Where is my Photos Library... SSD, HDD or Both?

[Utterchaos23]

Hi All,

I have a home made fusion drive in my Mac Mini consisting of a 250GB SSD and the stock 1TB 5200 HDD.

I also have a Photos library of +400GB.

Will the "Magic of Fusion" put any of my photos on the SSD? In my mind the photos that are accessed more regularly will be sat on the SSD where the old stuff will be on the HD just as Fusion is designed to function... or is the library just seen as one massive folder that is too big for the SSD and so is sat on my HDD?

Does a fusion lay out frequently vs non-frequently accessed data folder by folder, file by file, or bit by bit to be able it to obtain it's perceived near SSD speed?

The vast majority of my internal storage is taken up by photos. Music, Movies etc are all external.

If the Photos are stored on the internal HDD I am presumably not seeing the benefit of the fusion and so am I better off de-fusing my fusion allowing the SSD to achieve it's potential and manually putting the library on the HDD?

Thoughts would be greatly received....

P.S. - this was asked on the Apple support Forum but to no avail.

 

[Fishrrman]

"Will the "Magic of Fusion" put any of my photos on the SSD? In my mind the photos that are accessed more regularly will be sat on the SSD where the old stuff will be on the HD just as Fusion is designed to function... or is the library just seen as one massive folder that is too big for the SSD and so is sat on my HDD?"

I don't know of any utility that can reveal -just where- individual files are located (i.e., on the SSD drive or on the HDD) in a fusion drive setup.

I would -guess- that during the editing process, a photo file(s) could get "moved to" the SSD drive for a while, than later on "moved back", depending on how much the OS perceives those files to be "active" vs. "passive".

But again, I don't think there's any way of actually knowing -when- this happens during the day-to-day operations of the fusion drive.

In any case, with 400gb of photos, you should be backed up to at least one, probably TWO, external backups.

 

[Weaselboy]

Does a fusion lay out frequently vs non-frequently accessed data folder by folder, file by file, or bit by bit to be able it to obtain it's perceived near SSD speed?

Give this article a read. Fusion works at the block level (below file level). It will move the most frequently used data to the SSD for faster access, and that may only be parts of the photo library.

You can sort of indirectly figure out which physical drive the files are on by opening some files while monitoring disk activity as described here.

I would just leave it alone and let the Fusion do its thing.

 

[Utterchaos23]

In any case, with 400gb of photos, you should be backed up to at least one, probably TWO, external backups.

Cheers Fishrrman and Weaselboy, I have 1 TimeMachine and 2 naked hard drives stashed about the place as well as iCloud Photos.. yes.. that took a while to upload I can tel ya!

I think I'll leave it "Fused" until I can afford the new 2TB EVO ... it's only $1000!!

Cheers!!!