What are the affordable online backup options for a growing photo library on a Mac?
Asked 2/11/2011
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I need an offsite backup solution for a photo library that's already over 100GB and could grow to 200GB+ within a year. I'm using a Mac with Aperture 3, and I'd like something that can run in the background automatically. Cost is the main concern. I know an external hard drive would be cheaper, but I want a copy stored somewhere else for safety. What online backup options are worth considering, and what practical limitations should I keep in mind?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
15y ago
2 Answers
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not the answer you want, but I don't consider online backup to be cost effective yet. Costs are going down, but I find the annual cost is still more than it'd cost to buy a good firewire drive, copy the data, and store it in a drawer at a friend's house or some other offsite location.
And think about this. How long will it take to archive 100Gb of data onto an online service? I know when I experimented with this, a 50Gb set of data took weeks to get fully backed up online. And if you ever need to recover that data, how long will it take to download it again and get it back where it's available? Again, weeks. The cost of storing the data is one cost. The cost of the time needed to make the bakcup, and even more important, the cost of the time lost waiting to rebuild the archive off of the cloud, is a killer for me.
For relatively small, temporary backups I'll use dropbox. But for a permanent solution, it's multiple copies in multiple locations on multiple hard drives.
Originally by user705. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user705
15y ago
0
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Several online backup services are commonly suggested for large photo libraries on Mac, including Backblaze, Carbonite, CrashPlan, Mozy, Dropbox, SugarSync, and Amazon S3.
For your needs, an automatic background backup service is the right type of product, and unlimited-plan services can be attractive if available. However, the main practical issue is upload speed: backing up 100–150GB can take weeks on a typical home broadband connection, and restoring everything later could also take a very long time. You should also check whether your internet plan has upload or total data caps.
If cost is the biggest factor, online backup may still be less cost-effective than using an external drive and keeping it offsite, such as at a friend’s house. A common approach is to use both: a local external drive for fast backup and recovery, plus online backup only if your budget and internet speed make it practical.
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