Photo storage

[grsthegreat]

How is everyone storing their digital pictures? I have been keeping all of mine on a external hard drive but it has been acting weird lately and I'm worried I'm about to lose 10+ years of pictures. I guess loading them onto photobucket or something similar is an option but that seems like a monumental task. So what is the best/safest way to store digital pictures?

i have them loaded on 2 separate computers, plus a removable 1TB hard drive thats stored in gun safe. I dont want to lose years of photos due to a fire or theft,... or a computer failing.

oh.. and i also have a copy on my laptop now that i think about it.

 

[Fossil Farm]

It is best not to rely on someone else to store your valuable photos. Cloud companies can go out of business. Cassette tapes used to be an ideal way to backup data, but they are magnetic and in some cases if your tape drive died and you did not have the same brand, sometimes another brand or model would not read your tape. Hard drives are mechanical. They can easily fail. CD/DVD's and possibly USB thumb drives are about the best alternatives right now. The publication "Care and Handling of CD's and DVD's - A Guide for Librarians and Archivists" explains storage very well. It is from NIST (500-252). It is too big (1.24 MB) to upload here ( 1 MB max). Store CD's or DVD's properly and they should last 50 years. The questions always are, will a player be available to read the media in 50 years, and will software be able to understand the compression of a jpg file or other file storage types. Most likely yes, but if it is an important family photo, it may be best to have it printed on quality paper at a good shop for long term use. As the publication says, the proper handling and storage of any media is most important. And use quality media, not Dollar Store closeouts if long term storage is needed.

If interested -

NIST Digital Media Group: digitalPhysicalMediaAndDevice


Scroll down to the Final pdf version - 50 pages (1.24 MB file)

 

[IslandTractor]

It is best not to rely on someone else to store your valuable photos. Cloud companies can go out of business. Cassette tapes used to be an ideal way to backup data, but they are magnetic and in some cases if your tape drive died and you did not have the same brand, sometimes another brand or model would not read your tape. Hard drives are mechanical. They can easily fail. CD/DVD's and possibly USB thumb drives are about the best alternatives right now. The publication "Care and Handling of CD's and DVD's - A Guide for Librarians and Archivists" explains storage very well. It is from NIST (500-252). It is too big (1.24 MB) to upload here ( 1 MB max). Store CD's or DVD's properly and they should last 50 years. The questions always are, will a player be available to read the media in 50 years, and will software be able to understand the compression of a jpg file or other file storage types. Most likely yes, but if it is an important family photo, it may be best to have it printed on quality paper at a good shop for long term use. As the publication says, the proper handling and storage of any media is most important. And use quality media, not Dollar Store closeouts if long term storage is needed.

If interested -

NIST Digital Media Group: digitalPhysicalMediaAndDevice


Scroll down to the Final pdf version - 50 pages (1.24 MB file)

A few points (and acknowledging there is no slam dunk perfect solution to the problem of archiving or backing up photos):

1) Cloud companies may go out of business but when they do their assets are bought by others. Any cloud company (like Amazon, Google, Yahoo etc or even smaller ones like Carbonite or BackBlaze) have valuable assets that someone will buy and incorporate into a new business. Photos will not disappear overnight. That has not been an issue in this cloud backup business.

2) With proper care a CDROM or DVD might well last 50 years. Will you still own a DVD player or be able to access one at that time? Go try to buy a cassette recorder or even a 5.25 inch floppy drive these days. An old non USB or non IDE hard drive is hard to hook up to a new computer. Even USB thumb drives depend on that interface remaining a standard for twenty years or more (and BTW, I do think a collection of thumb drives makes more sense than DVDs). Home electronic technology changes rapidly and is headed to the cloud rather than to physical recording devices.

3) The automatic daily backup feature of cloud companies is really worth a lot if you are not someone who backs up data religiously

4) Where do you store your DVD's or thumb drives? A house fire or natural disaster could ruin the backup collection at the same time as the primary computer.

 

[troutsqueezer]

I've got CD's and DVD's that have had photos on them for years and years. I've never seen one degrade or become unusable. If you're worried about that, make a new copy every couple of years which is easy enough to do. When the storage technology changes, there will be some interface to transfer all your pics. I keep mine on Blu-Ray disks now since I have a lot of photos. I keep one copy in our safe deposit box so that it is off premises. Also have all pics on three computers and one USB hard drive. As for USB flash drives, I have seen those fail many times so I stay away from them. I would never store anything in any cloud, anywhere but that's just me.

 

[wmonroe]

Are the cloud companies secure? Not that I really have anything right now other than pictures that I want to store but what if I did, I'm guessing they are protected somehow.

 

[pacerron]

Are the cloud companies secure? Not that I really have anything right now other than pictures that I want to store but what if I did, I'm guessing they are protected somehow.

Is anything really secure over the net?
Might be today but tomorrow brings a new hacker.

Like troutsqueezer, I don't like cloud storage. I have lots of software that gives away 50 GIG or more of storage in the cloud but don't use it.
Even W 8.1 does that and is an automatic back up to the cloud if you want.
I do use flickr which now has 1 TB of free storage.

How old is your operating system?

W-7 and 8/8.1 have built in automatic back up if you set it up and most external hard drives of a terabyte or more come with a back up program that can be set to automatic if you don't like the windows system. MAC has the same thing.

I shoot RAW plus jpeg so each file is large compared to just a compressed jpeg. And of course I'm guilty of saving almost every shot.:confused2:
It takes too long and too many discs to burn, index, and store for my liking.

Storing external hard drives in a safe deposit box is a bit tuff but if you have a relative or close friend nearby dropping one off and picking up another
to update periodically will keep you pretty much up to date and you will have your main copy plus two on external hard drives.

There is no perfect system. Things change too fast in the digital world.

 

[IslandTractor]

I was once also shy of the cloud services. But when I compared how they backed up data and the track record of cloud storage compared to my own haphazard backup practices, I realized I would be in a much better position vis a vis risk if I just used a commercial cloud service rather than continuing my non system.

It's great to have an external HD backup locally but obviously you need to keep that local drive somewhere other than in the same dwelling as the main computer. Big hassle anyway you look at it. I kept the backup in our detached garage but even that was done inconsistently. I also failed to backup regularly on a schedule so there could be a month or three of data unprotected at any given time. Not good.

If you don't really trust cloud storage, consider it as a supplement to whatever hard drive backup plan you currently have. Keep doing your local backups but have the automatic cloud backup as well. For family photographs I would not worry about security as in tax data type concerns and family photos are so precious that redundant cloud storage seems just a prudent thing to do.

 

[pacerron]

Speaking of family photos being so precious.....
If you are in hopes that future family members will have and enjoy the photos that you cherish today, be sure to identify them properly.
A digital exposure number won't identify you 100 years from now.
Your best bet is to put the most important of your family photos in a genealogy software program. I became interested in my family genealogy after my mother died who was my oldest relative before her death. I knew where my grandparents were buried but not much more.
In the research I did find a number of old shoe boxes, bibles, etc. that had photos dating back to the 1890's. Of course many had scribbles on the back
saying aunt such and such, etc. but whose aunt such and such?
It was a great study and continues today much further back than any photographs. Lots of census and other records exist but what did the people look like?
My point is... identify or code at least some of your photos so they won't be just unknown faces in the future.
We have even had living, discovered, relatives tell us that they threw out shoe boxes of family photos because they didn't recognize them.
Since most folks don't write letters anymore someday the only record of your existence on this earth will be a few photographs and some digitized county records.

 

[The kid]

I have a USB Terrabyte external drive I drag out once a week patitioned into two drives. One for media, photos and videos and one to backup my PC. I store it in a fireproof safe when not in use. As mentioned. Online sites are after your personal preferences info if they are free sites. They could be gone tommorro as well. External drives are really cheap and worth the peace of mind. -kid

 

[dragoneggs]

I use a 3Tb USB external drive and also Carbonite at $60yr. Thus dual backup and virtually automatic. I have had to pull files back down from Carbonite and it was easy... you can pull individual files, folders if you are looking for something in particular. The key is organizing your files/folders in the first place. I like having my files backed up on both my own external drive and in the Cloud. I have lots of photos and a huge music collection. Both obviously irreplaceable... so the extra 'insurance' piece of mind is worth it to me.