Photo back up, what do you do? I am wondering how people back their photo files up? I save both .nef & .dng files. I was wondering if people save both or not? I file them by day taken.

graphicny Loc: Central New York

I am wondering how people back their photo files up?

I save both .nef & .dng files. I was wondering if people save both or not? I file them by day taken. It works for me. I need to pull the best shots and back them up also on DVD.

I have been backing them up on an external hard drive, now it is time to go shopping for another one, any suggestions? I am on a mac and using USB cables at the moment. I have an Iomega right now, but wondering if anyone has input about other brands? I am thinking that 2 TB size would be a good start.

Have had a few suggestions from people, Verbatim & Seagate. I stated to read the reviews, and you can get freaked out with the bad reviews, even with all the good ones. So just wondering if anyone has anything say on external hard Drives?

romanticf16 Loc: Commerce Twp, MI

I'd go to OWC- they have a large selection of enclosures w/without drives to select from. I'd get one with multiple inputs(firewire +USB. or USB + Thunderbolt), so if one port on the external goes out you can switch to another and keep using it. Be sure the External drive has its own AC power. G Force is another good drive brand. I'd also consider a cloud service like Crashplan to back up your Photos and All your HOME folder. An offsite backup could be vital in case of fire or theft.You do have another external drive for Time Machine too, yes?

rgrenaderphoto Loc: Hollywood, CA

Get a Seagate external USB drive. Better yet, with Mac you can use Timecapsule for WiFi backup?

I have a Netgear NAS networked dual HD RAID mirrored drive that I back up my Photo folders to every 2 days using Norton Ghost.

graphicny Loc: Central New York

romanticf16 I will look into your suggestion, thanks for your input, and I do not use time machine, tried it once, and it cause a few problems, so I back things up my self, not the best system, need to work on that.

Funny how the cloud paranoia is hard to shake, but it does have a plus side. Need to revisit that. You have given me some stuff to think about. Thanks.

bibsthecat Loc: Cold Spring MN

I have a 2 TB and two 3 TB's connected to my computer. All Western Digital. Have always had good luck with them. I make two backups of everything on separate drives. Soon I will be getting a 4 TB. I'm not quit sure of the new setup yet.

romanticf16 Loc: Commerce Twp, MI

graphicny wrote:

romanticf16 I will look into your suggestion, thanks for your input, and I do not use time machine, tried it once, and it cause a few problems, so I back things up my self, not the best system, need to work on that.

Funny how the cloud paranoia is hard to shake, but it does have a plus side. Need to revisit that. You have given me some stuff to think about. Thanks.

SuperDuper or CarbonCopyCloner are two good software packages for completely cloning your drive. The paid version lets you set automatic timed backups. Of course, you still want to restart from your backup drive every so often to insure your backup system is really working. Most people forget to check that. And keep one backup copy offsite in case of disaster at your home site.

RVDigitalBoy Loc: Clermont, Florida

I use Carbonite in "the cloud" to backup my harddrive which contains all my 2014 picture folders. Previous years are stored on an external harddrive (2T).

My folder system looks like this...

- My Pictures (windows supplied folder)
- Nikon Transfer
- 2014
- 01_02_14_201
- 01_04_14_202

The last three digits indicate the folder number. I started at "01" in December, 2011.

JJ Imagery

I felt the need not only to keep my files stored on both WD or Seagate Drives, but I now back up files offsite on a cloud storage system known as Backblaze. I've almost run out of room on my 2TB drive.... and will buy a new 4TB as the need arises.

JJ Imagery

RVDigitalBoy wrote:

I use Carbonite in "the cloud" to backup my harddrive which contains all my 2014 picture folders. Previous years are stored on an external harddrive (2T).

My folder system looks like this...

- My Pictures (windows supplied folder)
- Nikon Transfer
- 2014
- 01_02_14_201
- 01_04_14_202

The last three digits indicate the folder number. I started at "01" in December, 2011.

RV, please elaborate more on Nikon transfer... I'm curious... Thanks.

DavidA Loc: Hopewell NJ

Just a suggestion. If you back up to external drives, store them somewhere outside your house. Otherwise, a house fire could destroy your computer AND your external drives.

MarkintheHV Loc: Hudson Valley

I use an external drive and cloud storage. External drive is quicker for restoring, and the cloud constitutes my off site storage

RVDigitalBoy Loc: Clermont, Florida

JJ Imagery wrote:

RV, please elaborate more on Nikon transfer... I'm curious... Thanks.

The "Nikon Transfer" folder was created in 2008 when I began using Nikon transfer (part of Nikon View) to offload my SD cards to the harddrive.

"2014" is a subdirectory under "Nikon Transfer."

Each SD Card offload is assigned to an additional subdirectory beginning with the shoot date and ending with a consecutive folder number.

warrior Loc: Paso Robles CA

romanticf16 wrote:

I'd go to OWC- they have a large selection of encl... (show quote)

Seagate 1TB here

davidcaley Loc: Utah

Buy hard drives with 5 year warranty Western Digital are identified "Black". Just did down in "specifications" in web site. Most drives are 1-3 yrs warranty.

brucewells Loc: Central Kentucky

3 and 4 TB drives are getting cheaper all the time. Buy as big as you can afford. Ensure you get USB 3.0 drives. Your PC may not support it right now, but your next one will. Using USB 3.0 drives, I have one backup I do that is 1.8 GB in size typically. It takes 35 seconds to do that backup. USB 3.0 is that much faster. Wireless will always be slower than a 'copper' connection.

The key to successful backups is redundancy. I have 4 separate copies of all my data at any given point in time, one of which is kept at my office in a locked cabinet.