Moving to a new computer

gerrym  wrote If I restore my Elements catalog on my new computer a) Where do those pictures now physically reside

In the restore process, you have to choose yourself where the files will be restored.

My advice is to create a master folder just under the root of your chosen drive an not in your new 'My Pictures' folder.

The choice is either same location (not really true, since it's a new computer) or a 'custom' location of your choice.

The restore process recreates the same folder tree if you choose that option.

The catalog folder is also restored under the master folder you have created. The catalog manager sees it in 'custom' location. The catalog manager can also 'move' the catalog folder back to the default location on the C: drive if you prefer.

b) What happens to the rest of the pictures in the "My Pictures" folder not belonging to the Elements catalog?

Nothing is transferred. Those files are ignored by the catalog and the backup/restore process.

I like having the ability to quickly click on My Pictures and find a photo, I don't need to open up Elements every time I want to view a picture. I could easily just copy My Pictures over to the new computer but then I lose all my metadata, which I want to keep. It seems there must be a better solution to this?

Then, how would you do without Elements? You would use another copy or backup tool (the Explorer?) to migrate the contents of your 'My Pictures' folder to the new computer.

So, you could either run the restore to the newly created master folder after your global copy, which will create a duplicate structure, or you can specify the new 'My Pictures' folder as the destination, which should overwrite the duplicates during the restore.

With my library of 70 000 photos, quickly finding them from the explorer is impossible. To be fast and efficient I do need the organizer and its catalog(s).

jenniferlaufer  wrote Thank you. I need to backup my catalog to another location on my hard drive because I do not have an external drive or DVD reader. When I move to a computer, I will be doing a direct data migration from my old (current) to new computer. How do I ensure that all of my photos and metadata will be transferred properly to the new computer? I have plenty of space on my computer. Thank you.

How would you transfer (migrate) directly from computer to computer?

An external hard drive is not expensive these days.

Of course, you could backup to a new master folder in the same computer. How would you migrate (copy) that backup folder to the new computer?

Some users might consider another workflow when migrating from an old computer to a new one: with desktops it's often possible to add the old computer drive as an additional internal drive in the new computer. Would that be possible for you? Or it's possible to buy a USB drive enclosure to put your old drive into, and use that as the external drive for the restore?