You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!

When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.

Yet another « Photos  face recognition not working »!

Hello there,


So, as title says, Photos on Ventura MacMini 2018 not detecting faces correctly, in fact, stuck « 0 pictures analyzed since a while.


To resume the situation:


  • iMac 2017 with Ventura had my Photos Library running completely fine with « people » correctly identified;
  • got a « new » MacMini 2018 and when trying to boot from my CCC backup of Ventura (to clone back the Ventura install), it looked that it couldn’t work so I simply continued the Sonoma install (version that came preconfigured on the machine);
  • Sonoma wasn’t behaving really well on the Mac Mini but mainly, Photos had already a messed up library: stuck at « 0 pictures analyzed » and pics from some people gone from the « people » section;
  • Left Sonoma a few days idle, not sleeping but no go in the « people » section.


Unfortunately, and for a rare occurrence, I didn’t backed up the Ventura Photo library…


  • After a few days with Sonoma, I reverted back to Ventura, clean install followed by TM migration. I then had to repair (cmd option) the Photos library and it opened in Ventura but got stuck again (2-3 days) at «  0 pic analyzed »!
  • I also tried to make a new library and let iCloud do the sync again but this time, it got stuck at 200 pictures remains to sync but didn’t want to complete!


Yesterday, got the old iMac, reconnected the external drive with the library, synced with iCloud. Left the computer asleep and idle overnight but 24 hours later, no progress!


I would guess that going to Sonoma then back to Ventura accompanied by the repair completely hosed the library.


Also strange that some « people/faces » are intact with all the pics but some others, missing almost all of them.


Anyway, after having read a lot of similar threads here, on Reddit and Apple Stack Exchange and trying a couple of things, it looks I am stuck!


Thanks for your time,



Mac mini, macOS 13.7

Posted on Oct 9, 2024 3:13 PM

Reply
7 replies

Oct 12, 2024 7:25 AM in response to patrice289

Ok, MBP with Mojave successfully synced my library and face/people recognition was complete and all pics were back for all my friends/family over the night (Thursday to Friday), go figure!


I then tried an alternative way on the iMac 2017:


  • wiped everything related to Photos in ~/Library/Containers, made a new empty library on another external drive. Then, set it at system lib and started sync with iCloud. This morning, still in the process to download.
  • When I look in the « people » section, no more « 0 pictures analyzed », it even seems that photoanalysisd process already did the job. Fingers crossed as last time I tried to re-sync, it was stuck forever at 200 pictures remaining…


Once it will be complete, I will plug the external on the MacMini and hope for the best!


***Projects (slideshows) are unfortunately missing obviously but I still have a backup of the original messed-up lib with them. I will surely find a way to recreate or import them (unless I could find where they reside in the old library).

Oct 10, 2024 1:59 PM in response to patrice289

Replying to myself :)


Still 0 pictures analyzed in the people section 24 hours later…


Trying something else:


  • syncing a new Photos library on my older MBP early 2015 still on Mojave and hope that face recognition will kick in!


  • if successful, I will try to set the Mojave Photos lib as my new system library under Ventura, on my iMac 2017 first.


Please note that all those libs are on external drives. Anyway, lesson hardly learned: always have a backup when doing machine or OS change!


*** I have around 30k pictures and videos and this library was first imported from iPhoto back when I upgraded to Sierra (2016). Never had any troubles before but it takes one event to completely mess it up!

Oct 13, 2024 10:30 AM in response to BDAqua

Ok, the MBP with Mojave successfully synced my library and the face/people recognition was able to be completed and all the photos are back for all my friends/family. Done overnight (Thursday to Friday), go figure!


Yesterday I thought I would try again (in a slightly different way) on the 2017 iMac:


I deleted everything related to Photos in ~/Library/Containers and created a new empty library on another external drive. Then I set it as the system library and started syncing with iCloud. Yesterday morning, it was still downloading.

When I looked in the "people" section, no more "0 images analyzed", it even seems that the photoanalysisd process has already done some of the work. Fingers crossed because the last time I tried to resync, it got stuck indefinitely at 200 pictures remaining...


Once that's done, I'll plug the external into the MacMini and hope everything goes back to normal!


***The projects (slideshows) are unfortunately missing (obviously) but I still have a backup of the original messed up library with them. I'll probably find a way to recreate or import them (unless I can figure out where they reside in the old library).


***Update: Mac Mini doesn’t like the lib to be on an external (?). When I connected back the drive, it began again to analyze the library but was stuck forever, with number of pictures and videos not corresponding to the iCloud lib!


This morning, wiped everything (again) in ~/Library/Containers associated to Photos and reset the synchronization with a brand new empty lib, on the internal SSD (2 TB, enough space). Now, downloading the data, fingers crossed!


Weird that it worked without any troubles on the Mojave MacBook Pro!

Yet another « Photos  face recognition not working »!

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.