What backup facilities do you use?

[[Geoff Slocock]]

In another thread John said:

Quote:On a similar topic, what backup facilities do you use?

I use the main computer, an external hard-drive that gets powered on about once a fortnight to backup evening.
And my unlimited flickr account.

I figure you would have to be really unlucky to lose all three!

So here we go!

[[Geoff Slocock]]

I do things in a bit of a complicated way, one might think*. My hard disk is partitioned and I have a partition just for photo backups. So I shift all of my RAW my files from sd (and the high resolution unprocessed jpgs, too) over to the partition, every so often.

I then delete the contents of my sd cards. These days the sd cards and the disk drives are so massive!

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[/hr](*) Because I run Linux, I do not use the single partition per drive method that is Windows friendly. So I know how to create various partitions and use this method. I bet this is not a common method, too.

[[GRUMPY OLD MAN]]

I have been looking at hard drives in PC World, and I noticed that they have internal drives up to 3 Terra Bytes, with speeds from 5400rpm to 7200rpm. I know from my own experience that when storing files on an external HDD it has to be done manually, where as an internal HDD, I think can be done automaticly.

[[Geoff Slocock]]

Yes you can set updates to hard drive to run once a week, say, or whatever.

It's partly a matter of taste and partly matter of how technical you want to be. It's also, I guess, a matter of how many images you have.

I think I prefer to think about organising everything and burning some data dvd's, although I must confess I have not yet done that. A big advantage is that you can then lodge these dvd's out side of the house, with a family member, say. You can also do that with a pair of usb hard drives and rotate them.

All in all, this is very hard work for someone like me who does not throw that many shots away.

But going back to usb hard drives it is best to use a program which just copies what is new and leaves everything that is already there intact. Or if you keep monthly folders, you could just copy over the new folder every month.

[[Corblimy]]

When I built this computer, I installed a seperate drive as an archive for all of my aviation projects. It has a huge capacity.
The operating system is installed on its own seperate drive, all programs on another hard drive, and the photos are on the third hard drive but copied to a seperate partioned drive on the programs hard drive as a back-up. I keep meaning to buy an external drive but figure that the internal one is just as good.
With three hard drives it has a rather large power supply to keep it all ticking over!

[[Geoff Slocock]]

Of course having that extra capacity in the power supply is an issue. Plus you have got wear and tear because your disks are turning a lot of time, when the PC is on. I think off line storage is a good idea, by that costs a bit for the sort of capacilities most would want.

I build my own machines, too.