Storage and backup - does anyone else use Dropbox?

I've been using Dropbox for a while now - and recently paid the 9.99/month for the upgrade to 50gigs of storage. This is in addition to having two copies of my photos on two separate hard drives locally. Does anyone else include an offline storage option when they backup their photos? Mozy? Dropbox? Other?

https://www.dropbox.co​m/referrals/NTM1MzA3OD​A5

Well, 50 GB isn't a whole lot of storage; I've probably got close to that on my SmugMug site. I use several TB drives for my backups, and store one or more off-site.

Jon wrote in post #10038042
Well, 50 GB isn't a whole lot of storage; I've probably got close to that on my SmugMug site. I use several TB drives for my backups, and store one or more off-site.

I guess it was a poor way of starting a conversation on how people backup and store large amounts of photos. I don't have a ton so I haven't hit the 50g mark. It was a short-term solution to having an offsite backup for me.

Been using dropbox as long as it's been out but I don't use it for backup purposes (I'm far from needing online backups so I'm purely offline storage at this point). I tend to have all my work scripts on dropbox.

I'm a fan of dropbox for syncing and have been since it came out; but storage is a little limited for photos (even 50gb..).

I personally just use online backup for my jpgs (flickr), and two local copies of DNG (NAS + local). There are lots of cheapish methods of large file backup online (carbonite; amazon glacier, etc); but I haven't migrated to one yet. Urgency would move up if I had a child or depended on said files for my livelihood.

I use two identical 1TB drives to download my images from card to via LR. I back the main one up every month or so to an other portable 1TB drive that's stored at my wife's work, and I back everything up online with CrashPlan. I lost a relatively new drive once, only lost a handful of photos from a hike, but they were great shots in the fog. Never gonna happen again.

My macbook is also backed up onto a bootable drive using SuperDuper and CrashPlan. And one more external drive for TimeMachine.

Storage is cheap, lost stuff is priceless

illae wrote in post #10037926
I've been using Dropbox for a while now - and recently paid the 9.99/month for the upgrade to 50gigs of storage. This is in addition to having two copies of my photos on two separate hard drives locally. Does anyone else include an offline storage option when they backup their photos? Mozy? Dropbox? Other?

Hmm, at $9.99/mth x 12 = approx. $120/yr is a bit stiff for only 50GB of storage. For less than half that amount per year, I have unlimited storage using Zenfolio which is a photo hosting site. Others like SmugMug or Flickr Pro will also be a cheaper option.

For external storage, I'm looking at SSDs which is faster and more reliable than traditional HDDs. The cost for SSDs are also coming down gradually. One external solid state drive I'm eyeing is the rugged Sony PSZ-SA25 (256GB, 400MB/s transfer speed) which is more expensive compared to the price you pay for traditional HDDs at 1TB/2TB/etc. But then, you are the one setting what's the value you place on your pics.

For cloud backup, I would recommend Amazon Glacier. It's long term storage only, which means you have to give amazon advanced notice to remove data from the servers, and the more you remove, the more it costs. It's basically a backup that you never touch unless you lose all your other backups. On the plus side, it's cheap. $0.01 per GB per month.

http://aws.amazon.com/​glacier/

i use dphoto.com i find it to be a perfect solution for backups and distributing images to clients.

I love Dropbox for what it is: A file synchronizing/online storage system and the easiest way to get a file on or off a tablet/phone. I do not consider it a backup system. What happens if you have a file stored in Dropbox and synced to 5 devices, then someone either maliciously or accidentally deletes it from one device? Dropbox will dutifully delete it from the other 4 of course!

If you put important data in Dropbox, you still need to back it up. I do this with both local hard drive based backups and Crashplan online backup.

box.net gave out 50GB for free, but sucks compared to dropbox (different really). Even 50GB isnt enough. The thing with dropbox, is that I have it on all pc's, and would suck for all of them to sync.

that amazon solution looks pretty cool, but for the most part, I've given up on cloud backup. My cloud backup is my mom's house. I set her up with 3.5TB on a low power NAS, and backup to her house when I visit. Personal backup is also on my home NAS and USB drives.

SSDs.... I have literally dozens of working conventional hard drives. I also have 2 DEAD drives. Both SSDs... I thought they were great and now I really wonder about them....

Mark H

P51Mstg wrote in post #16326612
SSDs.... I have literally dozens of working conventional hard drives. I also have 2 DEAD drives. Both SSDs... I thought they were great and now I really wonder about them....

Mark H

That was your first dead drive? I consider you either really young or really lucky; likely a combination of the two..

https://www.google.com …UtA&bvm=bv.5321​7764,d.eWU

I don't use any online backup solutions. My website stores high resolution jpgs. I have multiple drives at home and since I'm in Oklahoma and have tornadoes, I'll take a drive to work (30 miles away) during storm season.

I have thought about getting a safety deposit box at the bank and keep a drive there, but didn't want the hassle of going down there every so often to get the drive, backup, and return to the bank. It is an option however I don't know the cost.

WOM.... 54 years old using PCs since 1980 (PET, TRASH80) etc... Can't count how many personal PCs I've had over the years.... I lost one HD in law school in 1986..

At the law firm we had about 60 PCs networked, replaced them once after about 6 years, never lost a hard drive. Did lose one in the server running an early raid in the early 1990s.

At home to store photos and other data I have 3 Thecus NAS drives (8800 Pro), each has 8 drives in it (24 HDs so far). Backup is on another 8800 PRO (8 more drives -32 Drives so far); 2 7700PROs (14 more drives - 46 total) 4200PRO (4 more - 50), 5200 (5 more = 55 hard drives).

I keep several spares on hand and never pull them out... Most of the exact types of drives in the NASes are out of production (combinations of 2TB and 3 TB drives). Also have a handful of older 1TB bare drives I make images of the computers boot drives on (not counting those)

I'm also not counting all the drives I've upgraded overthe years, where we went from 1TB to 2TB in the NASes, etc. Those drives I put in cheap cases and use them to send large amounts of data to people who need it.... (give them away as they become obsolete.

I probably have 8 more external HDs, some with multiple drives (LACIE) say 15 more HDs there....(70 HDs so far)

Desktop has 1 3TB and a 1 TB Boot drive; Laptop has 1 1GB and a SSD... Girlfriend has 2 laptops with 2 HDs; son... well I have no clue how many computers he has. His dorm room at college looks like a data center....

So 75 Mechanical HDs and 1 SDD that works. I have 2 other SSDs that dropped dead... Brands I use for mechanicals are seagate and WD, with one 8800 with 8 Toshibas (which are pretty darn fast)

I've lost 2 mechanical HDs in my life (one in law school in 1986 and one at the law firm in the mid 1990s).... Lost 2 SSDs (2/3 of my SSDs I've owned) while only 4% of Mechanicals have failed. When you are talking 100,000s or millions of hours MTBF, its rare one is going to go out.

I can say I'm impressed with SSD speeds, some work well and apparently some don't...

Mark H