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LeginW10
Participating Frequently
June 11, 2019
Question

Lightroom cannot open catalog because Lightroom cannot save changes to this location

  • June 11, 2019
  • 3 replies
  • 4255 views

I am getting this message.

I am running Lightroom 6 and Windows 7. I have two external hard-drives. One is used to back up the other and I keep my Lightroom Catalog on the first external hard-drive with a back up going to the second.


I got this message after no problems backing upto my original external hard drive for several months. Then all of a sudden this cropped up.

So I made sure to back up everything (my catalog) to another external hard drive and I was then able to open Lightroom 6. I assumed I had an issue with the first external hard drive.


As a result, I carried on using the second hard drive as labelled above. Again, for about a month I have had no issue. Today I closed out of Lightroom and then went back to it later and got this message. Same as what happened on the first external.

The only solution I have come up with so far is to reformat my external hard drive. As you can imagine, this takes quite a while. Some 8 to 10 hours. I do not understand what is happening or why?

I read something about checking permissions and I checked and everything seemed good. I am the only person using the computer and there is no reason why I shut down Lightroom and then it fails to open again with this message. It is bewildering. I would appreciate knowing what to try next time it happens as I'm sure it will. I am now having to reformat yet again.

    This topic has been closed for replies.

    3 replies

    S
    Sombat
    Participant
    February 21, 2020

    I have tried for 100 hours.  Here is my idea of what causes the cannot save to this location:  The external drive, eg on USB, goes to sleep or stops and then this OS sets the read only attribute on the folder where .lcat is reciding.
    My solution that works:

    a) drag the folder of the .lcat to a hard drive and start it from there.  it works and it will find your data on your external drive as before.  I call my data folder on the external drive " Photos controlled by CAT " jut to know that these are originals and not edited by Lightroom.  You can continue with all operations as usual import export keywords etc all on the external drive you cannot access.
    b) More advnced: Create and image file that could turn into a Virtual Drive on one of the internal drives.
    Then copy the .lcat folder into the virtual drive.  Open from the virtueal drive and follow as under a).
    The virtual drive can be opened by password, and encrypted and of any size. (search mount file in virtual drive).
    That means having 2 virtual drives one for the .lcat and one for the Data itself.
    For backup purposes the folder with .lcat can be copied to the drive with your data. Normally it will work there
    for a while, but then when you get the cannot write to this drive, then you move it into another drive as described.

    dj_paige
    dj_paige
    Legend
    June 11, 2019

    I read something about checking permissions and I checked and everything seemed good.

    Show us a screen capture of the permissions on the EXACT FOLDER where the catalog file is located. The error message seems to indicate it is on the O: drive but not in any folder, is that correct it is not in any folder?

    Also, you can try, as an experiment, copying the catalog file to someplace that does have write permission, such as the default Pictures folder, and see if it opens properly from there.

    L
    LeginW10Author
    Participating Frequently
    June 11, 2019

    I can't do that as I've now re-formatted my external hard drive.
    What I don't understand is why this happens?

    I can be quite happily working on my catalog and then close Lightroom. Why does this happen when I go to re-open it? What is happening to cause it to do this? That's what I need to understand because it is going to happen again and I need to know why.

    I have a system to get back up and running because I can simply reformat my drives but I'd rather not. I'd rather treat the symptom not the cause.

    dj_paige
    dj_paige
    Legend
    June 11, 2019

    Please show us a screen capture of the permissions on the exact folder where the catalog is located.

    Akash Sharma
    Akash Sharma
    Legend
    June 11, 2019

    Hi LeginW10,

    Sorry that you're getting an error message "Lightroom cannot open catalog because Lightroom cannot save changes to this location" while Lightroom was backing up the catalog.

    I'd recommend that you restore restore Lightroom Classic app preferences to default and let us know if the issue still persists? Please refer this article for step by step instructions:

    How to set Lightroom Classic preferences

    Thanks,

    Akash

    L
    LeginW10Author
    Participating Frequently
    June 11, 2019

    Thanks Akash... I have done so and will let you know.

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