Organizer loses file location

[Gerry_H]

Hi. I installed a new SSD in my PC and migrated everything from my old HDD C: drive across. I kept the HDD connected as the L: drive. I then ran Elements 13 Organizer from the SSD and found it linked to the image files on the L: drive. So I deleted the L: drive images and the Elements catalogue, and imported the C: drive images into a new catalogue. Organizer then links to the correct C: file locations. But when I close and then restart Organizer it again tries to link to the deleted L: files. Please can you help?

[MichelBParis]

The organizer was created nearly twenty years ago, long before users wanted to replace their standard hard drive with small SSD disks. One of the most frequent questions in this forum is how to move your catalog and library to a new computer or drive:

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop-elements/kb/backup-restore-move-catalog-photoshop.html

That is still true today. The solution to your problem is to restore the full backup you have (or should have) made before the transformation. You can restore anywhere on your old drive or any other one, but you can't use the old library location,; that's because the catalog has recorded all your media files as being in the C : drive and now they are in L: It's as if you had moved your media files to another drive or master folder. Reconnecting files does not work as expected, because the cloning of your old disk to the SSD has recorded the internal serial number of the old disk. The catalog sees two drives with the same internal number, and it is lost.

This issue could have been avoided if your media files had been in a different internal or external drive. The cloning process is the culprit.

Also, to recover all your organization, tags and all, you can't use 'import', even if you have 'written metadata to tags'. You'll miss a number of features like albums, stacks, version sets, creations and probably places locations.

If you use the cloning ut

[Gerry_H]

Hi. Thank you for sharing your knowledge. I've changed the volume ID on the L: drive and everything is now good. 

[MichelBParis]

Good news!

Unfortunately, not many users in your situation will be able to follow your smart advice.

For them, the general rule to do a full backup before such a change is the best and simplest answer. The other advice would be to ask for help in this forum before attempting the drive change. Even some tech note by Adobe to warn about the risk would never be read...