Successful backup/restore on new computer, but folder organization changed

[Marjon1]

I just restored a full backp of PSE23 and all photos from an external hard drive to a new Win 11 computer.  On the old Win 10 computer all photos were contained in the Windows 10 Pictures folder. But after the restoration in the new computer I found my Windows 11 Pictures folder was empty.  When initiating the restoration I found the lower portion of the Restore menu box direction for specifying the folder to restore to, to be a little confusing.  After checking past Community posts on this topic I eventually followed a suggestion to specify the path indicated in the Organizer help menu, which was C:\ProgramData\Adobe\ElementsOrganizer\Catalogs\My Catalog; and checked the box to restore the original folder structure. The restoration completed and the PSE23 software seems to  be operating  correctly.  However whereas my actual photos were previously contained in the Pictures folder they are now in C:\ProgramData\Adobe\ElementsOrganizer\Catalogs\My Catalog\Users\My username\Pictures\xxxxx. This long path doesn't appear to make any functional difference to the PSE software, which still works fine (and much faster on the new machine).  But I'm wondering if I should somehow simplify the path and get the photos located pack in the Pictures folder. By dragging and dropping the folders in the Folders view of the Organizer. Would there be any value or point in trying to do that (beyond familiarity with how it used to look), or is it best left alone?

[Greg_S.]

You are absolutely right that the instructions are confusing and lead to unexpected results.

While it doesn't make any difference functionally, I think it would be better to drag the current   . . . My Catalog\Users\My username\Pictures\ folder to the root of the C drive.  This should give you an easier path for finding your current photos and importing new ones.  More importantly, this will separate your media files from the My Catalog folder. 

If you decide to follow my suggestion, please show us a screenshot of the following folder after you move the Pictures folder:

C:\ProgramData\Adobe\ElementsOrganizer\Catalogs\My Catalog

We should then be able to see whether the catalog folder is in order.

[Marjon1]

Thanks Greg.  I looked futher and my restoration of the backup created a larger mess than I thought. I see path chains concatenated on to pieces of other paths and redundant catalogs created at other times that don't appear to be needed or connected to anything. I think it is likely the cumulative result of numerous successive updates, from version to version; and numerous (partly fumbled) moves from old to new computers over the decades (I think I started with PSE 5 and since then have moved through numerous new computers ). I  realize I would lose all the special information (facial recognition, tagging etc.) that I added over the years, but I'm wondering if I could just start with a clean sheet. With a new reset Windows 11 computer and a new download of PSE23 with a new default (empty) default catalog that I could start populating by importing my entire Pictures folder (20,000+ images) from the old computer. That would allow PSE to set up new, unduplicated or repetitive paths for my whole collection and clean up the messed up tree I'm seeing at the moment. Would that work?

[Greg_S.]

You can always create a new catalog.  But before you do that, let's figure out if it is really necessary to do so.

So, my first question is whether you are seeing all the messy files and catalog extras only in Windows File Explorer or also within the Organizer's My Folders panel of the catalog?  If you are able to see just the Pictures folder and sub-folders in the Organizer panel, then it may not be necessary to worry about the other concatenated paths.  Make sure you are in Tree View, not List View in the Organizer folders panel.  Let me know if you are unsure about my question.

Also let me know if you really want to create a new catalog.  I have some suggestions that will save you some work and preserve some of your information. 

[Marjon1]

Thanks Greg, for responding.  I didn't get the usual email notification of a response so did not realize you had responded until today.  In the end I did decide to go ahead with (another) full Win 11 reset, followed by a new install of PSE23 (including the Camera Raw plugin from its Help menu option). I then copied the contents of the Pictures folder in my old computer to the Pictures folder in the new one, and imported them all into Photoshop.  It worked (more or less) as expected, and I now have a new, single catalog and logical file structure and file locations I can understand. I'm OK with loss of the historical Photoshop modifications I made, and can always redo them if necessary.  It all works very fast now and everything went fine until this morning, when I tried to import 52 Raw (.ARW)  photo and video files, using PSE23, from the SD card of my Sony 6700 camera to my new computer. It skipped 38 files and imported 14.  The 14 are actually 7 of the videos (imported as .mp4 files) together with 7 .jpg images that I did not take, but which appear to be the first frame from each video. The 14 files were assigned a new numbering system I didn't recognize, different from that on the SD card. It was quite strange.  My first thought was that the Camera Raw plugin may have been too old to correctly process the files.  I cannot tell from "Properties" of my Camera Raw plug-in file what version it is, but as best I can tell from my internet search PSE23 uses uses version 15.2 of Camera Raw as default.  But according to Adobe's published document  the minimum version needed to process .ARW  from a Sony A6700 camera is version 15.5.  So I'm now wondering if there is a way to update the Camera Raw version now on my camera up to (at least) version 15.5.  And if so , how?  Any thoughts? Thanks.

[Greg_S. · Accepted solution]

I believe you will be able to update the Camera Raw plugin to the latest (currently 17.3).

Follow my instructions, found here, precisely.

[Marjon1]

OK Greg. I found a partial workarorund for Sony's .ARW raw files using Adobe's DNG converter, but it didn't work very well for me.  I also found out later that I could have quickly found my Camera Raw version by clicking on Help>About Plug-ins>Camera Raw in the Photo Editor. When I did so I found that I have version 14.4 of Camera Raw, not 15.2.  Thanks for the update instructions.  I'll give it a try.

[Marjon1]

Hi again Greg. I started to follow your instructions, precisely, and downloaded the latest ACR version (17.3).  But before installing it I checked the folders specified in the next steps, to be sure I could execute them. I found the Camera Raw .8bi file in C:\Program Files\Common Files\Adobe\Plug-ins\CC\File Formats. I then found what I think would be the folder mentioned in your list, into which this copy of  Camera Raw .8bi was to be pasted, but with a slightly different pathname, which was C:\Program Files\common Files\Adobe\Plug-ins\Elements 21\File Formats. I assume the slight differenrce ("Elements 21" instead of just "21") makes no difference.  However what I did notice was that the File Formats folder at the end of this path already contains an identically named Camera Raw .8bi file.  However that version of it in this (Elements 21) File Formats folder is only 162,877KB, whereas the version to be  copied/pasted, in the first (CC) File Formats folder, is 221,745KB.  So I'm wondering if it will be OK to have 2 different versions of the same named file in the same folder, or whether pasting with Win 11 should/would just replace the existing version in the Elements 21 File Formats folder?. Is that what you would expect to see/happen?

[Greg_S. · Accepted solution]

Sorry for the confusion.  My error. Yes, you have the correct folder to paste the Camera Raw.8bi file:

C:\Program Files\Common Files\Adobe\Plug-Ins\Elements 21\File Formats

Since the original Camera Raw.8bi file already exists in that folder, you should rename it (and include a tilde as a prefix) so that it is something like ~Camera Raw.8bi.original.  That way, if something goes wrong, it is easy to return the file back to the original version.

(If you had simply pasted the same-named file into the folder, a message would have popped up asking whether you wanted to overwrite the original.  If you said yes, the original would be replaced.  If you said no, the new version would have been given a different name with a suffix something like Camera Raw (1).8bi.  That would not work.)

[Marjon1]

Copy That.  I'll now install the ACR v. 17.3 download and copy/paste the .8bi file as per instructions. And thanks for the advice on how to rename and keep the original .8bi file.   

[Marjon1]

I completed the procedure per your advice and instructions, inserted my SD card with Sony .ARW and XAVC S video files into the card slot, and imported using the "From Camera or Card Reader" option.  Result: Smooth import of all files, with none skipped as before. Your workaround worked perfectly.  I started out thinking my only solution would be to buy a new 2025 license and start over with a new and unfamiliar PSE version.  But ended up with my new computer running Windows 11 and my familiar PSE23 software that fulfils all my needs, running faster than ever and processing all the output I have created to date on a new Sony camera. So thank you so much Greg, for sharing your most valuable experience and knowledge; I certainly could not have reached this point without it.