Moving between Mac and PC

[John E Anderson]

Been using Lightroom Classic on two Mac computers with catalog and all files on an external USB drive.  Drive appeared as \\Volumes\Photos on both Macs.  I bought a high-end PC with Windows recently and want to use Lightroom on it.  The external drive shows up as D:\Photos.  I can start LR and open the catalog no problem, but the image files aren't linked.

How can I change the root path of all my photos when switching between the Mac and PC?  All my data is on the external drive, all the image files have a common root folder.

[Per Berntsen · Accepted solution]

Right click the topmost folder in the LrC Folders panel (hopefully you have one folder that contains all the other folders), and choose Update folder location. In the dialog that appears, navigate to the correct folder. 

See also https://www.lightroomqueen.com/lightroom-photos-missing-fix/

[John E Anderson]

I don't see a folder that contains other folders.  If I click the "+" and choose the root of all my photos, it brings up the import dialog.  That is definitely not what I want.

[John E Anderson]

Fixed it.  Not sure exactly how, but I managed to get the Photos\Main folder to appear greyed out.  I right-clicked, selected "Find Missing Folder", and selected the Photos\Main folder, which is under the D:\ drive on my PC.  I assume I can do something similar if/when I migrate back to the Mac.

[dj_paige]

You can use relative folder paths in LrC, and then you won't need to reconnect any files or folders moving from Windows to MAC or vice versa. https://www.lightroomqueen.com/community/threads/unable-to-locate-file-using-both-pc-and-mac-with-a-...