Just completed that mundane yet satisfying housekeeping task of duplicating and backing up the April digital files. I think I set a record: 7,148 images filed away for the month. Another 187 gigabytes of space I need to find somewhere. I swapped out a 250gb drive for a 500gb, and I'll use the former for an offsite backup, and that'll buy me a little time. But not much.
Here is my backup protocol. At the end of the month I convert all my cr2 files to dng. I burn the cr2 files onto DVDs (22 of them for April). I like having data stored in more than one media type. The dng files go into an archive folder on a hard drive on one of the networked computers, and they also get copied to a hard drive (your basic ATA internal HD) that is stored across the street. Once or twice a year I plug in those off-site drives and spin them, just to keep them alive.
I'm going to have to confront my need for more storage space, and soon. I like having all my files available on my system, the way I like having my file cabinets of slides and boxes of negatives within arm's reach. But I'm going to have to investigate more sophisticated storage options. Right now I have about 4 terabytes of data on-line, and the hard drives are full. Anyone have ideas for me?
I'd suggest going with a network attached storage device like the Buffalo Terrastation.
http://www.buffalo-technology.com/products/network-storage/terastation/
With CAT 5 Ethernet cables 100-meter capability, that might be able to get you into that other building you were talking about.
The largest they offer, that I know of, is a 3TB server that would drop to 1.5 TB in RAID1. A couple of these would be much less than a full-fledged server and does not require any special knowledge.
Posted by: chuck kimmerle | May 05, 2007 at 07:32 AM
This solution is far too ambitious for my needs, but ReadyNAS NV+ has a lot to recommend it. Very flexible/configurable, and their software, at least on the Mac, is well regarded (haven't heard anything about the Windows side).
Paul Butzi blogged about it at http://photomusings.wordpress.com/2007/01/07/storage/
Posted by: Trevor Hambric | May 06, 2007 at 10:42 AM