Cannot migrate LR6.14 catalog to use in LR Classic 13.4

[StevenAckerman]

After a long hiatus, went to process a recent family photo shoot using LR6.14 (perpetual). Surprise - it's no longer perpetual - it now doesn't work. Seems that Adobe has taken the older license servers offline.

Decided to try the photography subscription offerring. Signed up, downloaded LR Classic 13.4, opened and it offerred to migrate my LR6.14 catalog to the new format.

Checked the box to verify the catalog integrity - told it to go ahead. It chewed on it for a few dozen seconds then an error popped up indicating that the catalog cannot be migrated. Tried it several times using older verified backups of the LR6.14 catalog - no joy.

Kind of surprised - in the past I've migrated from LR3 to LR4 to LR5 and then to LR6 with no problems.

Is there any kind of log file produced somewhere that I can look at to ascertain what it might not be happy about ?

Has anybody else experienced this SNAFU ?  Any suggestions ?

LR Classic v13.4

Windows 10 Pro v22H2 build 19045.4651

Thank you.

[Moved from ‘Bugs’ to ‘Discussions’ by moderator, according to forum rules. A ‘bug’ is not just another word for any problem with software!]

[GoldingD]

First up, as you start LrC via the alternate Prompt screen, go ahead and create a new catalog. Lets see if a new catalog at least starts. This is not to abandon your old imports or edits, but to just see if LrC can start.

It may be that your old catalog is corrupt. Perhaps if LrC using a new catalog will run, then you might be able to import the old catalog into the new one.

Also, that backup catalog, it is compressed, and hopefully on some other hard drive that the primary catalog. Before you attempted to use it, did you copy it to another location, and uncompress it before attempting to use it? Copying it is a protection measure, uncompression it is a mandatory step.

[StevenAckerman]

First, thank you for your quick reply.

Yes - I have run LrC and created a new catalog. It starts correctly with the new catalog.

I have also tried importing the old catalog into the new catalog as you suggested. This results in a message box to try upgrading the catalog directly by opening it with Lightroom 7:

I don't know where to obtain Lr7, Lr8, Lr9, Lr10, Lr11 and Lr12 in order to achieve this 'migration'...

When I dismiss this warning, my folders of photos appear in the Library Navigator section, and can be individually imported as if for the first time.

However - none of my edits are present - 12 years of post processing work. 

As for the backup catalog - yes it was on another drive and I did copy it and unzip it before trying to migrate it.

[Lumigraphics]

I take it you don't write changes to XMP files? ALWAYS ALWAYS write to XMP, no matter what anyone on here says. Its a built-in backup method for your edits and metadata.

[StevenAckerman]

Good advice - thank you !

[GoldingD]

Sounds like unless another member replys with a solution, that you will need to contact Adobe. Typically by starting a chat.

for example, bring up your copy of the Creative Cloud Desktop, select the three parallel lines top left, select Help, select Contact us..

[JohanElzenga · Accepted solution]

There might be a problem upgrading very old catalogs to the new 13-3 format, so what you could try is the following: in the Creative Cloud app, where you install your applications, you can choose to install an older version by clicking on the three dots next to the Install button. So you could try to uninstall version 13.4 and temporarily install version 13.2. Then try to upgrade that old catalog. If you are (very) lucky that will work, so then you can update 13.2 to 13.4 and upgrade the 13.2 upgraded catalog to 13.4. You could even try this by temporarily installing Lightroom Classic 12.

[StevenAckerman]

Yay !

Installing LrC12 I was able to sucessfully migrate my Lr6.14 catalog to LrC12. Checking it out, but all edits appear to be present and intact !

Thank you for this recommendation. I didn't know that I could install an earlier version.

I'm now going to make a verified backup of this catalog, reinstall LrC13.4, and see if it will now migrate the LrC12 migration of the Lr6.14 catalog.

Will mark this as correct if this succeeds.

[StevenAckerman]

Thank you - I will do this if I have no success with trying an earlier version. 

[StevenAckerman]

Sorry - replied to wrong reply.

I am now going to try LrC12 - the oldest version that I could find.  Interesting that LrC13.4 recommends starting with LrC7 - which is unobtainium.

Thank you.

[StevenAckerman]

Kudos to Johan Elzenga, below for his suggestion of temporarily installing a older LrC version and trying the Lr6.14 catalog migration, then, if it worked, reinstalling the latest LrC13.4 version and migrating the successful older migration. I went back to LrC12 and then...

This Worked !

Marked his answer below as the correct answer.

Many thanks to him and everyone else who took the time to read my post and offer suggestions !

-- Steven Ackerman

[Rob_Cullen]

@JohanElzenga  This thread, and your good answer, raises an interesting question.  When Lr-Classic goes to next version (v14?) legacy v12 will not be shown in CC (Current & one previous) to allow installing v12.  The result being that it will not be possible to upgrade catalogs from v6 and earlier without a request to Adobe for Lr-Classic v12.

[JohanElzenga]

I hope that this turns out to be just a bug, and that v14 will not have a problem upgrading these old catalogs.