george19

I use a MyCloud NAS drive, plugs into the router, connects to all devices. I even backed up my mother’s laptop to it remotely.

Phones and tablets automatically back up photos to it every day, although laptop backup is manual and a bit of a pain. Access is from anywhere you have an internet connection, so really handy if you want to find something when away from home.

After setup, it shows up as a drive. A friend has his configured to work with his Mac.

Full disclosure: for some reason access disappeared the other week, at least through Windows Explorer. I could still transfer files via a browser interface (very clunky and stressful), but finally got it working the other day.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

A NAS is the way to go. I have that Mediasonic, but it's strictly for in-house. I have a 2-bay Synology DS214, although I've never accessed it from outside the house. If you get one, get drives made for a NAS. I recently updated my two 3TB drives to two WD Red 8TB drives for $220, on sale. My 3TB drives cost $230 each in 2014. There is some controversy about the WD Red drives actually being NAS drives, so you might want to read about that. I think it's a tempest in a teapot.

https://smile.amazon.com/Western-Digital-Plus-Internal-Drive/dp/B09QQX27GM/ref=sr_1_4?crid=1M481Z89QV81&keywords=8tb%2Bdrive&qid=1659441414&sprefix=8tb%2Bdrive%2Caps%2C81&sr=8-4&th=1

ISOlate Loc: Maine

Synology NAS — hands down, the best solution I’ve found. They have a very low cost option to back up your Nas to their cloud, or you can buy a second NAS, put it physically somewhere else, and have them automatically back each other up. Lots of other available functionality too… Like, automatic sync with selected folders of your PC, multiple users each with their own space, photo storage with face recognition, and much more. I’ve been using the Synology NAS devices for five years, have upgraded twice, currently at about 10 TB each, and have had zero issues. One drive in the raid array failed, I just pulled the drive, replaced it with a new one, and it rebuilt itself.

jcwall396 Loc: Roswell, GA

Following this as I've had the same question for quite some time, but just haven't gotten around to doing any research. What do you guys who have done this think is the best commercial cloud service? I travel frequently and at this time, I take an external drive with me to use on the road, then when back home I back it up to 3 different other drives. What I don't have is a cloud service as they all seem to have pros and cons. Do you have thoughts as to which is the fastest / most cost efficient? I have just over 5TB of photos....

wapiti Loc: round rock, texas

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Once you get the address for your NAS, you can sign in from anywhere.

wcmoorejr Loc: Birmingham Alabama

I use a NAS (12 tb terastation) on my local network and I have crashplan pro running in the background on one of my windows machines to back up the NAS to the cloud. That way if I have a fire, I will still be able to pull my photos back from the cloud backup. I believe that my system does allow remote accesss but I dont have that enabled.

shackcf

I had used a WD mycloud solution in 2014 of 2TB. I had to update as they stopped supporting my model in 2019. I purchased a small 2 drive QNAP NAS. Populated with 2 4TB Toshiba drives designed for servers & NAS use. I have a WD 4TB & 2TB externals attached. I can access all of these drives with my devices, Windows & Android. I do wish I had purchased the next model up so I could add an ssd for caching but it works for me. I backup to my externals only. I am retired and I do not need an off site system. If I was to do that I would use 2 more externals and do a weekly storage swap with a location I do consulting work with. I want my data local.

There are maintenance tasks that will need to be performed with any freestanding system or NAS so think about the UI and check for ease of use. I am quite happy with the QNAP interface and available apps for media management, backups etc. All of the NAS systems for home are designed for easy managing. Good luck to you.

delder Loc: Maryland

Thank you so much for the warning about unanticipated data loss.
Those of us not normally Subject to Raging Forest Fires may be exposed to Flooding, Tornados or other events.

Good reminder of reality.

sandiegosteve Loc: San Diego, CA

This have everything with you and a backup at home can be done a few ways.

The easiest option for "everything with you" is to have your primary "copy" all on one big external USB drive that you carry with you. Then, when you get home, back it up another "drive". A "copy" to another drive is not a backup; it is a copy including anything bad. A "backup" will have past versions so you can go back in time if you make a mistake. So, it does get complicated.

Personally, I don't really want everything with me. Images I take on the road and maybe some select recent ones is fine. So, I have my primary collection on a NAS with recent work on my local drive. The NAS does do actual versioned snapshots and it syncs to the cloud for an offsite backup. I've pulled from the cloud while traveling to get images too. A real backup follows 3-2-1. Three copies, 2 physical devices with one offsite. I have had drives fail. Backups are worth it. The NAS makes that easier and it is automated for me. If your backups don't "backup", they aren't backups.

I use Lightroom Classic and working off the NAS is not slower. I did some tests, and bulk exporting was faster somehow. That said, drive speed is not a limiter in Lightroom and I have a fast wired local network. Wifi to the NAS might be a little slower.

My home PC is fast and wired to the NAS. So, that is my primary Lightroom instance. Two main folders; "Import" and "NAS" with the folders underneath. When I'm home, card goes in reader, ingest to LR Import folder. Cull, edit and then move to NAS. LR catalog is on local SSD and preview cache is also there.
My travel laptop is a Mac. It has LR on it as well (you get two machines, just not supposed to use at the exact same time). When on the road, I do everything on the laptop like normal. When I get back, I export the laptops folder with the current images "as a catalog" from LR. I dump that to a temp folder on the NAS, then from my Main PC, I "import from another catalog" and get everything into my primary collection which also starts the automated backup process.

I'm going to stop here since there is a lot to think about in remote vs home, where you store and how you backup. A good NAS costs more than drives. It can do a lot including VPN to allow remote access.

delder Loc: Maryland

To:
Shackcf:

How did you get your images off of your old Mydrive?

Same situation compounded by moving to an Enterprise Network provisioned Community.

cahale Loc: San Angelo, TX

Put them on SSD(s). Small footprint, available anywhere - even without internet access, fast, reliable, relatively cheap.

SuperflyTNT Loc: Manassas VA

What RAID level are you using?

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

There are EDC - Every Day Carry - websites and YouTube channels. I guess you could add 8TB of computer files to your EDC list.

That is a clever backup idea, though - carrying all your data with you. An M.2 drive would be perfect for that.

cahale Loc: San Angelo, TX

Actually, you can only "sign in" where there is access. He wants complete availability. While internet coverage is large, it is not un-holey.