Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6 and Catalina

[sergeg40241845]

Hello everyone, has anyone found a way to get Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6 to work on the new version of Apple Catalina. Thank you

[JohanElzenga · Accepted solution]

Lightroom 6 works on Catalina if it was already installed and activated on your computer before you updated to Catalina. Lightroom 6 will not work on Catalina if you try to install it after that computer has been updated to Catalina, or if you try to install it on a new computer that is running Catalina. There is no fix or work around.

[skwizard]

Serge, same happened with my mac too. The resolution I got was removing the application completely. It was mentioned to me that Lightroom 6 is 32 bit while Catalina is 64 bits operating system.

Mantavya

[JohanElzenga]

No, Lightroom 6 is not 32 bits. It's 64 bits. Only the component for license checking / activation is 32 bits. That's why it works if Lightroom 6 is already installed before you upgrade to Catalina. 

[Peter140]

Hello together, I also bought and registred a Lightroom 6 Version at the end of 2017. Systemrequirements Intel Mehrkern Prozessor with 64-Bit-Support ??? It was still running on my older 21 iMac, because of producing private 4K movies I had to buy a 27iMac, newest generation,top equiped. But it's not possible to install LR6 because the Installation Manger is 32-Bit technology. I'm not a professional user and also the Apple guy who supported me when I changed the Mac's  didn't know about this problem. What can I do? I use this program very rare but I paid more than 200,- EUROs for it and it's not older than 27 months! I'm not able to change to a cloud abonnement

[dj_paige]

What can you do? As far as I know, the only way to get Lightroom to install on Catalina is to upgrade (pay money) to the current version, which is Lightroom Classic 9.2 and requires an annual subscription (but you can choose to pay monthly 12 times or once a year).

[Peter140]

Thank you very much, but I’m not able to pay another money for subscription, therefore I use LR6 to rare.
In my opinion ADOBE is a weak company because they knew years ago that APPLE will upgrade to 64 Bit technology and now they force people to buy a subscription.
Kind regards Peter

[TheDigitalDog]

I will add, even LR5 runs under Catalina (I have a copy). Yes, maps mod is broken but that's got nothing to do with 64 bit technology. 

[kjetilj5340681]

So I did find a workaround, it's not pretty but it works.

I was so lucky that I finally had the opertunity to upgrade my machine to a newer one. It came with Catalina and I restored my backup to it and started Lightroom. It worked, but only once. Next time it refused to start so I started using google finding responses that I had to upgrade my Lightroom to a subscription model. Since it started once after restore I was curious about why that was and ended up analyzing what changed after first application start. It turned out that after application starts it tries to execute the 32-bit autentication binaries and breaks the authentication files. Next time Lightroom starts it will fail.

My workaround was to restore the authentication file from backup and make a copy of them.

When I want to start Lightroom I copy the old autentication files over the broken ones and start Lightroom.

Restore these two files from backup :

/Library/Application\ Support/Adobe/SLCache

/Library/Application\ Support/Adobe/SLStore

[Najki]

It was the same for me. I did restore a backup after launching my new MacBook Pro on Catalina. The first time, Lightroom started but failed on other attempts. I've tried restoring these two directories but now I get an error saying:

Configuration error
Please uninstall and reinstall the product.

If this problem still occurs, please contact Adobe technical support for help, and mention the error code shown at the bottom of this screen.

Error: 16

http://www.adobe.com/support/

So it didn't work for me on first try 😞 But I did search for hints on working around this "error 16" and found this topic. This helped and Lightroom launched again:

sudo chmod -R 777 /Library/Application\ Support/Adobe

[Peter140]

I‘m still very annoyed about Adobe that they force private user to buy the online solution which cost a lot monthly. I was using Lr only to pimp up my pictures. In the meantime I sold it with my „old“ Mac.

Kind regards Peter

[TheDigitalDog]

Adobe doesn't force anything on anyone. 

[Najki]

Yes. It doesn't. But what if someone did use Photoshop and Lightroom professionally in the past (so he has licenses for older versions) but changed professions? He would like to remain access to his old work and family photos but doesn't need anything more? Is it okay that this person is expected to buy a subscription for a pack of Photoshop+Lightroom just to access Lightroom catalogues?

Yes, it's not entirely Adobe's fault. Apple is guilty for ditching 32-bit apps. But as we can see with these workarounds - publishing a small update for Lightroom just to keep it running shouldn't be a big problem. It does however require a little bit of good will on Adobe's end.

[Peter140]

Hi,

in my opinion it’s Adobes fault because Adobe has got the information that Apple will update to 64 Bit technology.

Otherwise Adobe printed on the packing material: system requirements 64Bit technology !!!!!!

The whole software from Lr ist 64 Bit, only the install software is in 32 Bit technology, please explain me why?

It make no sense to discuss this matter for a longer time. I’m a private user and I'm really annoyed as I already wrote,
because your offer for a monthly license is too expensive for my kind of usage.

Kind regards and please don’t answer because I’m not anymore interested on Adobe, except you will offer an interesting solution.

Kind regards Peter

[JohanElzenga]

"But what if someone did use Photoshop and Lightroom professionally in the past (so he has licenses for older versions) but changed professions? He would like to remain access to his old work and family photos but doesn't need anything more?"

That good will is there and it's pretty good indeed. Such a person would retain access to his pictures. Lightroom Classic still works when you let your license expire. Only the develop and map modules cease to work, but you can still access your pictures, print them, export them, show them in slide shows, and even make small edits in the Quick Develop panel. So what such a person can do is get Lightroom Classic as trial, and then let the trial expire.

[Najki]

Good to know.

Still my DSLR is gathering dust on the shelf and from time to time I do take a few family photos. I would like to be able to use Lightroom for that with all features to which I'm used to and for which I did pay in the past. But using Lightroom once every 1 or 2 months doesn't economically justify paying a monthly subscription forever for that and the other app (Photoshop) which I don't use at all.

I did pay a fair amount of money to Adobe for 4 licenses in the past and I do feel very disappointed that I can't use them anymore.

Seeing a lot of similar opinions, I'm sure there are many people like me. Amateurs used to old Adobe products. Eventually most of them will just move to basic OS-based photo catalogues and other editing software. That's a lot of money lost for Adobe if it won't come up with a better offer for non-professionals.

[JohanElzenga]

You can use your licenses from the past. Just don't upgrade your system software if you want to keep using legacy software. Or use the 'expired Lightroom Classic' method like I explained. You are free to give your opinion about Adobe's policies, but first of all this is the wrong forum for that because this is a user-to-user forum, and secondly I don't think Adobe will change those policies anyway. 

[Thor Egil Leirtrø]

@Peter140   If you sold your old Lightroom with the old computer you don't have a license to it any longer. You need to buy a new license.

[FredBaltus]

I read that you can have it installed on two computers...

[FredBaltus]

Hi, What doe you mean with restore? Did you mean copy the files in the lightroom package to the same place on your new imac. And also files from the Adobe library? In Library\Application Support\Adobe?

Thanks,

Fred

[romainr88376488]

This worked perfectly. I copyed the three files "Sl store", "Sl store V1" and "Sl cache" on an USB key and replaced the ones on the new machine with them. LR 6 then launched without any problem.

[sprague10]

Can you give a step by step on how to do this?

[sprague10]

Is it possible tell us how you restored those files. Like where do you go to put them? Thanks

[romainr88376488]

Hi! Sorry I just saw your question.

-Search for thé 3 files "SL STORE", "SL STORE V1" and "SL CACHE" on your old computer (with Finder) 

-Copy thèm on a usb key,

-Search for those same files on your new computer,

-Delete them and put the ones on your key where they were,

-Launch Lightroom,

-Enjoy. 

You'll have to do the delete/paste partt each time ypu close LR. 

[FredBaltus]

A question, do you mean that you restore an oldder OS then Catalina? Then install LR6 and afterwards you update to catalina?

THanks ,

Fred