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This is an interesting thread. thank you, Cypherfox, for providing the Dropbox information I requested. Lots of good options described here for online backup. I too don't trust DVDs much any more after having many old ones become unreadable.
Good information. Thank you. I can see this being part of my backup program along with an external drive and BluRay disks. Just because I don't trust cloud services does not mean that I won't use them. I also don't trust disks to not fail. = ) I just won't upload anything personal to the cloud.
Have you ever restored anything to test how it does? It would be handy to be able to restore the program to another drive. Is it possible to set up a schedule around other things that are scheduled (e.g., anti-virus, defragger, etc.)
In following some links in this thread, I also found SpinRite which looks like it will be helpful in preserving hard drives and retrieving information from problematic drives. So I will probably be adding that to my mix of data-loss protections.
BTW, if you run out of excuses to avoid stuff, I have thousands that you can use. = )
It's pretty hot here too in summer - often over 30 degrees C. My PCs are stuffed with cooling fans though so the disks rarely get over 40 degrees.
It's pretty hot here too in summer - often over 30 degrees C. My PCs are stuffed with cooling fans though so the disks rarely get over 40 degrees.
LOL, I had to go to a converter to check the temps. It can get over 90 degrees F (32 C) here outside and be about 100 in my computer room. The house is a rental, and the windows are sealed shut so no flowing air or air conditioning either. I watch the computer temp closely then.
Right now for winter, I have the sides off my computers so i can take advantage of the extra heat (yes, I know open cases are frowned upon, but so is not being able to afford the utility bill which would happen if I had to turn the thermostat up).
As to my response about using disks, having more then one is not a bad idea. The problem with any type of storage is none are a fail safe storage. Everything over time will have their hiccups, be that cloud, externals or disks. You have to find what you are most comfortable with, to do what you need with the amount you have and whatever available resources, either monetary or devices or services.
As for why I use disks...I have been collecting content for over 10 years, don't always remember if I downloaded something so have several copies of just about everything I have ever downloaded, both free and paid for, this includes programs and their various plugins, scripts, etc. You take the amount of info you can put on a dvd and I fill them almost to capacity, times the number of disks I have and I have over 2 terabytes of content (will lots of repeats...lol). That is a lot to upload to an online storage service, so that option is not very feasible to me, disks are a better option in this case for me.
One time I was switching computers, from an old P4 to my current computer and needed a place to put the stuff on my hard drive till I could move it (I didn't have any disks as the time and was broke). Since much of the stuff was Daz stuff, an issue developed. I contacted the legal aspect of 4shared to make sure I could do this and was told the items were not mine by copyright and technically I could not store it. They could allow it temporarily but had to adjust the security settings for each item I uploaded so that no one else could access it. It was a major pain in the backside and took forever, but got it done and later moved out of there to the new computer.
With that said, I question using things like 4shared and cloud site and anything similar due to the fact it's online and potentially viable for hacking, so secure doesn't just mean protection from loss when servers crash and that type of thing. I also don't believe in complete security and any site that promotes security is painting a target on their back that says "try and hack me". Hackers like a challenge and every site has that risk in-spite of what they say.
I totally agree with this.
I too have a lot of redundancy in downloaded software/content. LOL, I have some backed up programs that are so old that they won't even work on today's computers. Even worse, I still have stuff on floppies.
My current thinking is to store the installed Poser program and runtimes and DS content/My Library on a cloud service with a copy to an external drive and continue making dual copies of Poser/DS installers on disks.
ISObuster is pretty good at retrieving stuff on corrupted CDs/DVDs (I think BluRay also, but not 100% positive).
ISObuster is pretty good at retrieving stuff on corrupted CDs/DVDs (I think BluRay also, but not 100% positive).
I'll keep that in mind. What I did at the time was recover what I could from each disc to a hard disc and then burn new media. Now days I keep backups on multiple hard drives, some internal and some on a NAS I built out of an old computer with new 2TB WD Red drives. In the old days, digital camera photos were small, and you could get lots on one DVD. Now days, the files are huge, especially when shooting RAW+JPEG. Optical disk backup just isn't a viable solution for me for the most part. I really need to put some effort into selecting a cloud backup plan. As it is now, all my backups are local to my home. A fire, flood, hurricane, or thief/vandal could destroy it all.
I'll keep that in mind. What I did at the time was recover what I could from each disc to a hard disc and then burn new media. Now days I keep backups on multiple hard drives, some internal and some on a NAS I built out of an old computer with new 2TB WD Red drives. In the old days, digital camera photos were small, and you could get lots on one DVD. Now days, the files are huge, especially when shooting RAW+JPEG. Optical disk backup just isn't a viable solution for me for the most part. I really need to put some effort into selecting a cloud backup plan. As it is now, all my backups are local to my home. A fire, flood, hurricane, or thief/vandal could destroy it all.
Yeah, complete at-home storage has some problems which is the other reason I am considering the cloud also. You might want to take a look at the cloud service that Taozen suggested: https://www.code42.com/store/ Their prices look very reasonable, and he said he has been using it for two years.
I like to make my pictures very large as they will look better later when resized smaller, and that requires a lot of space. My camera does not shoot Raw unfortunately, otherwise, I would be looking at even more huge files.
I have enough computer parts to build a computer just for backups, so I am thinking I may do that rather than the external drive. However, like you said, something out of the house is also needed.
Another thing to consider for photos is Flickr. A friend told me they give 1TB free storage. He's been happy with it. I have to wonder how long a business plan like that can be viable, though.
Owned by Yahoo. They also have a paid subscription which is ad-free. From Wikipedia: "Flickr may delete accounts without giving any reason or warning to the account's owner."
Not sure this is a good choice.
Anyone thinking about using Flickr might want to wait a bit — see if Yahoo! decides to reverse its untested, massively unpopular, amazingly bug-ridden and unbelievably user-hostile changes to the UI of the various Y! sections before the mass exodus of disgusted eyes-on-adverts (a.k.a. the users) causes the whole company to collapse.
I'm not exaggerating, in comparison the hideous problems DAZ has had over the last year and a half trying to get the new store software as functional as it is now was only a minor annoyance easily fixed with tweaks to a couple of lines of code. Right now I wouldn't depend on anything Y! has "improved" to their new Neo system standard. It's still unstable, even after several months of ignoring literally thousands of bug reports and fixing a few dozen minor glitches.
Unfortunately...no matter what one does, everything has a temporary (can change at any moment) lifespan. Even hands on photos can fade and discolor with time. Basically you have to look at the various storage methods, weigh the pros and cons and hope you choose one (or several) that get the job done.
LmWolfSpirit - I have a P4 with XP, still very functional, so older programs are not a problem...lol I also recall reading someone on PC World what you can do about older stuff on newer computers with newer OS on them. Will see if I can find the article.
Very true. My original thought in posting is that maybe someone had found a simple solution. = ) However, there are a lot of good suggestions here that are helping me to clarify how I want to approach doing backups.
LOL, it is a good then--maybe--that I never throw anything computer related away (neither hardware or software). I have a lot of older programs that no longer exist anywhere I can find--except maybe torrents, ugh-- that still have some use to them. E.g., I am still running ImageSynth which apparently Luxology retired several years ago. Fortunately, that one still runs on Windows 7, but only in Photoshop CS3, not CS5.5. = (
Good information. Thank you. I can see this being part of my backup program along with an external drive and BluRay disks. Just because I don't trust cloud services does not mean that I won't use them. I also don't trust disks to not fail. = ) I just won't upload anything personal to the cloud.
Have you ever restored anything to test how it does? It would be handy to be able to restore the program to another drive. Is it possible to set up a schedule around other things that are scheduled (e.g., anti-virus, defragger, etc.)
In following some links in this thread, I also found SpinRite which looks like it will be helpful in preserving hard drives and retrieving information from problematic drives. So I will probably be adding that to my mix of data-loss protections.
BTW, if you run out of excuses to avoid stuff, I have thousands that you can use. = )
I have restored files several times, both because I needed it and for testing, worked fine every time, and fast (depends on your connection of course). And you can restore to any drive you want.
You can create different backup profiles, each with their own settings. As for scheduling, see attached screenshot. Backup frequency for a profile can be adjusted from 1 day to 1 minute. With 1 minute every new or changed file will be backed up almost immediately, but I imagine it will use some resources constantly keeping track of the file system. The "Verify Selection" feature checks that all selected files have been correctly backed up, it's further explained here:
https://crashplan.zendesk.com/entries/24117072-File-verification-scan
Haven't used SpinRite myself (with sufficient backups you usually won't need it IMO) but it should be good for fixing damaged drives and file systems. I use HDD Sentinel for keeping a constant eye on my drives and for checking their health, it's a really great program with lots of features and can tell you anything you want to know about your drives. Support is outstanding. Funny coincidence btw, you can get the Pro version with a 50% discount here but only for today. It comes with a lifetime license (all future upgrades are free):
http://www.bitsdujour.com/software/hard-disk-sentinel-professional
This offer is for 1 a computer license however, you can get a 5 computer license (also lifetime) with a 30% discount here, which is even cheaper per license than today's discount offer, and available anytime:
http://www.bitsdujour.com/software/hard-disk-sentinel-professional-family-license
A comparison between the different versions:
http://www.hdsentinel.com/store.php
LOL, I had to go to a converter to check the temps. It can get over 90 degrees F (32 C) here outside and be about 100 in my computer room. The house is a rental, and the windows are sealed shut so no flowing air or air conditioning either. I watch the computer temp closely then.
Right now for winter, I have the sides off my computers so i can take advantage of the extra heat (yes, I know open cases are frowned upon, but so is not being able to afford the utility bill which would happen if I had to turn the thermostat up).
The house here was heavily insulated a few years ago, that really made a difference. Before it was freezing cold in the winter, now I hardly need to turn on the heat in the room with my computers, they usually deliver enough heat to heat up the room (old Q6600 CPUs, generate an enourmous amount of heat). :) In summer though the heat they generate is a disadvantage, obviously.
It actually doesn't matter whether you take the sides of the cabinets or not, they'll heat the room the same anyway (unless you have the air flow output from the machines directed outside or to some other room using a piping system, which is unusual (but handy in the summer heat I imagine, have thought about it myself)). Actually I'll recommend not to take the sides of for in some cases (depending on hardware and room temperature) components inside the computer may overheat if the air flow through it is disrupted.
If the files are strongly encrypted before being uploaded to the cloud (you can do this yourself, or let the online backup software do it if it is capable (that from CrashPlan is)), hackers are no problem really. The can't get the key to decrypt the files since it's stored on your computer and nowhere else.
Sorry, link to today's HDD Sentinel discount offer was bad, here's the correct one (also corrected in original post now):
http://www.bitsdujour.com/software/hard-disk-sentinel-professional
Thank you for the information. The reason I was leaning toward SpinRite is that it also aids in recovery. It looks like I still have some studying to do on this. If DAZ hadn't left me so broke, I would have jumped on that sale even without the extra study. Great sale, but I will have to wait for the next one.