Backing up photos ( best advice): I recently read the various methods and products used by members to back up their photos. It seems that there are so many ways and costs to achieve...

mjgreen53 Loc: Christchurch NZ

I recently read the various methods and products used by members to back up their photos. It seems that there are so many ways and costs to achieve this task and was wondering for a relative 'newbee' where do I find unbiased advice and explanation on the subject. I only have approximately 150gb of photos to date and currently use a WD passport drive and some 2tb flash drives in my fumbling uneducated attempt to find a quick and easy method. It seems to take an age (2 hours plus) every time I do a back up. Am I doing something wrong ?
Just hoping to find an easy, fast, reliable method and explanation of how, what and why before I decide on a solution that suits my minimal requirement and pocket. Any pointers as to where I should turn would be very welcome. Thank you in advance.
P. S. I use a windows system laptop, have a Samsung android phone and Google photos if that is relevant.

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

Your personal back-up strategy is a balance of risk vs effectiveness vs efficiency vs cost. WD passport is more than sufficient, getting positive check-marks for effectiveness, efficiency and cost.

2 hours sounds out of line, though. You only need to back-up new / modified images, not the unchanged files. If you add new images to your primary disk / computer using date-stamped folders (YYYY / YYYYMMDD <Description>), it's going to be easier to identify the folders that need to be copied onto the back-up media, just comparing the dates since the last update, say weekly or monthly. If you work on older images, use the modified date on the folders to identify those changes and copy them over the existing files on the back-up media.

Also important is disconnecting the external drive and keeping separate from the main equipment. In a drawer, in another room, etc. If your house burns down, is the loss of 150GB of photos just another disappointment or a major crisis? That's where the 'risk' of loss comes into play and how much you want to pay to mitigate that total loss.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

I back up my images, docs, PDFs, spread sheets, music, etc. to WD My Passport Ultra and it takes about two hours. I believe under 300Gb per backup set. I don't worry about the time as I start the batch file at night and just let it run.

hcmcdole

If you back up every time you download/edit/etc. it makes the job very easy and quick. Simple as copy and paste.

Massive backups are only necessary when you get a new drive or want to true up your drives. I lost a 4 TB drive a couple of years ago (I keep two that are the same thing) and after I bought a duplicate at Best Buy, I had it duplicated in a few hours from the other drive. I also have a 3 TB network drive which is slower going over the "air" but is also a duplicate of the two external USB drives.

Hard drives will crash so have more than one. The cost is very cheap these years. I don't keep pictures on the C drive as it is backed up on a much smaller external drive and pictures just eat up room and slow the process down.

johngault007 Loc: Florida Panhandle

hcmcdole wrote:

If you back up every time you download/edit/etc. i... (show quote)

That seems like a very manual process that could easily be done once a day to cover any modified or added files with a decent backup program.

Windows users please help me, does Windows come with a a built in backup-utility? I know it used to, and it was pretty user friendly.

rehess Loc: South Bend, Indiana, USA

mjgreen53 wrote:

I recently read the various methods and products u... (show quote)

Even if you spend two hours, say setting it off before you go to bed, there is very little cost to you. You will realize the value of that cost if you ever have a failure that forces you to go back to it.

Dngallagher Loc: Wilmington De.

mjgreen53 wrote:

I recently read the various methods and products u... (show quote)

Just a note about USB...

Be sure your ports and devices are USB 3.0 OR 3.1. If they are lower then the speed of data transfer is greatly reduced.

https://www.tripplite.com/products/usb-connectivity-types-standards

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

johngault007 wrote:

That seems like a very manual process that could easily be done once a day to cover any modified or added files with a decent backup program.

Windows users please help me, does Windows come with a a built in backup-utility? I know it used to, and it was pretty user friendly.

My experience with <the OLD> Windows backup utility is that it either encrypts or compresses files into a backup SET (file). I tried it once along time ago and individual files were not available to simply go get and copy them back to where I wanted them. I've been using XCOPY in a batch file for years. The copied files are individually easily accessible and the structure looks identical to the original.

johngault007 Loc: Florida Panhandle

Longshadow wrote:

My experience with <the OLD> Windows backup utility is that it either encrypts or compresses files into a backup SET (file). I tried it once along time ago and individual files were not available to simply go get and copy them back to where I wanted them. I've been using XCOPY in a batch file for years. The copied files are individually easily accessible and the structure looks identical to the original.

Thanks LS.

billnikon Loc: Pennsylvania/Ohio/Florida/Maui/Oregon/Vermont

mjgreen53 wrote:

I recently read the various methods and products u... (show quote)

I use Photoshop CC (free if you have photoshop), Nikon cloud (free for Nikon owners), USB flash drives (cheap) I use all three.

dhk

Good Sync. Fast, reliable and incremental back up

bz178g

Redundancy is essential to ensuring you don't lose irreplaceable images. I probably overdo it, but here is my scheme: 1. Images are stored on an internal hard drive separate from the drive where the OS & programs reside. 2. As soon as I upload images from an SD card, I copy them to an external USB 3 drive dedicated to photos. 3. I also use a cloud storage service (there are many; I use SugarSync) that automatically uploads all images when they show up or are changed on the internal drive. 4. Once a week, I copy new and changed images to one of two identical external USB 3 drives which then go off site until the following week, when they are swapped. Copying is done using Total Commander, an inexpensive file manager which recognizes which files are new and which have been changed and only copies the new or changed files. I have more than 500 GB of photos; the weekly copying of new and changed files takes only a few minutes and I feel completely secure.

ELNikkor

I back-up to two technologies at the end of every month. One to a Seagate 2TB external hard drive, and one to a large capacity thumb-drive. I keep the systems in different parts of the house. Lately, I've considered getting an SSD external hard drive instead of large capacity thumb-drives. It only takes less than an hour, and is well worth it. Make sure you are using 3.0 or 3.1 USB speed devices.

NCMtnMan Loc: N. Fork New River, Ashe Co., NC

johngault007 wrote:

That seems like a very manual process that could easily be done once a day to cover any modified or added files with a decent backup program.

Windows users please help me, does Windows come with a a built in backup-utility? I know it used to, and it was pretty user friendly.

Yes. But it is best used for what is known as an image backup. There are numerous backup softwares available, and which one works best is a bit of a matter of taste. I do both a manual backup and an automated cloud backup using iDrive. It is very full featured. One feature is that it can backup to both the cloud and to a local device such as an external hard drive, and can be automated to your needs.

47greyfox Loc: on the edge of the Colorado front range

Microsoft’s Synch-Toy still does the job for me.