sharing images on Macs

Question for you Mac experts.

 

I have a relatively large collection of photos over the years (120GB). I currently have an iMac 24in and plan on getting another (recent

convert from Vista). My photos reside on the iMac but are backed up by an Apple Time Capsule (1 terrabyte). I currently use Adobe

Bridge CS3 and Capture NX for file management. I got dismayed with iPhoto with all the bloat (duplicate files, modified files, blah blah

blah).

 

My question is: if I get another Mac, what is the best solution to enable it to view my photos? Can the Time Capsule act as a NAS in that

regard or should I just point it to my current iMac? Is there a preferred viewer I should use?

 

Thanks in advance!

You can set up a network with time capsule and allow sharing between both machines. Just go to "sharing" and check "File sharing" and set the user and password and choose the locations/folders you wish to be shared by both computers. All you have to do after that is connect to the other computer (you'll see the other machine / Mac HD / on the left column) and just browse the files.

Hope that helps.

 

-Herson

I would certainly not use the time capsule as a shared file storage drive - its function is to be a backup volume. While in

one sense it is "network attached" and it is "storage" it is a different animal than the usual NAT unit. You are quite likely to

end up with serious version control issues if you are opening files from your backup drive this way.

 

Keep the time capsule for purely backup purposes, and do your file sharing in a different way.

 

I would simply set up file sharing on both machines and let the new iMac mount the drive of the old one over the network.

Or get an actual NAT for shared file storage - they are not that expensive these days.

 

Dan

Yes you can use Time Capsule as a photo server. I do recommend backing it up. I use two of them on my home network.

Thanks for your responses. It looks like there are two opinions regarding the usage of the time capsule here. I would think using it (if possible) would be faster than sharing off my iMac.

 

Can you recommend snappy viewing software for this situation?

You may want to try this program to remove duplicates in iPhoto: Duplicate Annihilator.

 

http://www.brattoo.com/propaganda/

 

You may be having a problem if you are importing RAW with an embedded jpeg.

I use Aperture using a wireless router as a network. You store your photos on one mac and the second mac can use the same Aperture

library. The last time I checked Lightroom does not allow this over a network. I do not know about Bridge. 6500 photos and counting.

 

Fred Hawker

Bridge has no issues with wireless networks. Time Capsule was designed to act as a network storage device, it was just

designed with greater functionality for Time Machine. I would not use Time Capsule for both. File sharing is great if one

machine is a dedicated server or want to move a few files quickly from one machine to another. But to pull from a Mac that

is not a dedicated server machine will hamper performance greatly of the server Machine, it can also slow the network. I

have seen this many times. When asked about this my answer is the same. I can not tell you when the computer will fail

but it will fail.

check out Memeo LifeAgent. It runs backups the way I like and makes sharing easier. Right now, I'm using both time

machine and lifeagent on separate external drives. You could set it up for networked backups, and it will keep folders

synchronized on both your macs, doing it all in the background once you get it initiated.

Not that this entirely applies but it was before I had a Mac or two. (another one hiding from Vista) Since I

worked in the Storage Industry for 7 years I built my own NAS (Network Attached Storage) long before 1TB drives.

It functions as a stand alone server (linux) and storage bin for all of my files. The reason I went this route

as opposed to a single or double drive was that I've seen drives fail on a regular basis and worried I'd loose

too many photos if that happened. My storage bin is a 1TB Raid 5, with 5 250GB SATA drives and has just under

1TB of space. I like it because when a drive does fail, its simple to replace it with a new one and regenerate

the data on that drive. I lose nothing and I've actually tested this 2x over the past 3+ years.

 

There's some free software out there called FreeNas that lets you setup something similar fairly quickly on an

old PC and I recommend it over the single drive approach. This way when a single drive does fail, that 120GB of

photos in your collection isn't just a memory. Keep in mind that raid 5 as I have is only capable of surviving a

single failure, once a drive fails I immediately replace that drive and rebuild the data, ready for another

failure to occur. If 2 drives fail simultaneously I could lose all data. Since it is linux and Software Raid I

don't have to worry about controllers failing and losing my data, I only lose access. With that in mind I've had

this for almost 5 years running solidly and have upgraded many components aside from the drives with no impact to

the system.

 

In setting something like this up you build a network and keep the time capsule as a true backup instead of a

shared storage device. Plus by maintaining 2 copies if one does suffer from catastrophic failure you still have

a backup. Trying to ensure 100GB of photos are safely backed up on optical media can be time consuming and

frustrating.