Requesting Advice

I'm using a Mac mini with a 1 terabyte HD and since I started using LR and shooting RAW I'm using up my HD capacity pretty quick. I also have a little portable HD with about 500 gigabytes of JPEGs. I will admit my picture file storage is a mess and needs serious attention. I'm thinking about getting 4-5 terabyte external HD and putting everything on the one drive.

Any suggestions on an external HD and/or a process to organize my photo library ?

Appreciate any and all responses in advance.

I have a late 2012 Mac Mini server (2x 1tb internal hdd) I use an external Thunderbolt 2 x 3tb Lacie RAID in mirrorred mode to store all my images on. All files are stored on both drives in the enclosure. If 1 drive goes down, I can hot swap it out and the Lacie software restores all data to the new drive. I keep my lightroom catalogs on the 2nd internal 1 tb drive, as well as use this drive for the scratch disk. All other non photo or work files are kept on other external drives. Everything gets backed up to a G-RAID 4tb drive with removable disks. I rotate the disks regularly and store them at my office and home office.

I have a mini as well and I have a NAS that I move the folders into after I've been working. I don't know if I'd recommend this method as I've been having issues with LR "unmapping" the NAS drive or combining it with the computers root drive. It's all very confusing.

I think what I'm going to do is use a large external that I will backup to the NAS as a local backup.

frayne wrote in post #17788403
.. I'm thinking about getting 4-5 terabyte external HD and putting everything on the one drive....

May I suggest you not set yourself up for the classic "eggs in one basket" disaster?

Buy AT LEAST two of whatever size drive you can afford, and keep AT LEAST two copies of all you files.
Schedule a back up for whatever interval makes sense to your own use of the data, weekely, monthly etc.

My preferred recommendation would be THREE drives. One for the working files always connected, and a pair that are backed up from that drive at your scheduled intervals, one of which is always stored off site. (at work is the easiest solution for most)

Maybe every few months, bring the on site back up to work, and then bring the work one home and run the back up so you are also incrementally updating the back up of the "off site " drive. In few months, trade again, but never have all three at home!

One drive is fine, so long as you have an offsite backup. Don't mirror between them, as then corruption is mirrored, use a proper backup program that keeps incremental backups.

Agreed 3 is best if you have the space, money.
I choose to NOT keep a full set OR even a Library in my Lightroom.
I import batch export then delete.

I have two external hard drives.
Nothing RAID
One at home and one at work.
I manually manage them.

I have had no issues with my previous iMac or my current Mac Air.
But during college I lost almost all my photos before August 2009. (When my laptop drive failed completely)
Photography was not my hobby then but I learned my lesson. Backup and then backup again.

I would be wary of keeping a large collection on your internal drive. Even if it is convenient.
If the computer cashes for any reason you cannot access them.
At least if mine fails, I can restore it or reset it, and have everything ready on externals.