Move your data to Synology

easy Takes minutes to set up

Once you have your data out of the big services and cleaned up, it needs to live somewhere you control. This guide covers moving your archive to Synology.

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Step by step

  1. Create a shared folder

    In DSM, open Control Panel, then Shared Folder, and create one for your archive with read and write permission for your account.

  2. Connect from your computer

    Enable SMB under Control Panel, then File Services. Then map the share on Windows, or use smb://your-nas/sharename on macOS.

  3. Copy the cleaned library in

    Write your organized Year and Month folders into the shared folder.

  4. Let Synology Photos index it

    Install Synology Photos and point it at the shared folder. It builds a browsable timeline and albums from the folders you copied, using the dates stored in the files.

  5. Turn on versioning or snapshots

    Use Snapshot Replication or Hyper Backup so you can roll back mistakes and keep a second copy.

Worth knowing

Metadata repair matters here: Synology Photos sorts by the date stored inside each file, so fixing dates before you copy gives you a correctly ordered timeline.
Synology Photos reads your folders rather than converting them, so your files stay in a normal, portable layout.