iampewter Loc: Bason, TX

I am cross-eyed trying to figure out what are the best, most economical, and secure ways to store images. I am relatively new to DSLR photography. I know I should use more than one source for storage, ie: online and external hard drive, but which ones are best suited for amateur who doesn't want to lose even one tiny bit of what makes an image outstanding. Any advise or suggestions which include why you think they are the best would be great.

DavidPine Loc: Fredericksburg, TX

Welcome to UHH. Seagate or Western Digital work great. I have 4 external hard drives with a total of 10TB. I use one for backup. Two are redundant storage folders and one I travel with. I don't use cloud storage just because I don't. I do recommend that you acquire LightRoom for file management. Before you start downloading, I recommend you review a video by Jan Kabili on Lynda.com on the Fundamentals of LightRoom 5. You will be glad you did, I promise you. Good luck.

iampewter Loc: Bason, TX

I am sorry if I seem ignorant, but in truth, I am. You are saying that you store images solely on external hard drives with 2 of them being redundant and in your opinion the manufacturers you listed are the best? I mostly want to be assured that as time goes on, my children and grand children will be able to see the photos I have created in my life. I am having a hard time making the jump from 35mm to DSLR and feel like the decisions to be made are enough to make me want to pull my hair out.

Dngallagher Loc: Wilmington De.

My 2 cents....

I too store my images on an external drive, backup to another external and do a monthly backup to yet another external, but photographs that I consider complete I also post on Flickr.

I do not consider Flickr as a backup or storage system, rather I use it as a sharing system - photographs there are available for the entire world to access with any internet connected device.

There are also other online services for photograph sharing besides Flickr.

Of course, once the images are completed in digital format, they can be easily printed over and over again.

Neubee Loc: Wisconsin

There is more than one way to save files (ie:photos)..
Backup to a hard drive..
Save on a DVD..
Save to a ("Flash" Drive)...
You can make file sizes on your computer to fit which ever method you use..

minniev Loc: MIssissippi

I keep all my photos on external hard drives (Western Digital, La Cie and Buffalo) and backed up on a different external hard drive. I use still another hard drive to back up my computer. For the backup files I use small external drives, and when they area full I mark them and put them on the bookshelf in my workspace. This keeps down the desktop clutter.

I make sure my Lightroom catalog file is backed up two different places in addition to my regular computer (that's where the Lightroom editing info that goes along with my photos is stored, and the cataloging that would let someone find what they want by entering a word or name). I have never had an external drive to fail, though I know they certainly can. The original external western digital I got about 10 years ago is still chugging away. I am in the process of developing an additional online storage for what I consider the best of them.

The biggest problem I encounter is outgrowing my drives, as I take large numbers of photos, and cameras keep producing bigger files. I have taught my most tech-savvy adult child to understand my system so he could work with it if anyone wanted to get into it. I am now using thunderbolt drives, since I can daisy chain them and don't run out of fast ports on the computers I use.

If drive formatting or storage options change, I'll have to re-evaluate since technology becomes obsolete so quickly.

iampewter Loc: Bason, TX

thank you so much for the info. As I continue to research the subject, I am learning more and more.

iampewter Loc: Bason, TX

Thank you so much for the suggestions. I checked out both sites and just need to decide which one will work best for my needs.

Neubee Loc: Wisconsin

Every 2,3 months i cull or remove about 5 to 10% of my jpeg files in my computer so as to reduce the amount of storage..
I find in the end i am only saving my best 30% photos..

bdk Loc: Sanibel Fl.

I save my RAW files and If I work on them I save the output as a TIFF, if I convert it to a JPEG for uploading, I save that too. So Im saving a lot of files.
I save to A western Digital 2 TB drive. I also save to a seagate 2 TB drive. I also write my files to a DVD Plus I have them saved on the computer hard drive. I used to save my files to two DVD's in case one had an accident etc.
Im getting lazy and now save to one only. you can put a LOT of files on a DVD. Is my the right way? yes it is , for me, it is. Take every ones advise and see what works best for you.

DavidPine Loc: Fredericksburg, TX

If you store you photographs on you internal hard drive you are playing with fire IMHO. Things happen to the best of computers. You've asked for advise and you have been given advise based on personal experiences. You will spend thousands of dollars making your photographs over a period of time. How valuable are they to you? Good luck.

Mr PC Loc: Austin, TX

I'm a computer guy. I shoot RAW and JPG. External drives are cheap, I carry a portable one on trips around the world to have a backup of all my photos, they're also on a laptop I carry and I don't erase my SD cards til I get back. At home, a desktop computer, more external drives and Carbonite for online storage. Only downside of Carbonite, they don't backup RAW files. I burn Bluray disks once a year of the previous years unedited and edited images. I also have one external drive that is always off site in case of flood, tornado, fire or other disaster. Call me paranoid, but I have experience with customers frequently that haven't taken my advice (a consultant can only suggest, after all) when they have lost everything during a hard drive failure without any backup. Not going to happen to me. That's just a physical hard drive failure or a natural disaster. The latest ransomware viruses encrypt and password all of your data until you pay the bad guys. This is the reason for clod storage, where a rolling month of all of your files are kept. In the event of being infected by one of these, you can get back to where you were a day ago, a week ago, up to a month with dealing with the dark side. Backup, backup, backup!

doduce Loc: Holly Springs NC

If I may add a thought. If you store your photographs ONLY on your internal HD, you are begging for problems. Internal is OK if you have the space and keep them backed up elsewhere as discussed above.

rook2c4 Loc: Philadelphia, PA USA

Online storage sites are fine for short term storage, but not ideal for long term goals. Over the years, a number of storage sites have come and gone, and in some cases, people have lost their data. Storage sites can go out of business, get bought up by another company, decide to terminate all the storage accounts and move into other services, or experience massive storage data loss due to failure of their mainframe. It has all happened before. Realistically, there is no guarantee any given online storage site will still exist 20, 30 years from now. Your own external hard drives may be your best bet, or perhaps even actual prints of your most valuable work - placed in a bank vault storage box to somewhat diminish the possibility of loss through fire or flood.

amehta Loc: Boston

One of the biggest advantages of the external hard drive over media like DVDs or flash drives is that it is simple to copy everything to a new drive. If you have two archive/backup drives, if one fails you can make a copy of the functioning one.