Cannot create new folders or albums in Photo11 with Tahoe

There's not much to work with here. Can you give us a bit more information?

1. What model is your Mac?
2. What version of Tahoe are you running
3. Do you have more than one Photos Library?
4. Where does your Mac's Photos Library reside-- in the Pictures folder of your internal drive, or on an external drive? or on a network? on iCloud drive?
5. Are you using iCloud Photos to synchronize your devices? If so
6. …Do you have “Optimize Storage” checked in Photos’ Settings
7. …Do you see all your Mac’s Photos  pictures at iCloud.com?
8. …Have you checked to see if the Apple Account is really really the same on the Mac and at iCloud.com?
9. …What is your storage at iCloud.com? At System Settings>[name]>iCloud>Storage , my Mac says 176 GB of 200 GB used. What does yours say?
10. What is your storage on this Mac? At System Settings>General> Storage, my Mac says 745 GB of 1TBB used. What does yours say?
11. Has this problem always existed, or did it just start? Can you think of anything that changed that might affect your device?
12. What does your Library say at the bottom of the Library view? Like this:

To narrow things down, try these steps:

• Restart the computer (of course)
• Re-start in Safe Mode. This bypasses certain potentially disruptive processes, and it often helps. Safe Mode is different for different computers, so see this: 

           Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support 

• Use another library if you have one, or make a small test Library with a few pictures in it and see if the same thing happens. You can create a new Library by closing Photos and then option-clicking on the Photos icon.
• Make a new user and see if the same problem recurs with it.  This is a bit harder, because a new user can't access a different user's stuff. You would need to temporarily move your Library out of your own user's Pictures folder up to the general "Users" folder. 
• Rebuild your Photos Library--close Photos and re-launch by option-command-clicking the app icon. If you use iCloud Photos, it’s possible that this will cause a re-sync that lasts long enough to make you nervous. I usually turn off wifi when I do this.

The idea is to find out if the problem is with the Library, with your account, or with caches and login items, and stuff like that. One of these steps may fix the problem, but their failure to work also helps figure out what's happening.

Let us know what happens…

The fact that Photos works in Safe Mode and not normal mode indicates that there are some 3rd party software that is interfering with Photos.

Have you installed and run any "cleaning", "optimizing", "speed-up", anti-virus or VPN apps on your Mac?

Please download and run Etrecheck.  The free version is sufficient. However, if you find it worthwhile you should support the developer and purchase the app.

Copy and paste the results into your reply. Etrecheck is a diagnostic tool that was developed by one of the most respected users here in the ASC to provide a snapshot of the system and help identify the more obvious culprits that can adversely affect a Mac's performance.

Copy the report

and after clicking on the Reply button use the Additional Text button to paste the report in your reply.

Then we can examine the report and see if we can determine the cause of the problem.

Correction

Restart in safemode and Photos works - imports photos, sets up albums, transfers images and movies (Jpg Mov and Heic) from library to albums

When go back to normal mode - no more album creation, no more importing

I'm sorry-- by "dump them" I didn't mean turn them off. I meant get rid of those apps and all their parts. Then do a re-boot.

Safe Mode runs the Mac with only the minimum of drivers and software. Even if those apps or others leave trash around, Safe Mode will avoid it. You need to get rid of that stuff to run normally.

You have not said what happened when you tried the other things that I suggested: another Library, another User, rebuild the Library. Are you serious about fixing this?

downloaded the 'free download' of top right button which takes me to

https://cdn.etrecheck.com/EtreCheckPro.zip

and not the one in the text which takes me to same address. However when used the one in tet it worked!

Now Photo working I am not going to pursue this further - but checking report has been interesting.

Interestingly - new photo12 on goldengate had same problem - blocked Googledrive and prevented from starting at restart - now Photo works fine

Put back Googledrive and restarted before decided to ditch - Photo still works -

Googledrive on Macmini is the only added app which is not on the Airbook. It seems the likely culprit if there is one.

Still got to work out what to use for a music player now Music will only list purchased music. But that is for another thread.

I'm sorry you didn't answer the other questions. Generally, people have to know what's going on with your machine in order to help.

Are you using a VPN or "Cleaner" apps or "anti-Virus" apps? Duplicate finders? Those are mostly useless on a Mac, and they can interfere with legitimate apps.

Check Login Items. I have 0 login items, and that is the ideal number.

Sorry to miss the list

to answer

What model is your Mac? mac Mini with Apple M2 pro 16Gb and 2Tb

What version of Tahoe are you running - 27.7.2

Do you have more than one Photos Library? no - only on my harddrive

Where does your Mac's Photos Library reside-- in the Pictures folder of your internal drive, or on an external drive? or on a network? on iCloud drive? In Pictures folder

Are you using iCloud Photos to synchronize your devices? No

…Do you have “Optimize Storage” checked in Photos’ Settings

…Do you see all your Mac’s Photos  pictures at iCloud.com?

…Have you checked to see if the Apple Account is really really the same on the Mac and at iCloud.com?

…What is your storage at iCloud.com? At System Settings>[name]>iCloud>Storage , my Mac says 176 GB of 200 GB used. What does yours say?

What is your storage on this Mac? At System Settings>General> Storage, my Mac says 745 GB of 1TBB used. What does yours say? 1.4Tb of 2Tb

Has this problem always existed, or did it just start? Can you think of anything that changed that might affect your device? It started with last upgrade of Tahoe or the one before

I do have a vpn and Clam XaV - they have never generated an issue in last 3 years wiht Iphoto

As said - Now works in Safe mode - imports images and movies fine - adds albums etc - but out of safe mode there is no import possilbe and no adding albums or folders.

PeterCarpt wrote: I do have a vpn and Clam XaV - they have never generated an issue in last 3 years wiht Iphoto

Dump them. they are useless and may be the cause of your problems. See if things clear up..

Interestingly, my MacAirBook, which runs Goldengate with Photo12 (and Xav and VPN) has no issue with creating albums or uploading photos etc.

Upgraded my Mac Mini to Golden Gate (27.2) and Photo12 - to no improvement

I tested the link provided by OT: https://etrecheck.com/en/index.html

From there I could download Etrecheck 6.8.18 with Safari to my Downloads folder and drag the app to Applications, replacing an older version. I could open it without problems on macOS 27 Golden Gate.

The error message might be from the Gate Keeper. It is raised, if an app is unsigned and the web browser is setting a quarantine flag. You may still have an older, unsigned version installed.

What is different in your case? Which version did you download? Is your Downloads folder on an external drive?

Infact having stopped everything in automatic start up on entry including Gdrive am getting Photo not working as usaul pattern.

tried running etrecheck from safari and form Firefox

both get this:

Did you go to the developer's website and download it? You don't run it in a browser but download it. The launch the app.

Where did you try to download it?

having stopped them logging in at start up and with no wifi on - still cannot get folders to create nor import images and happily opening in other apps.