Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Hurry, I'm on my second!

Pegasus Loc: Texas Gulf Coast

Let's be clear here. CDs, real pressed CDs do not fail unless damaged. CD-Rs and CD-R/W and the equivalent in DVDs fail over time because the method used for recording is not as permanent as a physical change like pressing pits in a CD. The CD-Rs have greater longevity than CD-R/W because the action of having the laser change the dot to dark is not reversible unlike in the CD-R/W.

If you want to use CDs and DVDs and so on for long term storage, use the R models only.

Yes, cloud accounts can be and are hacked. That is exactly why I do not store my nuclear launch codes in those accounts. Just think of it this way, if you have stuff that would be embarrassing or could get you into legal jeopardy it's not a good idea to have any of it anywhere on the internet.

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

Sorry, just no way I cannot respond when it is stated that an SD card or a hard drive is more reliable long term storage than “the cloud”. From a previous thread:

Let’s take it a point at a time.

1) security/hacking: Hackers want databases with useful information like SSNs, nicely organized. Do you think they sort through thousands of photos hoping for a tidbit to exploit - rethink this. And all your critical info is already in the cloud. 2/3 of major companies store information in the cloud, and most of the remaining 1/3 are planning to. Your military records, SSN info, credit card info, banking info. and medical information and imagery is already in the cloud.

2) reliability/security: cloud storage from major companies use redundant servers, redundant networking, redundant storage and redundant power, in secure facilities, administered by professionals, But MOST IMPORTANTLY, they keep 3-5 copies of your data at different geographic locations for DR (disaster recovery). Can you replicate that? Of course not. And you WISH that you could achieve “4 nines of reliability/availability - you cannot simply by keeping extra copies. The “gold standard” in industry is 5 nines (99.999), and you are nowhere near that with a single server, a single network connection, single power, limited (if any) DR, and your storage redundancy is an extra HD.

3) the myth that users have lost their data from failed cloud companies: Aside from some mom and pop local company, let’s see you name a single decent sized company that has gone “belly-up” without notice causing loss of customer’s data. I have posed this challange multiple times on UHH, and no one has ever responded. I’ve spent 25 years working for the largest storage companies in the world that together store 80% of the world’s data (including a cloud company), and I know of ONE small cloud company (Nirvanix) that went under, and even then, customers had months of notice to move their data.

4) Bottom line: the ONLY valid reason not to use the cloud, at least for DR, is if you have poor Internet access. As a storage professional, I have well over 1TB in the Amazon S3 cloud in addition to my local backup, and I sleep well at night knowing that my data resides in multiple, professionally managed data centers, and I can restore/access it from anywhere that has internet access. Can you say the same?

5) Backup to the cloud. Hopefully, you only have to do a full copy once. After that, if you have a decent workflow, you backup incrementals on a daily basis. I can’t speak to your access, but here in Raleigh, like most metropolitan cities (which account for the majority of the US population), Google, AT&T, Spectrum ,etc are busy stringing/burying fiber and offering Gbit internet access at a reasonable price. I have 300Mb down and 60Mb up. That means, assuming worst case of 50% effeciency, that I can upload ~4 MBytes/sec or 240 MBytes/min or ~ 15 GBytes/hour. Are your incrementals bigger than that? Just kick it off with a chron job after you go to bed, and it will be done LONG before you get up the next morning.

Edit: my wife’s 5year old IPad display just went “strange” (orange screen). Time to update it anyway as it was a gen2 and dog slow. But the good news is it was backed up automatically to ICloud (for 99 cents per month for 50GB). Just ordered a new one, and when it arrives, I’ll log into the cloud, and everything (pictures, aps, mail music, texts, etc) will be restored. Tried that recently with any other backup mechanism?

ralphfr Loc: Long Island, NY

It's a question of reliability vs security. No way the cloud is more secure than local memory. No way local memory is more reliable than the cloud. Pick your poison.

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

Only if you believe that you’re less likely to be hacked or infected with a virus or malware than Amazon (or Google or Microsoft or Apple)...

Pegasus Loc: Texas Gulf Coast

TriX is doing an excellent job of debunking misunderstandings about cloud storage.

I would think that individuals damaging or even losing their local storage is much more frequent than the rare, yet highly publicized penetrations at big sites. The reason they are publicized is because they ARE rare, but when they happen they involve a lot of accounts. It's the same thing comparing airliner crashes to small aircraft incidents. Overall, I'd rather be flying in an airliner; and after being in IT for 45 years, I'm much happier to store my files in the cloud compared to having them only locally. And by locally, I mean with proper NAS or server-based storage, not an assortment of silly little fragile SD cards.

ralphfr Loc: Long Island, NY

True. I was thinking more along the lines of unwarranted access to your data by hackers.

ralphfr Loc: Long Island, NY

Agreed. I mean unless your storing the secret 11 herbs and spices for KFC Chicken or the Classic Coca-Cola formula you can't beat the convenience of cloud storage. Unless you're a serious survivalist!

Pegasus Loc: Texas Gulf Coast

Like I explained earlier, I make sure I do not store my nuclear launch codes in the cloud. But if someone wants to go through 20,000 pictures of swimming or shooting competitions, family, and travel, they can have at it.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

rgrenaderphoto Loc: Hollywood, CA

Excuse me, but Amazon, Dropbox, Apple, Microsoft just to name the Big 4 spend billions, no trillions on data centers and infrastructure. Class 1 Data Centers have triple layers of reliability on all critical systems from storage to power and backup data centers. You data is far safer in "the cloud" than it ever could be in your home, regardless of how many external drives you may use.

And, unless you are a Hollywood Superstar, I do not think you have to worry about your photographs being hacked.

Pegasus Loc: Texas Gulf Coast

Who says quick235 is not a Hollywood Superstar?

Rdhalste

The explanations are about as simple as I can make them.
Every read, write operation on memory cards take away some of their life which is listed as a number of operations with the disclaimer of "up to" in their somewhere.

But in plain language, From experience, neither SD cards or thumb drives are reliable methods of storing data / photos, except short term. Long and short term are relative definitions. Both methods of storage "should" be good for a few months if not exposed to high temperatures. IE: left in a closed car an a hot summer day. The format saved makes a difference as well. My experience with older forms of JPGs has shown a relatively high failure rate, while TIFFs have not.

I have an old D90 that may get a fresh battery and memory card every 6 months (give or take) and have had no failures with it, but that is only one camera and two memory cards.