# Import Takes FOREVER



## MelissaA (Jan 28, 2016)

I am having import speed issues while using my laptop.  (Haven't seen any of these issues with my desktop).  I keep my catalog on an external hard drive.  This is my normal workflow while away from home and using my laptop:  I import images directly from the media card into LR.  My laptop has always been slower than my desktop, but NEVER this slow.  (It took 8 hours to import 395 images.)  I thought maybe it was the card reader (although it was new).  So I purchased a different new card reader.  But that hasn't helped.  I've also tried to first copy the images to a hard drive and import from there.  It didn't make any difference.  The import is still very, very slow.  Suggestions please?


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## clee01l (Jan 28, 2016)

Imports use lots of  Working storage and create lots of intermediate files.  If your primary disk doesn't have at lease 100GB of free space, LR will slow down because that is not enough room to create the temporary intermediate files.  Also if you are converting to DNG or are building 1:1 Previews on import, these processes will slow your import.


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## Hal P Anderson (Jan 28, 2016)

Any chance your laptop is overheating? CPUs will slow down out of self-protection if they start getting too hot.


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## MelissaA (Jan 28, 2016)

I don't think my laptop is overheating - doesn't seem like it anyway.  My drive is 1TB and was empty when I started - so lots of space.  I don't convert to DNG, but I am creating 1-1 previews.  However, I have always done that.  In any event, don't you think that 8 hours is a bit long to import 395 photos - and that was without the 1-1 previews - just bare bones!!!


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## Jim Wilde (Jan 28, 2016)

Lightroom import has a couple of discrete phases, first copying the files to the hard drive (whilst converting to DNG if that option is selected) and populating the catalog with the image metadata, and the second phase being the preview generation (which may include smart previews if selected).

So which phase is taking that 8 hours (and yes I do agree that's way too long)?

You say you've tried copying the files to hard drive and imported from there.....does that mean you did an "Add" import rather than "Copy"? That should have taken a few seconds to run the first phase.


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## MelissaA (Jan 28, 2016)

Copy to hard drive is what took 8 hours.  Actually all phases took a long time, so I unchecked the 1-1 previews which was also taking forever.  Oh, and I wasn't adding, I was copying to a different drive and folder.  At this point, I have made progress.  After the last import, I closed out of and restarted lr.  Within 10 minutes it had imported 200 pictures.  So I think this might be back to normal.  However, I have a couple of new problems.  One of my camera rename presets has disappeared.  That's not a huge problem, I just recreated it.  But it does bother me that it just wasn't there.  Previous to that, a copyright preset I had created for 2016 had disappeared & I needed to recreate that, too.  The biggest NEW problem is with one of the folders that I want to import.  Let's call it folder A.  I can access it on both the card reader and on the "temporary" hard drive folder.  In other words, in the import dialog, Lr will populate the import window with the pictures from either location.  But as soon as all the images show up, they disappear and the import window is blank.  What's up with that???  So I'm not able to import those images into the catalog from either location - even at the all time slow speed!


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## Jim Wilde (Jan 28, 2016)

Regarding the last problem, in the centre panel of the Import Screen above the grid what of the 3 options (All Photos, New Photos, Destination Folders) is selected? If it's New Photos, do the images reappear if you change the selection to All Photos (which would indicate that the photos are already in the catalog).


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## Replytoken (Jan 28, 2016)

What kind of transfer speeds are you seeing if you just move/copy a number of files in Explorer?

--Ken


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## MelissaA (Jan 28, 2016)

Thanks Jim!  That was the problem.  I guess all photos has always been checked.  Somehow it became unchecked and new photos was the one checked.  When I changed that, it corrected the problem.  Thanks for all the help/suggestions!
Melissa


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## MelissaA (Jan 29, 2016)

Hi Jim
I think I have figured out what the problem was - but wanted to pass this information on to you in the event that there is something I should be aware of for future imports.  Might this happen again?  Is there something I did that caused it?  Do I need to "clean up" something in Lr?  I discovered 11 images from the same card and camera, taken on the same day where LR failed to read the image correctly.  The image displays perfectly on the card, but shows up like the one I've attached here in LR.


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## Jim Wilde (Jan 29, 2016)

That's typical of corrupted raw files. Which generally mean that you've had (or still have) a hardware problem somewhere along the chain from camera to the hard drive. First thing to do it to check if the same problem shows if you take one of the corrupted files into the Develop module (i.e. trying to establish if the problem is in the library previews cache, or the real raw file). 

Assuming that Develop shows the same problem (indicating the actual raw file on the hard drive is corrupt) then you have to start trouble-shooting to to find the problem....it could be a faulty memory card, faulty card reader, failing hard drive, even failing RAM. So trial and error really, probably starting with the original card if you still have those images on it. Try copying them outside Lightroom to say the Desktop, then try importing them (using Add) into a test catalog to see if any problem shows up. Next steps depend upon what the first step shows....


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