I used Backblaze for years. Cheapest by far including all connected external drives. Full time, real time backups. But last year, I noticed a lot of files having to be backed up. Support said sometimes it refreshes old files or some crap. After blowing my data cap for 2 months I dug into it and the number of files they had was far less than what I had, so in my mind, they lost a big chunk of my data.

So currently, I am using 3 externals, with one kept off site.

I am looking at other cloud backups, but will need to pay at least twice what Backblaze charges.

So, right now, looking at Crashplan, Carbonite and iDrive. The last isnt unlimited, but at 5Tb, it will hold me for a few years.

Same as dbvirago, I use Backblaze.  Cost is $10/month per computer.  Unlimited cloud storage.

I currently have 9.6TB (yes, Terrabytes) on my BB backup of my main computer.

If it's really Gb buy a second drive and a deck or dock. $61



2T drive is $69

You now have the backup drive and a copy of the backup drive.

After a year (or any time you want), put the first drive on the book shelf, or in a bank box, or offsite... buy another one, back up and you are solid. Cost will be about $70 a year.

CDs and DVDs are unreliable! Your can buy the most expensive Gold and make backups, come back five years later and there's data loss. They are slow.

Personally, I back up photos once a year, from the backup. So I have the last two years of photos on the computer, the backup of the computer all years, on an external drive, and the archived backup of the external drive on a hard drive, that's not connected to anything except when in use.

Video has it's own backup drive, same way, on the computer, on the external and on the backup of the external. Some externals will automatically keep a backup of selected drives and folders, you don't need to do anything except once a month make that redundant backup like the first example.

What I have is the originals, a copy and a backup of the copy. Pretty basic, and never in forever have I lost one file, using hard drives. DVDs and CDs and QIC tapes and Zip drives, I've lost data on every one of those.

At the moment we have 58 TB stored on Dropbox.

I like DropBox too, but....   58TB??? How much does THAT cost???

Great topic!  I need the same as I'm pushing over 10tb.  Planning a trip to Chile and hoping for a solid cloud service to upload from down there as a backup.  Either Dropbox or Google Drive... anyone with experience using both have a preference?

i back up to three external HDs. two in the studio and one in the car. i used to keep the DNG, TIFF and PSD files but found that I never really used them so I only keep my processed, uploaded, high res jpegs

My one and only advice:

Go with a BIG name.

There are so many competitors and many won't be around in 5 years... I have personal experience with this and then you have to upload everything again...

Quote from: increasingdifficulty on January 24, 2019, 07:21

My one and only advice:

Go with a BIG name.

There are so many competitors and many won't be around in 5 years... I have personal experience with this and then you have to upload everything again...

I agree COMPLETELY!  I have had to do it twice now. And uploading 10TB takes roughly 8 months on my internet connection.

BackBlaze has been around for awhile, I HOPE they stay around, since that is where my 10TB now sits...

Pretty interesting advise and that's a long time. I thought I have slow Internet. 

I can understand better now, why some people want cloud, especially for travel, or multi-location use. I suppose even a small account would be good when I am on the road. I have Dropbox which could hold a weekend of photos, no video. As it is, I carry two external drives. But I see the point of cloud storage vs what some of us do on a desktop.

I can understand better now, why some people want cloud, especially for travel, or multi-location use. I suppose even a small account would be good when I am on the road. I have Dropbox which could hold a weekend of photos, no video. As it is, I carry two external drives. But I see the point of cloud storage vs what some of us do on a desktop.

More than that.  What happens if your house burns down?  What happens if a burglar breaks in and steals your computer and the drives near it?

I lived in Berkeley, Calif for 26 years. Nice safe urban area.  Then the Oakland Firestorm came in 1992, destroying 3300 homes in the largest urban fire in US history. The fire was stopped literally across the street from me.  I did not lose my home that time, but it was touch-and-go.

I now live in Ecuador. Our home was burglarized and the perp stole two laptop computers and a very expensive lens (Canon 70-200 f2., plus $1000 in a petty cash drawer.  He did not take my disk drives, but what if he had taken those too?

Cloud backup should be part of everyone's data security plan.  Disks will fail, so daily local backup is good.  Homes burn down or get burglarized, so offsite backup is also needed.

If you don't have both onsite AND offsite backup, then you are playing Russian Roulette with your data. What will happen if you lose it all?  Setting up a continuous cloud backup for $10/month is pretty cheap when you consider the downside of not having it...

Interesting to see the use of back up drive and copy of back up drive.  I'm not quite sure if I understand how it works.

I have my files inside my computer. It's a desktop. (1)

I have an external drive connected, I copy everything to that drive now and then. Actually there are external drives that will do that, automatically, and always be a redundant backup of whatever folders or drives or what you choose. (2)

I have a StarDeck drive holder that I can swap in or out, different drives, nice, buy an internal desktop drive (which is what they are called), no case no cables, nothing extra. There are some cheaper solutions like a Sata USB cable to USB. I just like the deck. (3) If someone wanted offsite, they would take these drives to a safe place, bank box Etc. Fireproof storage boxes are easily available. 4T drive $119

For people who are on location or move from place to place or want backups while they travel, cloud is a better solution. For people who are worried that a 747 will fall on their home and burn up the desktop, the backup and at the same time, lightning will strike their bank or their office building, cloud would be peace of mind.

Often people forget that their cloud storage is mirrored, how many times do we read, "I deleted files on my computer and lost everything" because when you delete the computer file, the could file is removed.

Amazon Glacier looks interesting, .004 per Gb per month, then additional fees when you download. If you don't need it, you aren't paying extra, just a monthly storage fee of $4 per Terabyte. Using the 4T just because that's what I have, others will have much less, video people will have much more. Cloud at the lowest rates, $16 a month = $192 a year. Hard drives 2T, because that's what I actually have, $69 each x 2 = $138. In a year the drives have been run a couple hours total. I can buy another, next will be a 4T, probably $100 by then but $119 now.

I back up the two 2T drives to the 4T and file the 2Ts offsite, if I wanted. I keep filling the 4T. If it's full, I file it and start over with two more 2T drives. I still have old IDE drives on the book shelf, with the original files that are now backed up a few times on newer larger drives.

But the idea is redundant home backup, have one set someplace safe, off premises. In a case in the trunk of your car is a safe place. If the car gets stolen or bursts into flames, you just make another backup from the working copies at home. Your insurance covers the replacement costs. If a volcano pours lava over your house, and you escape in your car, you have your data with you. That's examples for people who want extremes and hypothetical extremely uncommon catastrophic possibilities.

I have already asked myself, who's going to care about my photos when I'm gone? No one that I know. I have left my stock accounts income to someone close and the photo hard drives and music tapes to my niece. She has two kids in their 20s, hopefully they might find something useful. But realistically, unless someone here is Ansel Adams, Karl Bissinger, Dorothea Lange or Alfred Stiglitz and that sort, worrying about most of what we shot in 2004 isn't worth the space it takes to save them.

I have negatives going back to the 50s and my parents photos going back to the 20s, those other 20s?  I save them, I carry them, I move them, I scan them and I don't believe there's one photo of significance in the whole bunch. 20 years from now, no one will care about any photo I took in 2008, except maybe one. Honestly how important is cloud backup or me having a half dozen modern drives and 3-4 backups of everything I ever shot with a digital camera?

If someone wanted offsite, they would take these drives to a safe place, bank box Etc. Fireproof storage boxes are easily available. 4T drive $119

Most people (including myself) would find it quite inconvenient to have to go to the bank to get backups. And the point of cloud backup is that you can backup every day if you want. You won't do that with a bank. You would take each 4TB drive only once it's full, thereby not having very recent backups most of the time.

Often people forget that their cloud storage is mirrored, how many times do we read, "I deleted files on my computer and lost everything" because when you delete the computer file, the could file is removed.

Cloud storage is not all mirrored. Some is. Sure. But what lunatic would mirror 15TB of data?

I have already asked myself, who's going to care about my photos when I'm gone? No one that I know.

My family has photos from my grandfather that are of infinite value to us. We are certainly thankful some of his work survived.

Honestly how important is cloud backup or me having a half dozen modern drives and 3-4 backups of everything I ever shot with a digital camera?

If it's not important to you, we are not forcing you to use cloud backup.

To me, what I have created digitally is pretty much ALL that is of great value to me. All my physical things can be replaced. My life's work cannot. Having it backed up is of infinite value to me.

Some people are not nostalgic or sentimental people. Others are.