What's everyone using for storage?

[askme77]

I'm sure this question gets asked alot but I'm getting paranoid about losing all of my pictures. I have roughly 12,000 pictures that I want to store somewhere that will be safe. Currently I have them all on HDs and SD cards but any reliable online storage that is recommended? I've read up on Smugmug, Google One, Amazon Drive but not sure which would be the best. Any suggestions that everyone is happy with ? I currently use Google Photos for some storage but hate that you can't just drag and drop a folder. It pretty much uploads all the pictures and then Google decides how they should be sorted. Any help would be appreciated

[wq9nsc]

I use good quality external hard drives for back up, one stored locally and the other at a different location.  

Online can be convenient but when using my own drives I don't have to worry about some other organization changing their data storage policies/protocols.  IF you use the dual drive backup method, then make sure the second drive is at your office or other location to avoid data loss from disaster/theft etc.

Although one would expect the major cloud storage providers to have exceeding good protection against ransomware and other acts with very safe redundant backup I would certainly want to study your potential choice to see if you trust them as a sole source.  A good hybrid alternative, and one I am considering, is keeping one backup set at home on external drives and using cloud storage for the redundant backup.

Rodger

[shadowsports]

QNAP NAS replicating to a second QNAP NAS, then both are backed up to external disks.  So essentially, 4 copies.

Some of my most important pictures are also backed up to the cloud.  This is overkill, but I never lose data and a hardware failure is only a inconvience and not a life ending event. 

Onsite and offsite storage as wq9nsc suggests is the best solution. 

[RobertTheFat]

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@askme77 wrote:

I'm sure this question gets asked alot but I'm getting paranoid about losing all of my pictures. I have roughly 12,000 pictures that I want to store somewhere that will be safe. Currently I have them all on HDs and SD cards but any reliable online storage that is recommended? I've read up on Smugmug, Google One, Amazon Drive but not sure which would be the best. Any suggestions that everyone is happy with ? I currently use Google Photos for some storage but hate that you can't just drag and drop a folder. It pretty much uploads all the pictures and then Google decides how they should be sorted. Any help would be appreciated

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Do NOT use an online service for anything but secondary (or preferably tertiary) backup. When you place your primary backups under someone else's control, you take a serious risk. A few years ago a prominent backup service went broke, and its users were not given enough time to retrieve their files before the servers were sold off. And do not use CF or SD cards for backup; they're too easy to misplace or accidentally re-use. Buy one or more USB hard drives; they're relatively cheap these days.

[Lumigraphics]

Online is fine for a backup, don't let anyone scare you with horror stories. Numerus businesses use cloud storage and there are companies like Amazon and Microsoft providing storage options who are unlikely to go out of business anytime soon. You should also think about off-site backups, I have backup hard drives at my mom's house. Chances are that if something happens at my place, hers (100 miles away) will be ok and its a 90 minute drive to retrieve files if needed.

[Sunnywind]

I've lost my images on online service, itI was 6 years ago, now the services are better, but I don't share my information with them. I write DVDs and have copies od hdd:))

[UsaMusa]

 I have been using google drive for years and  i keep complaining they I do not have enough space and do nothing about it 

[Mitsubishiman]

This depends on your budget as well as your level of trust. 

I took matters into my own hands, Buffalo NAS 24TB Server, configured to RAID 6, This allows 16TB usable storage and simultaneous failure of 2 of the 8 Hard Drives without data loss. 

And I backup to external portable 4TB Western Digital Drives (2) and rotate them from on-site to off-site. 

I only have the files on my desktop PC while I am working with them, then transfer to the server. 

Whatever you do, do it twice, USB thumb drives are realitively inexpensive, and the track record is 90%+ - yes they can fail, so 2 copies and store one off site away from the other, safety deposit boxes a good choice. 

The primary reason flash drives fail (besides physical damage) is excessive read-write cycles, they have limitations, but have improved. 

Stick with name brands, SanDisk, Kensington are extremely good. 

Adding another internal drive to a computer has also become inexpensive but not a substitute for long term. 

Copying to a DVD is also advisable due to economical reasons, and will not fail except for physical damage, 3 copies, 3 locations. 

[Unrelenting]

I use two Sandisk external SSD hard drives to back up my photos as well as an HDD drive The Sandisk SSD drives come in 250GB, 500GB, 1TB and 2TB sizes, are very compact, and are not too expensive. I brng one with me to download photos from the flash memory cards in the camera each day on a multiday photo shoot.

[ChrisPBacon]

Almost every Costco has memory storage that's between 5 and 8 terabytes for very reasonable prices ($110-165), for use with Apple or Microsoft software devices.  The larger (8Tb) of the two stores about 320,000 photos.