Problem Copying a Lightroom catalogue from Windows to Mac help please

[paulr17287058]

I'm trying to copy a light room catalogue from Windows to Mac via an external hard drive.

i have copied both the catalogue file and the previews file in Windows onto the external hard drive and then connected the drive to the I  Mac . I can see the previews file but not the catalogue file. So subsequently the Mac recognises the previews file as a data base file but it has no associated application.

i have tried this both on an I Mac and Mac book pro With the same problem. When I do the same thing with a Lightroom catalogue created on the Mac book pro both files can be seen on the I Mac And I can open the catalogue.

the Lightooom catalogue is version 5.7.1

help appreciated please!

thanks

[99jon]

I did this some time ago and seem to remember just copying the .lrcat file into the pictures folder and leaving LR to generate new previews on the fly.

The problem was that folders previously on the “C” drive were associated with the Mac HD, whereas I wanted to keep the images on the external hard drive. But the problem was easily resolved by right-click (control-click) on folder name’s and choosing “Find Missing Folder” The catalog links are quickly restored especially if all the photo folders are structured under a root/parent folder.

[paulr17287058]

Thanks it's just dawned on me that the catalogue files I am trying to copy across are very large, and the drive is formatted to MS dos fat 32 so that both Windows and Mac can read it - I believe the maximum file size for this formatting is 4gb - the catalogue is bigger than this......I'm going to try and transfer the files using drop box......