Moving fro Windows to Mac

Chief1948 wrote:

NTFS

In that case, you should move them to another drive formatted for Mac (HFS+ or APFS) or as exFAT if you plan on using the drive with both Windows and Mac.

Do note, if you are planning on importing all the photos into a Photos App library, the external drive will need to be formatted for Mac and won't be usable on Windows.

Chief1948 wrote:

I have 40,000 photos that were created in windows on external hard discs. Will they be accessible on the Mac and if not how can Isolve this problem?

I do not see why not...depending on the format

You can read the external drive

to write to that drive may require third party software:

Options:

http://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/

http://www.tuxera.com/products/tuxera-ntfs-for-mac/

https://github.com/osxfuse/osxfuse/wiki/NTFS-3G

https://iboysoft.com/mac-drive-manager/ntfs-for-mac/free-software-read-write-ntfs-mac.html

https://iboysoft.com/ntfs-for-mac/wd-ntfs-driver-for-mac.html

I'm not an expert on photos but I offer the following thoughts. First, what is the format(s) of the photos? Macs can generally read external drives that have been formatted in various ways. Are the photos saved/stored in an app? If so, being a PC based app, they cannot be read unless they can be exported. I would format an available drive to a Mac format and then copy the photos onto it. Good luck.

Chief1948 wrote:

Thanks. What I plan to do is, connect the drive to the new Mac, format a new drive in the Mac, and copy the files from the old to the new. They should then be available in Mac format and available to Lightroom and Photoshop.

Your views please?

Seems a bit unnecessary. If the Mac can read your original drive then the photos are available to the Mac just fine.

The only caveat here is if the drive is formatted as NTFS for Windows, the Mac can't write to it. but the photos themselves should not be affected by this and can be accessed directly.

The drive format and the photos file format are 2 different and independent things.

If the photos are jpegs or pngs tiff, er even RAW, the Mac can read them no problem.

You are of course free to have a drive formatted for Mac, and if you plan on using the Apple Photos app included with every Mac, the drive would need to be formatted as HFS+ or APFS. Otherwise, you can format the drive as exFAT or FAT32 so it remains readable and writeable from both Mac and PC.

Beyond that, there should be no issue whatsoever accessing your photos.

Chief1948 wrote:

Thanks for the reply. I will want to be able to make additional edits on some of the photos so I have to be able to write to the file and not just read. If I copy them to a new Mac formatted drive they should be available for editing, I THINK?

Yes.

Though as mentioned depending on the exact format of your current external drive it may also just be able to write to it and save the changes directly. Only if its NTFS would there be an issue. How is the external drive formatted currently?

Simply: If they work in Lightroom and Photoshop on Windows they will on Macs.

Move them to a disk formatted apfs or MacOS extended.