| ▲ | antimora 2 hours ago |
| Does anyone use it for family photo backup for generation to pass on? I am struggling to come up with a good back up solution that last ages. |
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| ▲ | ssl-3 4 minutes ago | parent | next [-] |
| If you want to pass stuff on stuff so it will last for ages, then: Get it done already. Print it, email it, post it somewhere and share links, have it framed and then delivered by a singing courier -- however it is done, then just do it and get it over with. Now it's their problem to take care of, ignore, make fun of, or whatever, which was always ultimately going to be the case anyway. This allows you to back with living your life while you still have one. There's little point to bothering with predicting what the future will look like after you're dead, and even less point to trying to influence how others will behave on your behalf. |
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| ▲ | doublepg23 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| I love curating my photo library but after I kick the bucket I have to assume the number of photos that my future relatives care about will number in the dozens. |
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| ▲ | FlowingRiver 20 minutes ago | parent [-] | | I've talked to many deceased estate cleaners over the years, I have seen them in action many times. The amount of stuff people want to keep from relatives is a rounding error of 0%. Whole lives of collecting sentimental goods all end up going in a giant bin, a whole house cleaned out in less than 2 hours. Photo albums are rarely kept, they just go in with it all and off to the tip usually in a single morning. What you think is important to you, is basically just trash to your relatives/kids. They will probably have want they want before you are gone. |
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| ▲ | jordand 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Blu-ray drives are becoming increasingly rare sadly, so it's not great to hand over to others in the years ahead. An external hard disk drive kept safe and secure might be your only option. I had the same issue 6 years ago winding down my company and archiving data. Only sensible options were M-DISC and external hard disks. |
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| ▲ | WalterBright 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Buy a new hard drive every year, make it your primary drive. The previous one becomes your backup. Or just keep it attached to your system, so spyware, adware, and the NSA will make free backups for you! |
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| ▲ | FlowingRiver 28 minutes ago | parent [-] | | This has been my system for a while now. The funny side is that, I have yet to have a drive failure so the amount of local backups is getting silly. The other thing I did was I ended up collecting HDD's out of old DVR's people were throwing out. Those drives are used for cold storage but not for anything important because they already have tens of thousands of hours on them and in not the best temperature conditions. Again, non have failed yet. Funnily enough, the only HDD I have failing is a 2.1GB Quantum Fireball from 1997 in my Pentium 1! Really should swap that for an SD card via IDE. |
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| ▲ | 8fingerlouie an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| I do this, alongside other methods. The problem with archiving data is you always need to be prepared to use the "next big thing" once your preferred method becomes unobtainable. I currently have : - Photos in iCloud (Live working copy) - Backup at home on NAS (updated nightly, snapshots) - Backup in pCloud (lifetime, mine or theirs, no illusions, hopefully lasts a couple of months if I die unexpectedly) - Yearly archive on external HDDs, identical copies stored in separate locations, clearly labeled "Photo backup". No encryption, no archiving, just plain APFS formatted drives that can be plugged into a computer and read. - Yearly archive M-disc blu-ray discs, again, identical copies, stored in separate locations. One disc per year labeled as such, ie. "Photo Backup 2020". The idea being you restore them in chronological order and have a complete set. |
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| ▲ | canpan an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| For family photos, my solution is as follows: - A photo album extended with a curated set of photos each year. The real deal! - NAS at [my] home and blu-ray off site (parents home) for all photos Updated: added [my] for clarification |
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| ▲ | ggm 42 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Your backup plan is to store the asset in [checks actuarial tables] the place most likely to be withdrawn first? | | |
| ▲ | canpan 15 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | Sorry if it was not clear: The NAS is at my house but houses may burn down. THE discs are at my parents house for off-site backup. Like the sibling poster says, I would be the one going through the things anyway. But if unsure you can also ask a friend to keep them, one blu-ray can hold tons of photos and doesnt take much space. | | |
| ▲ | ggm 6 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Fair. Nothing is risk free. Move overseas, be more than 10 days away, other sibs have the burdens "we threw out those old unreadable backups Dad had stashed from his time at the computer center".. But your strategy isn't the worst by far. My 3-2-1 has 2 of the 3 in the same physical location. Not good. |
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| ▲ | ocdtrekkie 34 minutes ago | parent | prev [-] | | They probably will be the one going through their parents stuff and hopefully by the time its an issue can move it to their kids' place. Options for trusted free hosting are limited sometimes. ;) |
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| ▲ | comboy 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| get some used LTO-5 / LTO-6 drive if you have some desktop/server to plug it in |
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| ▲ | jordand 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | LTO tapes are the worst possible format for passing on family photos to family members. I dread to think of anyone in my family trying to setup an LTO drive when they barely understand how to use their smartphone. | | |
| ▲ | comboy 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I mean if you don't print them and want digital and we're talking having them for the next generation(s) then pretty much whatever current format you choose, it won't be the one that's widely used in the future so it will require some tech knowledge. And LTO tech stayed pretty settled and compatible for quite a few years now. | | |
| ▲ | jordand 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | LTO drives/tape are not friendly, consumer grade technology. One look on a search engine, and it's all obscure refurbished server parts costing hundreds. The prices of them going forwards might increase sharply too and make it unviable...a bit like external hard drives right now. So yeah, printing everything out and hoping for the best is the only sensible option... |
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| ▲ | cyberax an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | There are companies that can read the tapes for you, especially for a one-off transfer. This is an _additional_ layer of backups, on top of the usual iCloud/whatever things. LTO is certainly not user-friendly, but neither is it especially user-hostile. And I think I trust tapes far better than any other alternative for long-term storage as they have by far the smallest areal density of information compared to disks (hard or optical). I have DVD disks that are barely 10 years old and that I can't read anymore. Hard drives also die in storage and/or during transport. | | |
| ▲ | ggm 41 minutes ago | parent [-] | | These companies charge a megabuck. Maintaining the drives doesn't come cheap. I am (like other ageing former mainframe operatives) the holder of a variety of tape forms, and nobody local wants the hassle of giving me a bitstream, without significant vig. Like thousands. Recently the computer museum helped recover early 1970s unix tapes. It was a big deal. |
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| ▲ | iAMkenough 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | My grandkids AI robot will figure it out for them, right? | | |
| ▲ | kjs3 an hour ago | parent [-] | | Your grandkids will just say "make me some memories" and their AI will look at your posting history and gen up some fresh new ancestors very similar to the originals. | | |
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