Digital Photo Storage / PC Download

bmac · Nov 14, 2004

A good hard drive backup prevents lost data. 

PineRidge,

You are absolutely right. I have to admit that on my home computers, I do not back up much as there is very little data that is critical. Our digital photos are the exception. That is why I back the photos up to DVD before deleting them from the memory cards. At work, I had a computer with which I was not disciplined with my backups. This is the one that hurt when it crashed. I am doing better with it now. I also now have some redundancy with my imaging computer at work - the photos are actually loaded on 2 different computers and I back up one of those to an external hard drive. My other business computers are backed up to tape daily.

I would be surprised if many folks routinely (or ever) back up their personal home computers. Maybe I'm wrong. Your advice is right on target.

thcri · Nov 14, 2004

Anything that is critical on home I send to work or copy CD and take to work. We use Connected.com for an online backup. Your computer is backup'ed every night. It only backs up new files and changes to existing files so once you do your back up then from then on it is fast.

For home usuage it looks like $10.00 a month. At work we pay around $35.00 per month. If you have some precious pictures or files it is not a bad deal in my mind.

Course today with the CD's they are a lot more reliable than the 3.5" floppy's.
murph

Gatorboy · Nov 14, 2004

For home usuage it looks like $10.00 a month. 

It would be cheaper to just buy a 2nd hard drive, and use one of many available backup programs to keep a mirror image.

bczoom · Nov 14, 2004

I regularly use the "My Briefcase" option to backup my PC. It only takes a minute and I have 2 PC's with the same "stuff"

thcri · Nov 14, 2004

( It would be cheaper to just buy a 2nd hard drive, and use one of many available backup programs to keep a mirror image. )

Dave,

Actually at work we do have a mirror drive. But for most insurance companies that is not good enough. Lightning for example can take both drives out. Ten bucks a month is a lot for most home applications, but if you have a business at home then maybe it is worth it.

murph

MossRoad · Nov 14, 2004

The reason we still need floppy drives is because Windows still needs emergency recovery diskettes. If we could do away with those, there would be little need for them.

There are many different card readers as you describe. They are great and cheap. That doesn't happen often /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

I've been using PSP for a long time, too. I like it.

We keep all of our digital photos on our hard drive. I also copy them to another PC from time to time and make CDs. I always make two CDs and test them in a different computer before deleting the memory cards. I keep one set of CDs at home and the second at work.

At work we are also required to use off-site storage of backups.

Recently, it has been discovered that CDs aren't as permanent as once thought, so it is a good idea to make new CDs once in a while for archiving.

AndyM · Nov 14, 2004

I didn't realize they still put those in PCs any longer. 3.5" drives are going to fade away, just as the 5.25" drives did. 

I'm kinda of clueless on these, but tell me about these flash drives I've been seeing that plug into a USB port. I didn't see one for the first time until a few weeks ago (I'm behind the times?). Do I need additional software installed to use one of these?

Is this going to become a new standard for storage? It seems to me with a 256 MB capacity (vesus 1.44 MB with a floppy), they will take the place of floppies very quickly.

thcri · Nov 14, 2004

They are very common and if you have either Windows 2000 or XP the software more than likely is already on your computer. My son goes to college and he keeps the majority of his homework on them. This way they can just carry them from puter to puter at school and to their own in their dorm rooms. I have one but don't use it, it just sits next to my computer here at home.

However, in your picture I see that there is a keyless device for a car. I would worry some if the two being that close could cause trouble. Kind of like 3.5" floppies and laying them on top of your computer with the magnetic fields. Maybe some puter guy here can school us??

murph

MossRoad · Nov 14, 2004

If you have USB capable operating system(win98SE or higher comes standard) you just pop one of those in your USB port and your system instantly recognizes it as an additional hard drive. No additional software required. Really handy.

We have disabled most of the USB ports on most of our work PCs because of these little gems. People bring their infected home files in to our nice clean PCs and make them sick. /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

OkeeDon · Nov 14, 2004

( Hey, Don, I've got one of those Mavicas collecting dust at my office. What do you think I could get for it on E-Bay? )

(

) ... Oh, about $20 -- I'll be nice and give you $25 for yours, and I'll pay the shipping!

Seriously, it's hard to tell from the bids when so many of them have reserves, but currently it looks like somewhere around $100 or so for the older ones like mine (FD71, if I recall), on up. One guy had 2 FD81's and a whole bunch of accessories; bidding was up to $100, but the reserve was not met with only 2 hours to go. I'd say they were worth more than $100, but no one bidding at that time thought so. I think I paid around $150 for mine last year; but I was fairly desperate and wanted an immediate replacement, so I used "buy it now" for a camera in Florida that could be delivered in 1 day.