I am using iCloud photo library and have chosen to download originals to my MacBook Pro because I want to have local copies of all my photos.
My SSD is almost full and I will most likely have to switch to optimising mac storage and storing originals only in iCloud. I would like to be able to still easily back up the whole library to an external drive. Is there any reasonable way to accomplish this for a 300GB library? I have a 1Gbps internet connection in my home so there's enough bandwidth.
I don't want to have an external drive as my primary library location since I wouldn't be able to use photos without the drive attached.
I assume that I'm not the only one with MacBook Pro and big photo library so I'd also like to hear about any alternative solutions that offer easy backups and ability to access the photos with all iOS devices.
Hello!
Did you finally find a solution?
I am in your same situation and looking for a good solution. I have found the usual ones. Also found this link but it is a "non oficial" way of doing it
https://www.reddit.com/r/synology/comments/4r2t2q/backup_icloud_photo_library_to_synology_with/
Also another post from synology forums talking about ds photo, but nothing clear...
https://forum.synology.com/enu/viewtopic.php?t=119592
Thanks!
[doublepost=1502013158][/doublepost]A bit more information abou using synology ds photo and iCloud:
https://www.reddit.com/r/synology/comments/5m80su/ds_photo_app_and_reliability_of_backup/
It seems that you can back it up since version 4.12 of DS Photo or something like that.
Hello!
Did you finally find a solution?
I am in your same situation and looking for a good solution. I have found the usual ones. Also found this link but it is a "non oficial" way of doing it
https://www.reddit.com/r/synology/comments/4r2t2q/backup_icloud_photo_library_to_synology_with/
Also another post from synology forums talking about ds photo, but nothing clear...
https://forum.synology.com/enu/viewtopic.php?t=119592
Thanks!
[doublepost=1502013158][/doublepost]A bit more information abou using synology ds photo and iCloud:
https://www.reddit.com/r/synology/comments/5m80su/ds_photo_app_and_reliability_of_backup/
It seems that you can back it up since version 4.12 of DS Photo or something like that.
Ok, I have found it and configured. It has started uploading around 57k photos, I will come back later and tell you my experience
Don't know what the Synology is going to do.
I will try to clarify my setup a bit:
- I have a MacBook Pro with 512GB SSD an iPhone (64GB) and an iPad (256GB).
- I have like 322GB of pictures. Local copy with original files on the Mac and "optimized" library on iPhone and iPad.
- I am running out of space on my Mac so I need to find a solution to "optimize" the library on my Mac but I still want to have a local copy of my original pictures.
I have also a Synology DS-213+ at home that I was using as my local cloud, but last December I activated iCloud and I am moving everything there.
I was "googling" about it and found this post and several others, started investigating and found that, with the app "DS Photo" from Synology, you can configure an "auto upload" feature to copy all the pictures from your iOS device to your NAS. It claims to support iCloud Photo Library also. So I don't know how it works, I suppose the iOS device is downloading a copy of the picture and uploading it to the NAS, but I am not sure for the moment.
I have configured the feature and I will tell you the results.
Also it will have some problems:
- It will not support Live Photos, or will sync them as a picture+video.ç
- I think it has also problems with photo boosts.
- I don't know how the NAS is going to "sort" all the pictures, and if it is going to "copy" everything merged into the same folder.
- I don't know if I am going to maintain every information on the picture, like geo-position, name, resolution, etc.
- I don't know what is gonna happen with all of the other things from iCloud Photo Library, like "faces", "places", etc.
- Because of "Apple limitations" on iOS, the app can not sync in background for photos. Synology has "solved" if using a geo-fence thing. It is kind of smart, but it would impose some limitations to background synchronization. You can read further but basically they have programmed a geo-fence activation so, when you enter your home area or your work area, the app "wakes up" and starts sync'ing, but it will work only for 3 to 10 minutes due to iOS running app on background limitation. I think you can solve this by turning on manually your iphone/ipad for a while when you are at home and waiting for DS Photo to end the synchronization.
- Also, you need an iOS device, I didn't find any solution that can be run into a Mac.
I think maybe we can lost all of these, but at least we can have a "local copy" of iCloud Photo Library while "optimizing" space on our MacBooks.
I will tell you the results and my thoughts about them
Best regards!
ISO