Recovering iPhoto from a flash drive

dduelin

dduelin

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In the 2005 - 2015 range I had a couple of Apple desktop computers. The first was a 2005 iMac and the next one was a 2008 or 2009 Mini running OS Snow Leopard if I recall. The model year of the Mini was important (I think) because it got to a point were it could not be upgraded to the next OS. The next year following could. The iMac quit working due screen problems so I bought the Mini. After several upgrades and maybe 7-8 years the Mini began to get really buggy on sites that were running Java scripts. I probably got that description technically wrong but it just freeze up a lot and was difficult to use. I used these mostly just for email, web surfing, and photo storage. I still have the Mini but quit using it. The Mini had a program called Time Machine that backed up the system daily or on command. I have a portable Toshiba storage drive with all Time Machine back ups on it. It has a USB connector. At some point I got another Toshiba drive and moved about 3000 photos from iPhoto onto it. As far as I recall that is all that is on it. From 1995 to retirement last year I also had a Dell Latitude laptop issued to me for work use. In 2017 the company I worked for at the time was bought and merged. I was issued a new laptop and I kept the old Dell which I am typing this on. So my daily driver is this Dell.

I would like to recover the stored photos and be able to view and share them. How do I do this? When I plug the Toshiba drive with photos on it the Dell does not recognize the device. I'm sure this is very simple but I don't know anything about computers except to turn them on and off. Thanks in advance.
 
I'm not sure if your Apple devices used APFS or not, but if they did, then this is what you'll need to do. I never use Apple products myself, so I'm not sure what models use what, but here's an article that gives you an idea of the issue that will need to be solved if your hard drive files are in APFS format. The fact that your Windows computer can't read the hard drive would suggest that there is a data formatting incompatibility issue.

www.paragon-software.com

APFS for Windows | Paragon Software

Read and write APFS-formatted HDD, SSD or flash drive on Windows computer.
www.paragon-software.com www.paragon-software.com
 
Dave,
The problem is probably that the USB Toshiba drive is formatted using an Apple format (HFS or APFS) that cannot be recognized by Your Dell computer that is running Windows. So you need to find an Apple computer to access the USB Toshiba drive.

The other issue is a recommendation I always make to people, like me, who have an iPhone and use iPhoto/Photos on a Mac. The problem is that Apple Photos stores all the photos in one large file. There are advantages to this in terms of speed and ease of backup, but the big disadvantage is that if that file becomes corrupted, you will lose ALL your photos. I always recommend that you use the export function in Apple Photos to export the photos as individual JPEG files. You can use the Smart albums function in Apple Photos to create albums by year and then export all the photos to a folder for that year.

I then recommend you follow the 3-2-1 backup process
  • Make 3 copies of your valuable data
  • 2 copies should be on different types of media: i.e. USB Hard Drive & DVD
  • 1 copy of your data should be stored offsite
just my 2c ;) ;) ;)
 
Apple and Windows drives are not natively compatible with each other, due to different formats used, as mentioned by @amorley .
Think VHS and Beta videotapes. You'll remember those.
Or, engines designed for gasoline or diesel.
Of course, there ARE workarounds, depending on how technical you want to get, or how much you want to budget.
 
I have an Iphone SE, and open and then save Apple pics as jpgs, etc.

Would an Apple emulator program on the Windows computer work?

When I was an Apple user, I ran Virtual PC to use Windows programs and files.

I even got it to work with a two-button mouse so I could play Minesweeper.
 
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While tedious, a no-cost method would be to upload them from your iPhone or Mac drive to Google Drive. That's free 15gb storage for Gmail users, which of course is also free.
(Except for Google mining your personal information, but everyone does that.)
Depending on how many and how large your photo collection, you may have to offload them from Google Drive to local storage and repeat the process.
15gb seems like a lot, until you start reviewing several years' of pictures.
Another alternative is SmugMug, which also hosts ADVrider.
I like free, usually...
 
Well, I am posting this from the Mini. It took a while to connect it to a monitor that was gathering dust but it started right up and brought up the tool bar. Immediately it opened a notification that Apple updates were available but I don't want to do anything that might lock it or freeze it up so I passed on that. I opened iPhoto and all the originals seem to be there. I pull up a saved photo, click File, and there is a box with format and Export. Duhh or Uhh.. if I click Export where will it export to? Here are the options.
 

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Since I don't have any direct mac experience I'm going to mostly stay out of this, but from what I've read online mac recognizes FAT32 disk format, as does Windows.

So, if you have a spare external hard drive, or thumb drive, and don't need any of the data on it (you'll have to wipe it clean to re-format) format it as FAT32, I think you should be able to write files from the mac, and then read them from a Windows PC.

Based on your OP I'm not sure if you understand any of that, but thought I'd throw it out there for now.
 
dduelin said:
Here are the options.
Click to expand...

Creat a folder on your desktop called "Pictures" and export to that. Make sure you set the JPEG quality/size to maximum. You can select all your photos by pressing "CMD A" and export them all. It will take time.

Once you have all the photos exported as JPEGs to the folder on your desktop, copy them to a USB drive formatted as FAT32 or exFAT. You should then be able to read them on your Dell.
 
The partition map for dd's Macs is HFS+. They're too old to have been APFS and he didn't mention an upgrade to an OS that would change the map.

Macs can use a couple of FAT formats. With the Toshiba plugged into the mini, launch Disk Utility and you can check the Tosh's format. Most externals (yes most) come formatted so that both Mac and Windows can read/write up to 4G files without changing the formant. A new large capacity thumb drive is pretty cheap and should be compatible out of the box as I mentioned

If the Tosh is HFS+ get another drive (spinner or thumb) of sufficient capacity and plug it in along with the Tosh. As mentioned create a new folder on the new drive and move anything you want to save to the thumb. Some thumbs are much slower than others and none of them are really fast. But drag drop and have a cold beverage.

Getting a cheap 2.5" SSD in a cheap enclosure would be much faster, but this sounds like a one time thing.

A 3-2-1 backup is always a good idea for anything critical. How bad you feel when it's gone is how much there should have been good backups.

Most of this you ready know I'm sure. And apologies for any redundancy as I just glanced through other posts.
 
amorley said:
Make sure you set the JPEG quality/size to maximum. You can select all your photos by pressing "CMD A" and export them all. It will take time.
Click to expand...
There should be no need to do any of that — just drag the files or folders from one drive to the next. They're likely jpgs already. I don't recall when Macs started using png files. Maybe he was shooting RAW or TIFF. No need to change the format to move them unless they're larger than 4G.

Snow Leopard was a great OS but it's really old. In computer years it's already dead. (Old PowerMax joke). Any current flavor of Window should be able to read any pic files that would have been on the Macs back then.
 
ST Gui said:
There should be no need to do any of that — just drag the files or folders from one drive to the next. They're likely jpgs already. I don't recall when Macs started using png files. Maybe he was shooting RAW or TIFF. No need to change the format to move them unless they're larger
Click to expand...

If the photos were taken using an iPhone they are not in JPEG format but are in Apple’s HEIC format. They need to be exported from the Photos data file as JPEGs.
 
Thanks Andy and all who chimed in. I'm moving in the right direction thanks to you.
 
amorley said:
If the photos were taken using an iPhone they are not in JPEG format but are in Apple’s HEIC format. They need to be exported from the Photos data file as JPEGs.
Click to expand...
That's what my Iphone pictures are. I can copy or move them to the W11 computer, and even open and see them, but I have to save them as jpgs, etc. to use them.
 
My son and I use this device/app:
apps.apple.com

‎SanDisk iXpand™ Sync

‎Have an iXpand™ Flash Drive? Download the app that works seamlessly with your drive as the simplest way to transfer photos, videos and files between iPhone, iPad and computers – without the cloud, cables or internet connections. What is the iXpand Flash Drive? It’s like the USB Flash Drive...
apps.apple.com
It’s got a lightning and USB plug.
IMG_1360.jpeg
 
amorley said:
If the photos were taken using an iPhone they are not in JPEG format but are in Apple’s HEIC format.
Click to expand...
Only if the iPhone used is running iOS 11 or later unless/until changed to jpg in Settings as John-O mentioned. Prior to that they would have been jpgs.

Larry Fine said:
Just changed it to "most compatible."
Click to expand...
Most compatible is jpgs for photos. You probably noticed it also changes video from HEVC to H.264. HEIC and HEVC have advantages but if you need compatibility with other formats and systems then Most Compatible is the way to go.
 
I had an old application for Macs that recovered some pics from a thumb drive. Usually these work on directory damage and the files themselves aren't corrupted. I had a mixture of success with most files recovered with only a couple corrupted. It even recovered some files from an "erased' thumb drive. On Mac with HFS+ drives I've used DiskWarrior to repair directory damage in general on thumbs and externals. This isn't photo recovery software specifically but has fixed directory damage for me that had previously rendered a drive inaccessible.

I haven't had any need for "Photo" recovery software for a very long time so don't know what's available these days. I'd suggest a web search for a program/application/app for your platform of choice.

Try to find a known reliable site for your platform as there are a lot of sites that hawk questionable software you've never heard of and can't find a reliable source to vet it. A real problem is bad apps that further corrupt the drive making content unrecoverable by better software that could have recovered it first time round.
 
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