How do you back up your files?

[jimmy986]

I wasn't sure where to post this so hopefully this is the best place. I currently keep all of my photos on an 8 TB external drive. My Mac only has 1 TB of storage and my photos are just over 900GB. I need to get a back up for the external since I can't use my computer to store them on. What is a good way? I would love to have something that would automatically sync with my external but if need be it doesn't have to. Cloud storage would be nice because then I wouldn't be relying on two drives located together if anything should happen to my home. I know the easiest option would be to just buy a second drive and it may be what I do but I wanted to check and see if there were any better ideas.

[sixzeiss]

A small NAS device with "personal" cloud would probably help you. Its possible to configure the Disks in the NAS to be redundant, and they all seem to have "backup" method/button for copying to an external disk.

Western Digital make a few devices (i.e. My Cloud Pro Series PR4100), and QNAP make an even broader range of devices.

[slackercruster]

I use a bunch of external drives, some DVDs and thumb drives short term. My main back up is the original SD cards. I'm a scatterbrain and have deleted files off my computer more than once and had to go back to the SD cards.

Cloud takes over the computer, didn't like it.  Stop paying the bill and in 30 days your cloud files go poof! Some of the media is kept off site.

 

[garryknight]

I use FreeFileSync to mirror my photos to an external drive. Simple enough to set up and very easy to use.

[martynhicks]

I always work from one main back up drive, then I duplicate/mirror that to a second hard drive. When that's full, I'll move to two new drives and do the same. It's a pain but always having duplicate backups is definitely worth it.

[Thad E Ginathom]

So far as photographs is concerned, I don't delete the pics on my memory card unless or until I have to, so that is one copy, but I don't count it.

So far as photographs and all other data on my computer is concerned, I keep two external portable drives (It has just become necessary for me use 2Tb drives). About once a week, I make a backup to one of these drives and swap it with the other, which is kept at a friend's house in a different area. Technically, I use a linux program called grsync which just copies new files to a mirror directory tree on each drive. I also use tar for occasional systems backups from which I could (probably) restore my entire system without reinstallation. All this is very OS specific --- back in windows days I had an excellent sync program, but I forget its name.

This is a low-discipline, low-security, somewhat haphazard regime which I would have laughed at when it was my job to do this stuff. But it is good enough for me. If I lost a week of concert photos it would not be the end of the world, but if I lost a holiday's worth, that would be more serious. Professionals can add frequency, discipline and rigour.

It occurs to me to emphasise the importance of two things. First, a back-up disk should not be connected to a computer or to mains power except when in use. Second, one back-up should be at a different location.

I have not mentioned the cloud. I do not use it at all much, except for sharing. IF I had huge bandwidth and high internet speeds, I would use it --- as a convenience, or as another string to the bow. Personally and professionally (but long-since retired anyway) I believe in having physical possession of*, and responsibility for, my data. There is no company that is so perfect, whatever its size, that it will never have downtime, or so huge as to be completely immune from catastrophe.

Coming back to brass tacks: there are at least two, if not three (sometimes four!) copies of my photos (and music, and personal stuff) at nearly all times. The times when there is not is counted in hours and days.  

 

*Including that vital off-site storage, of course.

Edited May 25, 2019 by Thad E Ginathom

[WestonDeclan]

On 5/26/2019 at 2:07 AM, Thad E Ginathom said:

So far as photographs is concerned, I don't delete the pics on my memory card unless or until I have to, so that is one copy, but I don't count it.

So far as photographs and all other data on my computer is concerned, I keep two external portable drives (It has just become necessary for me use 2Tb drives). About once a week, I make a backup to one of these drives and swap it with the other, which is kept at a friend's house in a different area. Technically, I use a linux program called grsync which just copies new files to a mirror directory tree on each drive. I also use tar for occasional systems backups from which I could (probably) restore my entire system without reinstallation. All this is very OS specific --- back in windows days I had an excellent sync program, but I forget its name.

This is a low-discipline, low-security, somewhat haphazard regime which I would have laughed at when it was my job to do this stuff. But it is good enough for me. If I lost a week of concert photos it would not be the end of the world, but if I lost a holiday's worth, that would be more serious. Professionals can add frequency, discipline and rigour.

It occurs to me to emphasise the importance of two things. First, a back-up disk should not be connected to a computer or to mains power except when in use. Second, one back-up should be at a different location.

I have not mentioned the cloud. I do not use it at all much, except for sharing. IF I had huge bandwidth and high internet speeds, I would use it --- as a convenience, or as another string to the bow. Personally and professionally (but long-since retired anyway) I believe in having physical possession of*, and responsibility for, my data. There is no company that is so perfect, whatever its size, that it will never have downtime, or so huge as to be completely immune from catastrophe.

Coming back to brass tacks: there are at least two, if not three (sometimes four!) copies of my photos (and music, and personal stuff) at nearly all times. The times when there is not is counted in hours and days.  

 

*Including that vital off-site storage, of course.

1. Select the Start button, then select Control Panel > System and Maintenance > Backup and Restore.
2. Do one of the following: If you've never used Windows Backup before, or recently upgraded your version of Windows, select Set up backup, and then follow the steps in the wizard.

[FunWithCameras]

One thing that I find worrying is when I see that someone has just one backup of their images. Or even no backup if they have all their images on a single external drive. These are the people you see posting in forums asking how they can get their photos recovered from a failed hard drive...

Yesterday was International Backup Day - seems a good time for a little rant...

Hard disks FAIL! Sooner or later, every single hard drive will fail. It might last a week, a year, five years, even more, but it will fail. If all your images on a single hard drive, you are going to lose all your images one day.

Does that bother you?

The answer is to have multiple copies, on multiple devices (no, having three copies of all your images on the one hard drive is NOT backup).

There are a lot of options.

1. Cloud backup is one, but make sure you are using a cloud backup run by a reputable company (a couple have vanished without trace, leaving people without their backups).
2. Some people backup some of their images to Flickr or Instagram or SmugMug or whatever - make sure they don't have a clause in their contract which gives them the right to use your images without your permission!
3. Hard disk servers on your LAN - this is rather old-school, and you still need to backup the server!
4. NAS boxes are an option, but you should probably have them connected to a UPS (uninterruptible power supply) to ensure their storage is not corrupted by a power failure
5. Tape backup used to be an option, but it's not a real option any more
6. USB connect external hard drives

Personally, I use USB attached 2.5" hard drives - I used 2.5" hard drives because they are powered by the USB connection. You can get larger 3.5" external hard drives (14TB or more), but they are powered by little transformer wall-warts, and those either go missing or fail in a puff of smoke. Much easier to use drives powered from USB. Currently these hard drives are available up to 5TB, and they are cheap. You can get them from lots of places, even big stationery stores! Buy multiple brands (I mostly use Western Digital and Seagate. Lacie are generally too pricy for backup. Toshiba should be good) - you don't want to make years of backups to discover that all the drives have failed because of a manufacturing flaw.

Don't use SSD external drives - way too expensive for backup - use the SSDs for rapid downloading of your images and processing them, but back up to old-fashioned magnetic disks.

Another neat feature of external 2.5" disks is that they are fairly compact. You can transport them easily, and your brother / mother / son / granddaughter / best friend won't mind if you ask them to keep one or two for you - you want your backups stored in multiple locations so you don't lose your images if your house or apartment burns to the ground.

The absolute minimum number of copies of your images that you need is 3, and that is only enough if you keep checking that each backup is still accessible. More is better. I tend to create a new full backup about once a month, and the current price of hard drives is low enough that I frequently buy a new drive for the next backup (if you don't buy a new drive, then re-use an older one - never write your new backup over your most recent backup!). I have a drawer full of old backups - gosh, some of the oldest are on 250GB hard drives!

Rant over. Now go buy a drive and make a backup!

[8201]

Highly recommend Backblaze for cloud backup.