# Kind of a philosophical question... How much photo backing up is enough?



## Kit Lens Jockey (Oct 4, 2017)

I'm sure this has been discussed, but searching for "backup" shows a lot of threads talking about backup camera bodies...

What methods does everyone use to back up their photo collections, and how confident do you feel in your method?

When I first started seriously taking photos, I bought a pair of identical external hard drives and kept identical copies of my photos on each one... Logical enough, if one HDD fails, I'd have another copy of all of my photos, go buy another HDD, and copy the photos back onto that one.

That seemed pretty safe to me, but then I got a cloud service and began keeping a copy of all my photos on that. Since all my photos were now on the cloud, I decided that I didn't need to keep _two_ identical HDD copies in my possession, and I had just about filled up one external HDD at that point, so I started using the other HDD as storage for new photos, instead of keeping it as an identical backup of the first HDD.

I also figured that keeping one copy of my photos on the cloud and one copy physically with me would protect me in case of a catastrophic event like my house burning down, which probably would have caused me to lose my photos when I was just keeping two copies on two HDDs stored in the same location.

But now, with the sheer number of photos, the amount I've spent on equipment and traveling to take all of them, and no plans to stop, I'm wondering if I'm doing enough to keep the backups safe.

I mean, I think I am... If my HDD fails or my house burns down, I get a new HDD, and download them all from the cloud to make myself a new local backup. (However, now that I'm pushing 2TB of photos, it would take a long time to download them all. I worry something could go wrong with that.)

If the cloud service somehow fails, gets hacked, etc, then I still have my own local copy on the HDD to fall back on. Pretty unlikely for both things to happen at once, but now I'm contemplating buying another HDD just to have another redundant copy of them on that HDD, maybe store it some place other than the original HDD copy. Maybe it's overkill, but HDD storage is so cheap nowadays, barely any more than a nice CF card. Seems like it might be worth it.

How does everyone else back up their photos?


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## LDS (Oct 4, 2017)

The more separate backups you have, and in different locations, of course, the better. Then there are questions how each backup is reliable. I.e. a single disk is less reliable than a redundant system (i.e. a DAS/NAS with some form of RAID or similar), and not all cloud services are created equal (some may be less reliable than others, they can go out of business, etc.). Usually space/costs - including lost business - boundaries will put a limit to haw many backups you can keep and where.

One often neglected aspect is if backups are actually working... once every n months is advisable to perform a full (if possible) or partial restore and check the result is what expected. More than once people tried a restore when data was lost just to find the backup wasn't working as intended...


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## Kit Lens Jockey (Oct 4, 2017)

I dunno, thus far I've kept things pretty simple... Files and folders, copied to multiple places. I'm not really too keen on using an official "backup" program, as I never quite know what they're doing... Case in point, once I used the Mac backup utility to backup my normal computer HDD, then later deleted some things off of it, to clear some space, assuming the old backups still had these files on them. Well, when I went to look for the old files later, I discovered that somehow the backup utility decided to delete those files from my old backups for some reason, I guess when it saw them gone in the current iteration, it decided it should just totally get rid of them. 

Like you said, I don't want to put my faith in some piece of software to be able to "restore" my backup. I just want files on a disk. To me that's the simplest and most reliable backup. As long as the files appear to be reading, should be all good.

When you start talking about multiple disk backup systems, really I would just consider those to be about the same reliability as manually copying the files onto multiple individual disks, it's just more automated.


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Oct 4, 2017)

There are backups for different reasons, and differences in how to protect your files. 

I use two NAS units as online backups, one backing up the other. I have lost files and had to go to the 2nd backup to retrieve them.

Just last week, I discovered a missing directory of historic images of a ancestor, apparently, they were accidentally deleted sometime in the past few years and were gone from backups during that period. I pulled out my DVD backups from 2002 and restored them.

Its interesting that the reason I found them was because I had purchased a bundle of M Disk DVD's and was reviewing all of my important images before placing them on the new M Disks. I limited the M disk size to 25GB because the single layer disks are said to be more reliable than the higher capacity ones. Saving all my raw photo files to M disk is too expensive, so conventional hard drives will have to do, but I'm considering archiving full sized jpegs of the edited versions to M disk for anything worth keeping.


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## docsmith (Oct 4, 2017)

I would assume (hope) Pros would have a heighted level of backup.

As a hobbyist, I have my photos stored on my primary hard drive, two different backup hard drives at home, and a remote hard drive that I update ~quarterly. I rotate out my back up HDs after every ~3-4 years as HDs do fail.

I do like the idea of M disks, but have yet to take it that far.


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## Duckman (Oct 4, 2017)

Out of my camera, I will copy files to a SSD (that I work off of) and another to a HDD. The HDD then gets cloned to another HDD. I also use Backblaze for my offsite cloud storage. I only will delete/format my cards when I have at least 3 copies of all my files, one of them being offsite (which can take a while to upload unfortunately). 

FWIW Backblaze allows you to download files for free or purchase your files on a HDD that gets mailed to you.
-J


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## Kit Lens Jockey (Oct 4, 2017)

I looked at the M disks just now. I see the idea behind using them, since obviously magnetic HDDs have a pretty limited life. But the cost for the storage you get is pretty poor. Seems like you could buy new HDDs every few years for the same price or less, or SSDs once the size of them gets to be sufficiently large, as long as you don't mind re-copying files over to them.


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Oct 4, 2017)

Kit Lens Jockey said:


> I looked at the M disks just now. I see the idea behind using them, since obviously magnetic HDDs have a pretty limited life. But the cost for the storage you get is pretty poor. Seems like you could buy new HDDs every few years for the same price or less, or SSDs once the size of them gets to be sufficiently large, as long as you don't mind re-copying files over to them.



SSD's / Memory cards are probably the least reliable form of backup. I've lost many CD's due to degradation of data, even the "Gold" ones that were supposedly going to last. The one from 2002 was Mitsui Gold, and was getting hard to read, it took a few minutes before it could be read. All of my Sony Branded DVD's long ago lost their data, I tossed any unused ones. Currently, I've been using Verbatim, but lost three of them over the past 3 years due to degradation(I just recently discovered that).

With hard drives, it is not just the magnetic media, but the circuitry that can fail at any time. They are reasonably reliable, but not for long term archive. I'm old enough that I have to consider that I will not be around many more years, so I plan on sending M disks of family photos to cousins, I sent a set several years ago. I have a extensive genealogy database that needs to be preserved, its taken me many years to build it. The photos go with it, and not only include scanned photos but scanned documents as well. Some are available on line, but many are not.

So, there are two basic backup types, short term and long term archives.

To make things worse, using a online drive or NAS is not secure from ransom ware, the files on them can be locked, and the ransom ware does that. A backup in the form of a snapshot is currently immune to ransomware, but for how long before they crack that? How many use snapshots of data on their NAS? I do, and had to upgrade memory and learn something new in order to do it.


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## tpatana (Oct 4, 2017)

For one, you shouldn't buy two identical drives. Always buy two different ones to give better chance that they don't die the same moment.

I'm lazy myself, I have random assessment of USB drives on my desk. They are sort-of organized by years (certain drive-pair has specific years), and I make sure to copy everything to two different drives. The lazy part is that I don't have off-site copy, so if house burns down they are gone. At that point I have other pressing matters too so I'm ok with that.


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## Famateur (Oct 4, 2017)

One thing that hasn't been mentioned (while not an electronic backup) is physical prints.

I do a lot of printing -- mostly because I love to actually hold a photograph. Somehow, it just doesn't feel like a photograph until it's printed on physical media.  Prints also serve as a backup in a situation when digital versions are lost.

Another thing that hasn't been mentioned (though maybe less risk) is EMP exposure.

I'm not wearing a tinfoil hat or predicting doom, but with regimes like Iran and North Korea obtaining nukes, it's possible that an EMP could be detonated, proving destructive to digital archives, backups and cloud-based storage services. Would it be paranoid to store at least one backup drive in a Faraday enclosure of some kind?

My own backup routine is a continuing work in progress. For now, it consists of two identical external drives that I sync when more photos are added (including Lightroom catalog). One drive lives at home. The other goes with me everywhere I go.*

Eventually, I'm hoping to keep a separate collection of my just my best work and apply whatever thorough/paranoid preservation strategies I come up with to those. ;D

_* Yeah, it's excessive and inconvenient, but after losing every photo of my daughter's birth (long story), having only the 640x480 compressed versions of a half-dozen I had e-mailed to family, I'd rather be a little over-the-top than go through that again..._


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## kaihp (Oct 4, 2017)

The recommendation for backup is The rule of 3-2-1. That is, have 3 backups, 2 locally but on different media, and 1 online.

First is your primary backup. The second is to quickly restore to the primary if that fails. The third (online) is for disaster recovery (fire, flooding, theft, etc).

Finally, make sure not to confuse redundancy (RAID) and backup. Having redundancy isn't a backup; a deleted file is still deleted on a RAID volume without backup.

OP, with "only" 2TB, I'd go for having a couple of single drives for the two first levels. For the third level, look at online providers such as BackBlaze or CrashPlan.


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## Velo Steve (Oct 5, 2017)

Famateur said:


> ...
> Another thing that hasn't been mentioned (though maybe less risk) is EMP exposure.
> 
> I'm not wearing a tinfoil hat or predicting doom, but with regimes like Iran and North Korea obtaining nukes, it's possible that an EMP could be detonated, proving destructive to digital archives, backups and cloud-based storage services. Would it be paranoid to store at least one backup drive in a Faraday enclosure of some kind?
> ...



I like this, if only because it's thought-provoking. If a random EMP pulse took out your home copy or an online copy, it is unlikely that both would be damaged. Unless you live close to the datacenter, which should be avoided in all scenarios. Just get the backup that wasn't affected. Unfortunately, if there's really a deliberate EMP attack, lots of things are going to be crazy for a while. The bandwidth we are accustomed to may not be available.

On the other hand, if it's a real war, our precious images may not matter as much as we think.

Excuse me - gotta move my latest backup to the steel safe under the house...


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Oct 5, 2017)

Famateur said:


> One thing that hasn't been mentioned (while not an electronic backup) is physical prints.
> 
> I do a lot of printing -- mostly because I love to actually hold a photograph. Somehow, it just doesn't feel like a photograph until it's printed on physical media.  Prints also serve as a backup in a situation when digital versions are lost.
> 
> ...



You need a permanent backup in addition to one that is short term like synchronizing to a drive or a nas. I keep several backups on my NAS.

The issue is that you may not discover a damaged file or missing directory for a long period of time, and end up copying the bad data or empty folder to your backup drive. You might not discover this for perhaps years. If you made DVD backups like M disks periodically, you can go back 5, 10, even 25 years or more to find a file that was lost somewhere along the way. I'd never keep cherished files solely on hard drives, too many things can happen to them. 

I lost all of my images in a hard drive crash about 17 years ago. I only had a few drom digital cameras, and lost just a few. I had CD backups, multiple ones, and found that some of my files were lost due to bad CD's, but I did have prints of many, so I scanned the prints. Then I purchased my first NAS to hold multiple backups. I've never lost files on a NAS (except when I deleted them in error), but now I backup one NAS to another.

Uploading files to online storage is also potentially a issue, as many found when a major online outfit bit the dust a few years ago. It would take me years to upload all my files with the slow internet I have, upload speeds tend to be much slower that download speeds in many places. And, when you look at the long term cost of storing a ever growing number of TB's of data online for 50 years, those expensive M disks look cheaper. 

No worry about EMP with DVD's either  

Offsite backups are a good idea, I send 20+ DVD's of my cherished family photos to cousins, brothers, sisters, and children / grandchildren. (and soon great grandchildren?)

I still have DOS files backed up on floppy disks, they were copied to hard drives long ago, but the backups are still there, I happened to check them out two years ago, most if not all are still there.


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## LDS (Oct 5, 2017)

kaihp said:


> OP, with "only" 2TB, I'd go for having a couple of single drives for the two first levels. For the third level, look at online providers such as BackBlaze or CrashPlan.



About CrashPlan, remember it retired recently from the "consumer" market, and it's now only offering more expensive commercial plans (https://www.crashplan.com/en-us/consumer/nextsteps/ and https://blog.code42.com/data-protection-needs-diverge/)

For a simple standalone backup application for Windows that can backup to external disks or NAS, give a look to Veeam (https://www.veeam.com/windows-endpoint-server-backup-free.html?ad=menu-products)


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## ethanz (Oct 5, 2017)

Mt Spokane Photography said:


> Offsite backups are a good idea, I send 20+ DVD's of my cherished family photos to cousins, brothers, sisters, and children / grandchildren. (and soon great grandchildren?)



I've given DVD copies of family photos to many relatives before, but while its a great idea to share the photos and to distribute the data, I don't know how many of them actually treasured the DVD and kept it safe. I wouldn't be surprised if they lost or trashed it already.



I use time machine for short term backups, have a NAS Raid 1 for all my files, then keep a separate hard drive in a separate location that is periodically synced with the NAS. The recommendation to have online backups (as in you can access it anytime and is always running, such as a NAS or cloud storage) and offline backups (such as DVDs or hard drives that are disconnected) is a great idea. 

To your philosophical question, it comes down to how much you value your data. Spokane clearly values his photos very much, and so he has spent money to make sure he has a great archival system. Do what you can with the money you have now, but make it a priority to invest in a good storage system.

Everyone here probably already knows this, but if you only have one copy of your data, you don't value it at all.


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## Kit Lens Jockey (Oct 5, 2017)

I looked at the cost of M disk blu-rays, and actually, now that I really dig into it, the cost is fairly cheap... I calculate about 0.4 cents per photo, assuming a 50MB raw file.

However, here's another sticking point I have with those disks... Ok, sure, the disk might last 1000 years, but how long do you think you'll really be able to find a functional blu-ray drive to read them for? I'm thinking, with the exponential progress of technology, blu-ray disks have _maybe_ 50 years at best until it becomes very hard to find any working device that can read them. I guess potentially if technology progresses far enough it would be easy to custom manufacture a drive that could read them at that point, but I wouldn't hold my breath. Ideally, to have at least the best long term chance of storage, I think the best thing would be some type of storage media that doesn't rely on any moving parts to function. Anything that does will invariably wear out. We'll certainly reach a point in time where almost every blu-ray drive made today has reached the end of its operational life.

I think anyone who's storing their photos on any type of media with the intent that "that's it," and they're backed up for good, is being pretty short sighted. Unfortunately, truly archiving digital files will probably always be a continual process, migrating files from system to system to keep up with technology.

Also, see this, which is a good argument for making prints...

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-31450389


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Oct 5, 2017)

Kit Lens Jockey said:


> I looked at the cost of M disk blu-rays, and actually, now that I really dig into it, the cost is fairly cheap... I calculate about 0.4 cents per photo, assuming a 50MB raw file.
> 
> However, here's another sticking point I have with those disks... Ok, sure, the disk might last 1000 years, but how long do you think you'll really be able to find a functional blu-ray drive to read them for? I'm thinking, with the exponential progress of technology, blu-ray disks have _maybe_ 50 years at best until it becomes very hard to find any working device that can read them. I guess potentially if technology progresses far enough it would be easy to custom manufacture a drive that could read them at that point, but I wouldn't hold my breath. Ideally, to have at least the best long term chance of storage, I think the best thing would be some type of storage media that doesn't rely on any moving parts to function. Anything that does will invariably wear out. We'll certainly reach a point in time where almost every blu-ray drive made today has reached the end of its operational life.
> 
> ...



CD's have been around since ~the 1980's so 37 years and will certainly have drives to read them for many more, so Blue Ray DVD's should be viable for 50 years. The reason for using media with a very long storage life is that its a bell curve, and if you have 200 units, some of them will be at the edges of the curve and might have 50 year or even less lives. So far, most of the mainstream media can still be read, 8 in floppies and 5 in and 3.5 as well. Tape backups were not mainstream consumer items, and many used SCSI, but I'm sure that they can be recovered and transferred by a professional recovery service.

So, I agree 50 years for blue ray DVD's is a likely max figure without paying a recovery service. B&W prints yes, but probably not inkjet unless archival inks and paper are used. If you want to do that, price some out, but be prepared for a shock. I'm skeptical about color prints, the dyes fade, and pigments are not forever


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## Kit Lens Jockey (Oct 5, 2017)

Optical discs as a whole might have been around since the '80s, but specifically blu-rays and the drives to read them have not enjoyed such longevity. Blu-rays actually popped up at just about the worst possible time, when high speed internet and streaming is making most of their uses obsolete.

With widely available cellular data, streaming, and ever-larger and cheaper solid state storage, I don't think blu-rays or any other optical disc are going to stay relevant for much longer. A lot of automakers are already phasing CD players out. Like I said, I think 50 years for being able to read a blu-ray is, if anything, a generous estimate.

I agree with you about prints. Those will break down too, unless they've very well made, and stored _perfectly_. Ultimately, again, I think if we're talking about really long term archiving of photos or data, it just has to be accepted that it's an ongoing process. Anyone selling a solution that they say will hold up for 1000 or even 100 years is probably selling snake oil. Technology will not move that slowly in the future, not even close.


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## LDS (Oct 5, 2017)

Kit Lens Jockey said:


> Optical discs as a whole might have been around since the '80s, but specifically blu-rays and the drives to read them have not enjoyed such longevity. Blu-rays actually popped up at just about the worst possible time, when high speed internet and streaming is making most of their uses obsolete.



On the consumer side, yes. Still optical disks are still an interesting option for business data "cold storage", even large ones, for example see https://datacenterfrontier.com/inside-facebooks-blu-ray-cold-storage-data-center/, or https://www.wired.com/2016/03/sony-giving-new-life-blu-ray-inside-data-centers/, as an alternative to tapes. Jukebox may require less power and less cooling.

The fact that once written they cannot be modifies, is also useful for legal reasons (albeit now there are other devices offering the same feature, yet it's in electronics, could be less safe).

How long they'll be around, anyway, is hard to guess. Anyway, at least the disc formats are standard, and the technology to read them relatively simple.


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## kaihp (Oct 6, 2017)

LDS said:


> kaihp said:
> 
> 
> > OP, with "only" 2TB, I'd go for having a couple of single drives for the two first levels. For the third level, look at online providers such as BackBlaze or CrashPlan.
> ...



True, but at USD10/month (vs USD5/mon before) it's still a viable option for OP.
Several other online backup services (Amazon, Google) have been either plugging the plug or severely limiting the amount of data you can upload to them. There are datahoarders with literally PB of data who are screaming over this.

Full Disclosure: I use CrashPlan Home and are converting over to the "Pro".


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## Talys (Oct 7, 2017)

If you have a friend/family member who doesn't use their OneDrive for Business -- it comes free with any Office E3/E4/E5 or equivalent Academic or Government subscription -- you get 5TB. 

I mention this, because very nearly 100% of the people who I know who have E3+ subscriptions don't use OneDrive for Business at all. I have to say 'very nearly 100%' because I actually use it myself... for backing up my photos (only), LOL. 

You can also run OneDrive for Business concurrently with (regular) OneDrive; they play nice. Behind the scenes, they are quite different, as OneDrive for Business is based on SharePoint, but frankly, who cares for backing up photos.


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## ethanz (Oct 8, 2017)

Talys said:


> If you have a friend/family member who doesn't use their OneDrive for Business -- it comes free with any Office E3/E4/E5 or equivalent Academic or Government subscription -- you get 5TB.
> 
> I mention this, because very nearly 100% of the people who I know who have E3+ subscriptions don't use OneDrive for Business at all. I have to say 'very nearly 100%' because I actually use it myself... for backing up my photos (only), LOL.
> 
> You can also run OneDrive for Business concurrently with (regular) OneDrive; they play nice. Behind the scenes, they are quite different, as OneDrive for Business is based on SharePoint, but frankly, who cares for backing up photos.



And I don't think people need to worry about Microsoft going under any time soon and losing your backed up images, unlike other companies.


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## lion rock (Oct 8, 2017)

I'm taking a pessimistic view.
Most of my photos are of no interest to anyone but me and myself. And I'm not going to live for ever. The life of an archival media would not need be longer than my lifetime. So, if I have several duplicate copies for use by me, that serves my purpose.
Sure, I may have some family shots I could pass to my daughter, and she'll have her means to save them for herself. Technologies in her generation may be far better than what I use, and I need not worry for her.

Onto my backups: I have four or five sets separate on a dedicated computer; three external drives in two locations; plus on my daily use computer. Maybe that's quite enough. However, I'm far from a diligent and organized person, these copies are not always in sync and not in the best organized manner (my fault,) so, sometimes I can't find a photo that I want. 

I'm taking a fatalistic view that if I loose my photos (which I had before I had built several backups,) so be it. We loose things, we loose love ones, we grief. And yet we continue. I'm not going to dwell on. The present is important. Play is important.
-r


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## lightthief (Oct 8, 2017)

I have two HDs in use in my computer and two USB-Disks that i mount only for the sync/restore.
I use YARC to sync all the disks. I start YARC manually when i want to make the sync to the second disk in the PC. Until that, i use the second disk to restore files i edit/delete/lost... on disk one.
Every three months i do a sync to one of the USB-disks. I switch those USB-disks for the sync so i have the older status up to 6 months. When i "loose" files and i notice that after 6 months they are lost.
When we leave the house for some days, i hide one USB disk inside the house, the second i put to my parents home.

I think, a mix of instant mirrored filesystems and a delayed backup, especially on diks that are not always mounted to the PC is a good thing. Think about an attack of your PC and all your disks become encrypted  :-\

Lightthief


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## Talys (Oct 8, 2017)

lion rock said:


> I'm taking a pessimistic view.
> Most of my photos are of no interest to anyone but me and myself. And I'm not going to live for ever.



Alien archaeologists will recover your photographs trillions of years from now and they will form their understanding of a primitive carbon-based life form catalogued as 017177132, in an ambitious project to identify which planet they originally heralded from.



lion rock said:


> Onto my backups: I have four or five sets separate on a dedicated computer; three external drives in two locations; plus on my daily use computer. Maybe that's quite enough.



I think you're good  

Backup durability is less important if you have multiple backups on media that you continue to write to, because backups are unlikely to simultaneously fail, and you are likely to detect media failures. 

However, I'm far from a diligent and organized person, these copies are not always in sync and not in the best organized manner (my fault,) so, sometimes I can't find a photo that I want. 



lion rock said:


> I'm taking a fatalistic view that if I loose my photos (which I had before I had built several backups,) so be it. We loose things, we loose love ones, we grief. And yet we continue. I'm not going to dwell on. The present is important. Play is important.
> -r



This is the bane of digital photography 

My data flow is: everything goes from SD card to archival storage into a dated folder, like, "2017-10-08". I use DPP to determine which photos have at least a small chance to be keepers, and copy those into regular storage, into a folder called Unsorted\2017-10-08. I don't delete a whole lot at this point.

On regular storage import through lightroom and I sort through them, delete and rename stuff, and move them from Unsorted, to for example, Birds\Eagles\2017-10-08. The finished product go into Birds\Eagles\JPG (or some other sorting, if there's a lot of processed ones of that category), all within Lightroom.

Automatically, daily, my regular storage gets backed up onto a removable backup hard drive and onto OneDrive.

When my archival storage is full, I copy its contents onto a cheap mechanical drive and reformat it (since 1TB SSD aren't cheap yet).

So, I normally have 3 hard drive copies and a cloud copy of my stuff, but most of that process is automatic, and the manual part is to keep organized, so that, I can, as you say, find stuff.


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## lion rock (Oct 8, 2017)

I was thinking, I had a university distinguished professor (UDP) who worked in the Manhattan Project and he documented everything he did in notebooks as any engineer is trained to do. When he passed away, his office was cleaned and there were his 5 or 6 stacks of notebooks stacked to about 5 feet high. In the past, the library would archive the notes/published papers, but they determined that doing so would take up too much precious space, thus, they stopped doing it.
I have personally surplussed 3 slide projectors from one retiring professor, and there were over 10 trays of slides together with boxes of of his lecture slides. No one wanted them. These went to the shredder. It is a shame to see a lifetime of work going to the dumpster. 
So, for myself, I am not going to fret over long term storage. There are so many things to do, to shoot. 

Oh, I spoke to the UDP about his travels when he was visiting places. I asked if he took photos of his journeys. The answer was he didn't. It was all in his head the places he saw. He passed away at 96.
-r


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## LDS (Oct 8, 2017)

ethanz said:


> And I don't think people need to worry about Microsoft going under any time soon and losing your backed up images, unlike other companies.



Yes, who would have believed Kodak would fail? Yahoo? Besides that, Microsoft - just like any other company - has a record of killing products/services as soon as they don't bring enough revenues - or change the term of service. Also, read the fine print about their reliability.

Cloud storage is still some kind of "battlefield", and the winners are not yet known.


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## kaihp (Oct 9, 2017)

LDS said:


> ethanz said:
> 
> 
> > And I don't think people need to worry about Microsoft going under any time soon and losing your backed up images, unlike other companies.
> ...



Exactly. The fear shouldn't be that MS, Google or Amazon goes down, but that they choose to kill, cripple, or limit the backup product to the point where it isn't valuable for you.


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## ejenner (Oct 15, 2017)

Philosophically, I think you backup as much as you can deal with maintaining. My guess is that if you are thinking about this seriously, then you may well lose stuff, but hopefully you will say 'yea, that was the risk I was willing to take'.

If Denver gets nuked, I will lose my photos. Yea, OK.

Personally I have 2 backups of my oldest raw files, at least 3 of my newer ones (because I'm more likely to accidentally do something to them) and 4 backups of my jpegs between work and home.

I do from time-t-time randomly copy/read of raw files, but I can't check them all on both backups. So I could have a disk partially corrupt and then the other fail and loose raws. But I'm not prepared to go to really deep lengths.


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## scottkinfw (Oct 15, 2017)

Hi Kit.

I don't think that is a philosophical question, and as you can see there are a lot of backup strategies. Personally I think of it in a binary way. Do I care about a pic or not? If I care about it, it will get backed up. I have lost data along with pics in the past and it is painful.

Now as to specifics. 

I use Drobo's. Specifically, I have a newer 5D3 with an accelerator and a total of 70 TB. I have a second 5D. Whenever I go on a shoot, I put the keepers in their own file, with a master file titled with the year. I also use the Drobo for my LR Catalogue.

There are 5 disks in the unit and I get notified if there is a problem such as a pending failure. If there is a failure, there is redundancy. Also, I can swap out a drive for a larger drive if needed. I can back up to the original drive too.

Anyway, that's how I do it. Main thing is that I feel very secure with RAID. Also, I use my 5D3 to directly edit the pics in LRCC. I use a 13" MBP with limited storage, so I absolutely need the RAID for that reason alone. Works well, never a problem. 

There are a number of other RAID/servers out there, and also configurations, including ones that let you set up you own personal cloud so you can access the data from any internet enabled device.

Hope this helps.

I recommend back up to RAID and you will be set.

scott


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Oct 15, 2017)

scottkinfw said:


> There are a number of other RAID/servers out there, and also configurations, including ones that let you set up you own personal cloud so you can access the data from any internet enabled device.
> 
> Hope this helps.
> 
> ...



This is not so safe as some think. 

None of the consumer NAS units are very secure, and opening them to the internet with the weak security is very dangerous. It takes a huge amount of time and effort to keep ahead of the exploits that hackers are using, and NAS security is months or years behind.

With new Ransomware attacks being launched frequently, a user needs to understand that they seek out and attack / lock any files on any attached device, so relying on a NAS for backup is not a safe plan. 

If your NAS can take snapshots, then so far, the snapshots cannot be compromised by Ransomware, and you can restore the files to a previous time. Don't forget to use the feature.


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## alvarow (Oct 24, 2017)

I keep everything on a local disk 8TB and a copy of it on Google drive ... whenever it goes to the disk from the card Drive syncs it, same with changes ... and a Google keeps revisions too. Expensive but works great.


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Oct 24, 2017)

It happened, my wife's SSD crashed and burned about 3 weeks ago. Everything on the 1 TB SSD was lost. 

Fortunately, I had multiple backups, (Disk Images), one was only 4 days old, so I burned it to a hard drive while waiting for Sandisk to respond.

I've never had a company been so slow to react, it took them a week to respond with a request for information which was not available because the drive was dead. Then another few days before they told me the return was approved and to use the return address being sent in a separate e-mail. It never came, so I had to ask them to send it, after two weeks of this, I sent it off to them and have yet to hear back.

In the meantime, I bought a new SSD, it came in 2 days, and I reinstalled to it from the backup. Its been running fine for 2 + weeks. I had a couple of SSD's in reserve, but had gave them to my daughter.

Its going to be hard to convince me to buy anything from Sandisk. Lexar has always had 1st class customer service, too bad they are going away.


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## alvarow (Oct 24, 2017)

Mt Spokane Photography said:


> Its going to be hard to convince me to buy anything from Sandisk. Lexar has always had 1st class customer service, too bad they are going away.



We’re going off topic, but I urge you to take a look at Crucial... not the fastest around, but reliable, supports hardware encryption on Windows and great service from support. I buy from them or Intel.


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## privatebydesign (Oct 24, 2017)

4 bay RAID 5 NAS, with snapshot and checksummed file transfer. Plus a HDD in another country with all the important RAW files on it.

My commercial images have a short shelf life (typically two to three years) and little value historically so I don't care about 90% of the stuff I shoot.


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## Orangutan (Oct 24, 2017)

privatebydesign said:


> Plus a HDD in another country with all the important RAW files on it.



Easier & cheaper to put that HD in a safe deposit box at a bank a mile from home. Barring a very major major disaster (earthquake, volcano, Martian attack) that HD will be both safe and accessible.


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## notapro (Oct 24, 2017)

For me, backing up photos once a month or so seems to be enough--or after a shoot with 200 or more images.

I'm using modest backup storage--A Western Digital two-disk system in RAID 0 (My Book Duo), 8 terabyte capacity.


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## Orangutan (Oct 24, 2017)

notapro said:


> For me, backing up photos once a month or so seems to be enough--or after a shoot with 200 or more images.
> 
> I'm using modest backup storage--A Western Digital two-disk system in RAID 0 (My Book Duo), 8 terabyte capacity.



Years ago I read one of those Q&A articles on backups, and one of the questions was "how often should I." The answer was "how much data can you afford to lose."

If you're a pro you probably need to backup every shoot to multiple storage media. If you're an amateur, you get to decide for yourself how valuable the photos are.


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## privatebydesign (Oct 24, 2017)

Orangutan said:


> privatebydesign said:
> 
> 
> > Plus a HDD in another country with all the important RAW files on it.
> ...



You'd think that wouldn't you?

The locations are over 1,000 miles apart yet both got hit by the same hurricane earlier this year. The backup got hit by two hurricanes and two floods and the entire country is devastated, for what it's worth I haven't lost a single file.


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## Orangutan (Oct 24, 2017)

privatebydesign said:


> Orangutan said:
> 
> 
> > privatebydesign said:
> ...



That's very fortunate. For most people, though, a bank vault will be plenty safe.


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## derrald (Oct 24, 2017)

I am a professional photographer and what I have in place is probably way to much for most, but I have seen what data loss can do to a company (I have an IT background). 

Here is my largest concern (aside from the EMP previously mentioned :

Ransomware

I have seen this affect companies 4 different times to devastating effect. It goes in and encrypts all the files. All data on your network is hosed. That means if you have 3 drives plugged in to do backups - hosed. One of the backups has to be offline or in the cloud. 

As a professional, the problems I have with the cloud is cost and bandwidth. I have some PSDs that are 2 or 3 GB in size alone not to mention all my RAW files. I currently have about 14 TB of data which would take way to long to upload to the cloud.

For the discussion here is my system and once again this is a fairly extreme example:

2x Dell R710 Servers with RAID 5 (RAID as mentioned before is not backup, but nice for speed and drive redundancy)
1x USB drive per server for on the network backups
2x USB drive per server for offsite backup (kept approximately 5 miles away)
Everything is transferred to backup every night via a Robocopy script
A monitoring program to monitor backup failures
All my final JPGs are kept in Zenfolio

The offline backup gets done weekly. I swap drives - put one on to backup and replace with the recent copy.

I have never had to go back to Zenfolio for files. I've never had to go back to the offline files. I HAVE had to go back to the online backup.

NOTHING is stored on my processing machine, everything is on the servers. Lastly, this backup system pertains to all my files, not just images. Invoices, receipts, tax docs, even my MP3 collection.

The monitoring program monitors for drives problems as well as backup failures. I've had about 5 or 6 drives go bad during this time. I've never had a drive fail before I was able to replace it because it almost always tells you its going bad before it does through the monitoring programs.

Also, I keep spare hard drives in stock. When one gets swapped out another gets purchased.

For my friends I always recommend 1x network or USB backup and 1x offline even if its at their work or friends. At the very least not connected to the network when the backup is not going to protect against ransomware.

I hope this helps someone. I am pretty passionate about backing up data as years ago I lost files I can never get back!


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## LDS (Oct 24, 2017)

derrald said:


> Here is my largest concern (aside from the EMP previously mentioned :
> Ransomware



As others already wrote, a NAS capable of creating "snapshots" is an effective way to protect from ransomware. A "snapshot" - as the name implies, take a "photograph" of the files. Changes made after the snapshot are made to an automatic copy of the file. It's not very different from Apple's TimeMachine and Windows 10 backup, but it can work an a NAS on its own.

Of course, it will use additional disk space (unmodified files only need the space needed to record the snapshot metadata), but one can revert to a previous snapshot ad needed. Unlike backups, snapshots are much faster to create, and can be created more often (some systems create them hourly, or even less). Reverting to an earlier snapshot is also faster than restoring a backup (but all work done after the snapshot was taken is of course lost). Some system allow to transfer or "open" a snapshot on a different system, for single file recovery. It may also useful to protect against accidental deletes or modifications.

Actual ransomware are not capable of encrypting files before a snapshot was taken - of course older snapshots may need to be deleted, and you have to spot a ransomware before it is too late - but that's true for backup as well.

A proper backup/archiving solutions is not just a matter of hardware and disk space, but of software also.


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## ethanz (Oct 24, 2017)

notapro said:


> For me, backing up photos once a month or so seems to be enough--or after a shoot with 200 or more images.
> 
> I'm using modest backup storage--A Western Digital two-disk system in RAID 0 (My Book Duo), 8 terabyte capacity.



Hello, just a note for you, that isn't actually a backup if it is only on the My Book Duo. If a file is only in one place it is not backed up, its only stored. If the My Book Duo was in Raid 1, that would at least be a little better because it would be on two drives.


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## derrald (Oct 24, 2017)

LDS said:


> derrald said:
> 
> 
> > Here is my largest concern (aside from the EMP previously mentioned :
> ...



I've seen ransomware affect snapshots as well. It depends on how they are taken. Regardless, something not connected is always better than something that is when ransomware attacks.


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## LDS (Oct 24, 2017)

ethanz said:


> notapro said:
> 
> 
> > For me, backing up photos once a month or so seems to be enough--or after a shoot with 200 or more images.
> ...



Actually, in a RAID0, a file is on all drives, some pieces on one, some pieces on the others. Losing one disk means to lose all files. RAID 0 is for speed and size, but it's the most dangerous one. Good for scratch space and large temporary files, but nothing critical.


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## notapro (Oct 24, 2017)

Orangutan speaks to something relevant with respect to one being able to decide how valuable photos are. For paid shoots, I back up the RAW files immediately so as to have an extra copy should something happen to the original set. Paid shoots aside, I shoot infrequently--sometimes not even one in a month--so my relatively infrequent backup schedule works for me.

To LDS--You offer helpful information on RAID 0. The storage I purchased was preconfigured for RAID 0, and that's the reason I'm using that. You and ethanz (below) have me rethinking the RAID 0 configuration.

To ethanz--Yes, I agree and understand about a file being only in one place not being a backup file. I think I've been imprecise in expressing myself in this thread. I have all my files on my main machine. I copy them to the external storage, and I refer to those files as my backup. With your and LDS's advice, I may look into configuration options on the My Book Duo.


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Oct 25, 2017)

alvarow said:


> Mt Spokane Photography said:
> 
> 
> > Its going to be hard to convince me to buy anything from Sandisk. Lexar has always had 1st class customer service, too bad they are going away.
> ...


 I'm a heavy user of SSD's, I have them from Crucial, Samsung, and Sandisk, maybe more. Crucial is Lexar, but I do have Crucial SSD's. Generally, their performance is slow, and I had one die about a year ago which was replaced promptly. They would be a low choice for me. Intel consumer SSD's are low on the totem as well. I have more Samsung SSD's than the others, they tend to be faster, I've never had one fail, and they cost more. I'd expect fast service from Samsung as well, I have not needed it.

I had bought a new WD SSD before I found out how slow the Sandisk service was, (They are the same now). I would have bought another Samsung otherwise.


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## kaihp (Oct 25, 2017)

Mt Spokane Photography said:


> I had bought a new WD SSD before I found out how slow the Sandisk service was, (They are the same now). I would have bought another Samsung otherwise.



Speaking of service, I have found that WD have quite good service. I had a WD Red drive (I have 6 in my DIY nas) starting to generate SMART errors, and contacted WD about it. They replied within 24h saying that it qualified for a warranty replacement, went on to suggest using their 'Advance' RMA to get the same firmware version (since it's part of a nas) and telling me how to do it.

Very good service, in my mind.


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Oct 25, 2017)

kaihp said:


> Mt Spokane Photography said:
> 
> 
> > I had bought a new WD SSD before I found out how slow the Sandisk service was, (They are the same now). I would have bought another Samsung otherwise.
> ...



Its possible that WD has a separate customer service from Sandisk, even though the own them. Sandisk SSD's are sold under Sandisk and WD names depending on the marketing area. On Amazon, here in the US, the WD brand sells for less even though its exactly the same unit. I've had good service from WD for the few times I needed it. The service address for Sandisk was Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin. The address for WD hard drives is in Kentucky but I would expect the WD Blue SSD's to go to Sandisk.


BTW, I received a email this morning saying that they had received the drive and would be checking it. Actually, they received it on the 19th early in the AM, so they have had it 5 working days now.


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## Valvebounce (Oct 25, 2017)

Hi Mt Spokane. 
You have to wonder why a company would wait so long to acknowledge receipt of a returned product especially if it was a tracked delivery, they must know that you know they have had it 5 days! :
I'm guessing that it is carefully worded so as to not be a blatant lie, but it still stinks to me! That is the kind of customer service I don't want to deal with. 

The next bit is off topic but somewhat relevant too. 

We got a new gas cooker last week and it had so many things wrong you have to wonder about quality control, we contacted their customer service department and they were down right rude, after 3 working days the "engineer will call in 1 working day" had not called, chased it and they were rude again! Guess what, they now have their crappy (expensive) product back with a don't bother sending an engineer note and we have a different brand, funnily enough we had to call customer service for them too (missing shelf) polar opposite, so sorry one will be sent, had it the next day! 

Cheers, Graham. 



Mt Spokane Photography said:


> BTW, I received a email this morning saying that they had received the drive and would be checking it. Actually, they received it on the 19th early in the AM, so they have had it 5 working days now.


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Nov 1, 2017)

The replacement Sandisk SSD finally arrived today, I think the original problem happened about Oct 5, so it took over 4 weeks to get it replaced. They sent the replacement by Mail Innovations, so that alone took over a week, first class mail would take 2-3 days from Wisconsin.


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