Is this a wise thing to do? Cheers

[MatLane]

Baisicly i am transferring all my photos (this is on windows by the way) to a usb mem stick, and then planning to remove them off the computer and just plug in the stick when i need photos to give me a bit more hard drive space as there is about 3 thousand.



Is this ok to do?


Strange i know, just dont want to loose anything

Somebody said to me yesturday not too? :

 

[840quadra]

For the most part, Solid state memory is slightly more stable than rotating media (disks). If you have multiple copies of this (IE two USB sticks with the same data), and have those copies stored at separate locations, it is actually a good backup procedure for your photos.

Most don't need to carry "all" of their photos with them on the road, and your solution sounds solid . I may recommend getting a large Hard disk too (perhaps use that as primary, and the USB stick as secondary), as using the USB drives can have slow read / write speeds.

The other minor issue is, USB sticks are REALLY easy to lose / steal , so keep track of were you put them!

 

[MatLane]

For the most part, Solid state memory is slightly more stable than rotating media (disks). If you have multiple copies of this (IE two USB sticks with the same data), and have those copies stored at separate locations, it is actually a good backup procedure for your photos.

Most don't need to carry "all" of their photos with them on the road, and your solution sounds solid . I may recommend getting a large Hard disk too (perhaps use that as primary, and the USB stick as secondary), as using the USB drives can have slow read / write speeds.

The other minor issue is, USB sticks are REALLY easy to lose / steal , so keep track of were you put them!

cheers man, thanks for that!

 

[G5power]

With DVD's and CD's being so inexpensive I would recommend also periodically burning them to disk for storage.

 

[Hawkeye411]

I had a USB stick sitting in my office on my desk for 4 months and then when I went to use it, it didn't work at all. I would only suggest using it as a backup and not as your only source for saving the files.

Cheers.

 

[rouquin]

One thing that you have to know is that the mean time between failure (MTBF) of USB memory sticks is much lower than a hard disk, the more you use it the shorter it's life will be.

If you intend to access & update your photo library often then a USB memory stick would not be recommended as you can never be sure when it will fail. However for occasional use and backup on a second stick this should be ok.

Personally I've got a couple of large external hard drives, one to hold the data and a 2nd backup drive to which the data is synced every night. I may be paranoid, but then again my wife would kill me if I lost our photos

HTH

 

[brn2ski00]

Yes, but once you get your first Mac, you won't have to worry about this.

 

[outaru]

it is still best to backup to multiple media, i use multiple HD..
Western Digital MyBook II works well in raid 2 configuration i just hope that both HD will not crash at the same time..

 

[i.shaun]

Personally, I have photos on my iMac internal HDD, a backup on a portable HDD, and every once in a while, I take about 10 or more single layer 4.5GB DVDs and backup my iTunes, pictures, and documents.


I find it's better to burn the actual folders of my iTunes library, rather than playlists. I get all the music done, then copy the iTunes library file aswell, if it is ever corrupted, I just re-place the old backup, and point iTunes to the old library file. No need to re-add music, taking a long time to add, convert, determine gapless playback, organize album and artist folders, and artwork.

Same can be done if you use iPhoto, just copy the library file, if necessary, copy a few picture folders inside it, and move them to reduce the size, and remember to put it back the way it was if you restore it later.


I'd say put the most important photos on the computer, or remove them all if you like. Place a backup on DVD, just in case, and remember to burn new backups periodically. Use the USB stick casually, and if it happens to fail, you'll have the backup DVD(s).

 

[alphaod]

USB flash drives are a lot less reliable than HDDs, no I wouldn't do it. Now SSDs are more reliable, but they also cost like 20x as much for the same capacity.