Corrupt Lightroom Catalog

[jessbei]

I was recently working on a Lightroom 4 catalog that was saved on a G-Drive when the hard drive failed. I was able to recover the catalog using data recovery software, but now when I try to open it, Lightroom says it's unable to open due to an unexpected error. I've tried renaming the catalog, importing from a new catalogue, and opening various ways, but nothing works. The catalog seems corrupt. Help! Is there any way to recover the catalog?

[paul_kleczka]

Hi Tuonor-

I can take a look.  I sent you a private message to the email address listed in your profile.

-paul

Paul Kleczka

[melkarl]

Paul, can you be my savior here as well?  What exactly would you need me to send.  I have Dropbox. 

[Guest]

Hi Paul,

I have have a corrupt catalog as well and I was wondering if you could take a look at it.

[wheelsee]

Paul,

I have two catalogs that have now corrupted. Can you take a look?

[tatiana.noel]

HI. My catalog just crashed a few minutes ago. I was working on an image, when I started getting the pinwheel (Mac).

The catalog is backed up, but the last backup was from the last time I worked in LR on the 16th. I'd like to get back the changes I added today.

I've tried repairing the catalog, there is no lock file, and I could not import from it to a new catalog. It's pretty much just saying it's dead.

My email address is tatiananoel@me.com.

My apologies if this is no longer the appropriate course of action for getting support on this. Please advise if I should go another route.

[areohbee]

Hopefully Paul can help rescue.

Anyway, for future, if you save xmp metadata or export a catalog containing recent changes as you work (to a separate device), you'll not end up losing edits when such disaster strikes your working catalog.

Sorry for your misfortune - let us know if Paul (or somebody) does or does not come through for you - thanks.

Rob

[tatiana.noel]

That's great advice, and I will definitely be doing that in the future.

I went ahead and just re-did what I had. Luckily, any edits/pics were done and exported anyway, so they can just be reimported to the backup catalog. And today what I'd mostly done was rate/sort new imports, and the images were still on my SD card. Not too much harm done. Just super scary that it could happen while I'm in the middle of working. I'm pretty good about backing up before quitting for the day.

[richardbouchez]

Hey Paul/Staff - I have a corrupt catalog w/no backup as well, same issues as outlined in the top of this string. Can you take a look?

I won't make that "no backup" mistake again.

Thanks,

-Richard

[paul_kleczka]

Hi Richard-

I sent you a private email.  I hope I can help.

-paul

[richardbouchez]

Thanks Paul! Appreciate the quick response! Zipped, uploaded and emailed per your request.

-Richard

[areohbee]

Richard - please let us know if/when the corrupt catalog is fixed, or whatever happens.. - thanks.

[arrowheadphotography]

Hi Rob,

I have pretty much the same problem and I was wandering if you could help me out as well please?

Arrowheadphotography

[paul_kleczka]

Hi Ben-

I sent you a private email with some details. I can take a look at your catalog to see if there is anything we can do.

-paul

[shawrf1]

Paul - I just experienced an unrepairable lightroom catalog.  Can you help?  Thanks in advance.

EDITED BY MODERATOR GEOFF THE KIWI TO REMOVE EMAIL ADDRESS..

Please don't post email addresses as it can lead to spam, etc.

Contact is best made on the forum via Private Messaging.

[lynnb47013440]

Yes, can I get instructions on how to repair this too please?

[Geoff the kiwi]

Are you still in trouble?? If so respond and I'll nudge the staff member..

Sorry I have been offline.

[mariand6577256]

‌hi, may you please also help me? My computer crashed after working on editing for a few hrs. The catalog is corrupted, I tried running SQLite thing but it's not letting me convert the file....I don't have experience with that so I'm confused about how to really use SQLite. Can someone take a look at the catalog and try to fix that? Thank you so much

[paul_kleczka]

Hi Mariand6577256-

I can take a look at your catalog. I sent you a private message with some details.

Thanks,

-paul

Paul Kleczka

[SGphotostudio]

Hi Paul, I have a smart preview catalog file that is also corrupt.  Can you please take a look for me?  I have the original catalog but used smart previews on a different mac to edit them.  I want to recover the smart preview catalog with all my edits.  Any ideas?

[royc5632]

Hi

I have had a similar problem to many others that when my PC had a fatal crash after updating to Windows 10, I could not recover one of my catalogs, even though I could see it on my back-up.  I received the message that it was corrupt.  I have an earlier catalog, but this does not include the data from the last session where I did a great deal of work on lion and leopard shots I took on safari in Kenya.  Any help to recover the corrupt catalog would be greatly appreciated.

[ktcooney]

Having an issue with potentially corrupt software and unrepairable catalog. Any chance for help?

Thanks so much.

[geec43094463]

Hi Paul

I've just had my Lightroom catalog fail to load and LR says it's unfixable. Would you be able to help at all please?

[AlGooldPhoto]

Like others I have got a corrupted catalog. I get the same 'encountered errors' 'trying to repair' messages as detailed above. I have actually managed to export working catalogs from every month but 1 and when trying to export it as a new catalogue i go into the unexpected error cycle again.
catalog is working most of the time

My catalog does work most of the time, then i get these crashes. I do have some work to complete on the current catalogue, but will put it aside and work with a brand new one from now.

I have seen offers to help with catalogs.  I have put my problem catalogue in a dropbox if there is someone able to assist. It's BIG! 8.55gb

[Geoff the kiwi]

Zip the catalog and don't include previews

>

[AlGooldPhoto]

Thank you, I have put the .lrcat (zipped ) in a drop box, I'll pm you the link