step of having a cloud based backup that you can recover from anywhere. Another alternative is to take one of those backup USB drives and bring it somewhere else - work, family, friend, etc.

There is much to say about online backups. That option may be excellent, adequate or unpractical depending on your needs. My own criteria are:
1 - Library size - more than 500GB, 70 000 items. Only 10% are useful for sharing or interesting to leave to the family
2 - upload/download speed: I have a very good fiber connection: (35,8 / 39,4 Mb/s now)
3 - safety/privacy/longtime reliability: must be taken into account
4 - sharing: I often need to access my useful (generally recent) pictures from other computers and devices. The problem is that you no longer have the organizer catalogs to search for items. Lightroom is better, but not perfect. The ease of use of online syncing sites (OneDrive, Dropbox, Google Photos...) makes it very easy to retrieve smartphones pictures without any cable. Sharing a collection for an event only requires a link to selected people.

So, I have decided to use online services as sharing tools, not full backup ones.
I have created a selection of files to be shared - family history - recent events etc. They are exported as jpegs. I could resize them for optimal viewing size on displays or good 4 x 6 in. prints.
The collection is synced (I prefer Dropbox, but OneDrive or similar would do). It is organized by a folder hierarchy and I 'write metadata to files'. Even with a slow local connection speed, it's accessible everywhere on my smartphone.
- I use Dropbox to sync that collection on my computer. When I have taken photos with my smartphone, I select the files to sync to the Cloud, then from the synced folder on my computer I do import in my catalog (no need for cables or card reader).
- My Wife is now shooting a lot with her good Android phone. She uses the saving option of all her shots to Google Photos. From the computer, I can open her Photos library and download them very fast. Same result.

I still think that for real backups, several external drives in different location are the best safety for me. At least two dedicated to organizer periodical full backups and one for using Microsoft Synctoy for syncing after each editing session.

Doing a backup onto the same HDD where the original files are stored really defeats the purpose of doing backups because when the hard drive fails you have lost the original files and the backup.  The backup really should be made on a separate HDD.

Regarding backing up multiple catalogues, I would back them up onto the same separate hard drive but in different folders.

eg...On the backup HDD I would have a folder called something like MyPhotosWareHouse_backup.  Then create a separate subfolder under MyPhotosWareHouse_backup and output each catalogue's backup to its respective subfolder.  The subfolders could be called the same as the catalogue name that is backed up to that subfolder.

HTH

You can use the same external drive, but you have to take care not to mix backup folders, catalogs and folder trees. It's not ideal for speed nor safety, but that may help for a migration process.
Especially if you have several catalogs, you have to distinguish two situations:
1 - The files managed in both catalogs are totally distinct: no big problem. You may restore twice on the same master folder. That master folder will be shared from both catalogs. Your restored catalog folders will be separate as before.
2 - The files are at least partly common to both catalogs. The safe solution is to restore each catalog on a different master folder. That will create duplicates for common files, but there is no risk in managing the files in a catalog, the other one will stay correctly connected with its own set of files.