Backing Up Photos

elvis2010 · Oct 23, 2010

I was just looking through my digital photos and realized I have over 42GB of pics and a few short videos that I should backup some how.

I currently save my pictures to an external drive with a backup on another external. What other way, besides on the net, could I back my pics up?

puyjapin · Oct 23, 2010

dvd's, if u have 2 externals surely that is enough.

Cy-Gor · Oct 23, 2010

I would think it would depend on how valuable they are to you (i know obvious answer)

If they are personal shots that would suck to lose but not the end of the world, then your current solution takes care of the loss due to hardware failure.

If they are for clients then that changes things. In this situation some sort of offsite backup is needed. This will protect you in case of fire or theft.

It could be as simple as burning DVDs and giving them to a friend to some sort of cloud solution.

Or you could go crazy like me and setup a VPN with automated backups between 3 different sites so that even if 2 of the 3 burn to the ground the data is still at the 3rd site.

arcooke · Oct 23, 2010

You could get a blu-ray burner, that's a pretty cost effective way of archiving your stuff. But keep in mind that optical media (cd/dvd/bluray) degrades over time (10-15 year life span or so I believe). You can pick up a blu-ray burner for around $150 and bluray discs for around a buck or two a piece with 25GB storage on each.

Another option would be to set up a NAS box in RAID0 on your home network. NAS is "network attached storage". It's basically a small box with 2+ hard drives in it that you hook up to your network to keep backups on. They generally have built-in RAID, and if configured as RAID0 (mirrored array), your data would be identical on both drives so if one hard drive fails, you still have the data on the other drive and you can just replace the dead drive and rebuild the array. It's a good way to keep your data safe. Some options to look at here: Newegg.com - Network Attached Storage, NAS, Network Storage, Network Storage Devices, Network Storage Hard Drive, Shared Network Storage

I know you said "other than online", but there are some great backup services out there. Never a bad idea to have off-site backups. If you had a house fire or something, even if you have 100 backups, all could be lost.

Cy-Gor · Oct 23, 2010

arcooke said:
Another option would be to set up a NAS box in RAID0 on your home network. NAS is "network attached storage". It's basically a small box with 2+ hard drives in it that you hook up to your network to keep backups on. They generally have built-in RAID, and if configured as RAID0 (mirrored array), your data would be identical on both drives so if one hard drive fails, you still have the data on the other drive and you can just replace the dead drive and rebuild the array. It's a good way to keep your data safe. Some options to look at here: Newegg.com - Network Attached Storage, NAS, Network Storage, Network Storage Devices, Network Storage Hard Drive, Shared Network Storage

Raid 0 is a stripe set not a mirror. so if you lose one drive you are SOL.
The best way i found to remember the difference is "you are a zero if you run zero" because there is no fault tolerance at all. one drive failure in a raid 0 array means the entire array is toast.

Raid 1 is a mirror.

Raid 5 is a stripe set with parity (takes 3 drives min)

for most home users raid 1 is plenty, or just have two drives with copies on both.