rdgreenwood Loc: Kennett Square, Pennsylvania

Okay, call me a wuss, but I'm getting nervous about all the viruses, hackers, and unresistable changes that are occurring. (The questionable continuation of Nik is my prime example.) I'm seriously considering subscribing to Apple's cloud backup. It only costs $9.99/month for 2Tb of storage, so my prior reticence has been purely out of my paranoia about letting anyone have access to my data.

What do you folks think? How many of you have joined a similar service or are thinking of joining one?

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

A couple of thoughts. If you are concerned about the privacy of you data in the cloud, then just encrypt it, Although you may need a different reputable cloud provider such as Amazon S3 (who owns the cloud market), Google, Microsoft, etc. secondly, if you're concerned about your data being compromised in the cloud, consider that all your really important data such as medical records, financial data, SS, etc. is already there. Finally, when hackers look for data, what they typically hack are databases, where all the data for thousands/millions of subscribers is neatly arranged - they don't go looking through personal accounts with thousands of pictures looking for a nugget of information - just not cost effective. Finally, the cloud is for archive/DR and your 3rd backup after your second secure local copy of your data - three copies, one off-site, is good practice. Be sure to check your internet upload/download speed so you'll have a good estimate of how long it will take to "seed" the cloud with your data. If too slow, some providers will allow you to send a HD with your data for upload, and will also loan you a HD with your data for download in the event you need to restore everything. Btw, I use ICloud for our Apple devices and Amazon S3 infrequent access for everything else. Total cost for both is ~$7.00/month. Provides great peace of mind...

rdgreenwood Loc: Kennett Square, Pennsylvania

Thank you, very much. That's exactly the type of feedback I was hoping to receive.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Wow! $120 a year, plus tax, for just 2TB. Take a look at BackBlaze, unlimited for $50 a year.

https://secure.backblaze.com/buy.htm

markngolf Loc: Bridgewater, NJ

I have been backing up to the cloud for 5 years. It provides piece of mind. I use Acronis software.
Mark

shelty Loc: Medford, OR

What's wrong with a hard drive? How about a SSD hard drive? I believe that the so-called cloud is someone's bank of hard drives.

markngolf Loc: Bridgewater, NJ

Of course. It provides an extra measure of security, in addition to one's own hard drives, if one has both. I have 3. Origin hard drive, externals and cloud.
Mark

Vince68 Loc: Wappingers Falls, NY

Check out Carbonite Backup. They offer two version, office and home. The home version starts at $59.99 a year for the basic plan, $99.99 for the plus plan. There are three home plans offered. Here is the link to the Carbonite for Home web page. https://www.carbonite.com/en/cloud-backup/personal/buy/

I am thinking of going this route for cloud backup myself. According to the website, the price is for Windows PC's, and they do offer backup for Mac's as well, but I did not check that out.

rdgreenwood Loc: Kennett Square, Pennsylvania

Thank you all. You've provided some great choices.

DJphoto Loc: SF Bay Area

I've been considering this for quite some time and tried Amazon, since I'm already a Prime member. Your Prime membership gives you unlimited photo backup, but only 5GB of other stuff, including videos. It costs more if you need that, which I do because I also take videos and they are large. I tried Amazon, but I found out you need to be a Prime member to get the share. I use Dropbox for photo sharing with friends and family, and have been very happy with the free version. I got 20GB for a year with a new PC about 8 months ago. I've decided to go with Dropbox, as I know it works well, even though it's not inexpensive at $99/year for 1TB, $150 for 2TB. I looked into others such as Carbonite, but it doesn't allow file sharing, and there were other things I didn't like about others. Maybe iDrive if I used a Mac, but I don't. I'm not sure I want Google or Microsoft storing my data either (though I wouldn't have a problem if it were just my photos). Here's a link to one article I found helpful last night: http://www.pcmag.com/roundup/306323/the-best-cloud-storage-providers-and-file-syncing-services
You can find other articles (though some are dated) by searching for cloud storage comparisons. I also back up to two external and one internal drive and store all of my photos on DVDs at my Mom's house about 60 miles away (though that isn't a long term solution, since she's almost 96).

I would be interested in what you choose to do.

rdgreenwood Loc: Kennett Square, Pennsylvania

You provide more food for thought. Here's wishing you many more years of storage at your mother's house.