The question then becomes, are all of your other machines in the Homegroup Windows 7 machines? If not the problem is obvious, change to a Workgroup type of network.
Also remember that libraries are only images of the actual files which are stored in the My Pictures folder. If you want to move them around you should use the My Pictures folder instead of the Pictures Library.
Last edited by chev65; 18 Apr 2010 at 15:32.
I think I know why this happens, and how to fix it.
I'm one of four computer users in my household. We all just upgraded to Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit) and we've all encountered this problem. Namely that opening the Pictures Library takes forever, but if I go straight to My Pictures through explorer it opens in an instant, like it should. I compared the folder options of the two and I've discovered the reason behind the difference.
In the Pictures Library I have things sorted by 'date', which is one of the default sort options. In My Pictures I have things sorted by 'date modified', which is no longer a default sort option in Windows 7, at least not for folders optimized for displaying images (I had to go digging through the 'more' section to find it). For some reason, if you sort a folder by 'date', it takes a very long time to load, whereas if you sort by 'date modified' or 'date created' it loads quickly. My theory is that 'date' looks for metadata within files (such as a 'date taken' token that you might find in an photo taken by a digital camera) and that's why it takes so long.
So yeah, fiddle with your 'sort by' settings, use 'date modified' or 'date created' rather than 'date', and hopefully that will solve this issue. It did for me.
perfect matty.
I changed mine to name as I said in my previous post. Changing them to date made it super slow.
Now date modified makes it super quick same as name.
So you can have it as a pictures folder sorted by how we want. None of that general rubbish
I have a solution that works well and lets you see all the thumbnails and sort the folder any way you want.
Windows re-scans every file in this folder each time you re-open it, period, and it takes forever.
The work around is a great free program called NoClose. Install NoClose and be sure to re-program the hotkeys. The default hotkeys didn't work for me.
Once the program is installed, open your pictures folder and wait until it loads, and then perform the NoCLose new rule function. This will prevent you from closing the pictures folder by greying out the red x in the upper right corner.
Now make and install a shortcut to your pictures folder and to NoClose and put them in your startup folder so that everything loads at startup.
If you don't want the pictures folder perpetually open on the taskbar, then download another of several programs that lets you 'close to tray'. When you minimize the folder, it will close to a tiny icon in your system tray on the right. I keep 50 taskbar items open at a time, so I don't care about this.
NoClose reminds/keeps me from closing the pictures folder. With the folder always open, it loads instantly, and further, when you open a system window such as to save a file to the pictures folder, it loads instantly as well.
Another work around is probably some program that lets you run the pictures folder as a service..... always open in memory even if you 'close' it, but I haven't gotten that far. This solution works well.
P.S. Using the solution to use 'Date Modified' posted above puts the folders on the very bottom of the window if the newest files are on the top and vice-versa. This may be undesirable for many people.
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