Options for More Storage

[nosnhojm]

My photo library is ever expanding, and I'm currently using 700GB of my 1TB studio's internal storage; starting to get a little storage anxiety. For those of you that ran out of internal storage, what did you do?

• Use external SSD for main photo library
  • Slower read/write speeds (is this noticeable?)
  • Less reliable
• Use "Optimize Mac Storage"
  • Backing up photo library becomes nearly impossible (locally or to Backblaze) since originals aren't downloaded
• Hope for future solutions
  • Rumored iCloud Time Machine
  • Possible Studio internal storage upgrades (via Apple Store or 3rd party)

 

[BrianBaughn]

You have a Time Machine backup on your Mac Studio's internal SSD?

 

[nosnhojm]

You have a Time Machine backup on your Mac Studio's internal SSD?

No. I backup using Arq to a local NAS and Backblaze B2.

 

[Fishrrman]

Get TWO 2tb external SSDs.
Use the first one for photo storage.
Use the second one as a cloned backup of the first one.

Move the photo library OFF OF the Studio's SSD.
Keep the application(s) catalog(s) ON the internal SSD (but again, not the actual photos themselves).

 

[haralds]

I have a Mac Studio with 4TB internal and 4TB external storage using Thunderbolt/M2 SSD. The latter runs at half the internal SSD speed but it is really not possible to tell the difference even booting from the external SSD.
For images, setting up an external Thunderbolt SSD looks like the best option. USB always has the issue of sleep disconnects.
Despite all that storage. I have my Media library (audio & video) on my NAS connected via 1Gb ethernet. It's more than 1GB and would take up significant storage.
BTW, I prefer TimeMachine to my NAS and an older upgrade TimeCapsule with a 10GB drive. It runs without thinking about it. I also use periodic CCC clones for fast restores. Call me paranoid!

 

[nosnhojm]

BTW, I prefer TimeMachine to my NAS and an older upgrade TimeCapsule with a 10GB drive. It runs without thinking about it. I also use periodic CCC clones for fast restores.

I do use TimeMachine to a USB SSD. I was also using TimeMachine to my NAS, but then it stopped syncing and didn't notify me; found out a month later. Now I'm using Arq to backup to a MinIO S3 storage server on the NAS. The NAS is connected via 1Gb ethernet and works great for backups, but is too slow (225MB/s) for real-time photo library usage.

Looks like a thunderbolt M.2 drive is in my future.

 

[MacGizmo]

It makes me shiver when I hear people talk about TimeMachine and Backup in the same context. TimeMachine is not a backup... it's just disaster recovery. Eventually, a TimeMachine drive fills up and older files are automatically deleted to make room for new ones.

For a lot of people this isn't an issue. But for someone who might be storing massive photo and/or music libraries, this could be a huge problem.

 

[nosnhojm]

TimeMachine is not a backup... it's just disaster recovery

Not sure your terminology is correct. Pruning backups does not make it "not a backup", and disaster recovery is the process used to restore from a backup.

The recommended backup approach is 3-2-1 (3 copies of your data, with 2 copies stored on-site and 1 stored off-site).

I backup to:

1. USB SSD (Time Machine)
2. NAS (Arq)
3. Backblaze (Arq)

All of those methods utilize pruning; TimeMachine based on my SSD's capacity, and Arq based on my configured retention schedule.

 

[OldITGeek]

Bought a QNAP t-0004 USB storage system

 

[theluggage]

Eventually, a TimeMachine drive fills up and older files are automatically deleted to make room for new ones.

...at which point you buy a new TimeMachine drive and lock the old one away for posterity. That's why I'd probably stick to spinning rust or cheaper SATA SSDs for TimeMachine rather than expensive high-speed SSDs.

Backup doesn't mean keeping everything forever - that would be archival which is a different animal. Last time I was involved with serious industrial-strength backing up it involved rotating a set of tapes in sequence (yeah... that old) so that some got updated daily, some weekly, some monthly, some yearly etc. Time machine is an easy way of doing something like that suitable for personal/small business use.

TimeMachine is a perfectly reasonable part of a backup strategy and 1000% better than nothing - if you're serious you'll probably have at least one other form of backup and manually archive critical stuff to separate drives.

 

[jerryk]

I have moved my inactive photo archives to my Synology NAS. I also have my Macs backed up via Time Machine to the NAS which picks up my active photos and video projects. The NAS is backed up to AWS Glacier.

 

[Killerbob]

I have worked in IT Risk management for most of my life, and consider my setup decent:

- My Macs have libraries and working files - they are covered by Time Machine. Also my User folders are backed up to an external Thunderbolt drive Daily.
- My NAS (Raid6) stores all my data-, film-, photo-, music-, and video-files. Most critical files are backed up to my backup NAS nightly.
- The critical files on my NAS are also backed up to my Cloud storage (IDrive) weekly.

I cycle the set of Thunderbolt drives (with critical data) between my home and my office, every month or so.

As for data quanity:

- ‘13MP - 1TB. ‘19MP - 2TB. ‘22MS - 2TB. ‘21MBP - 500GB. ‘19MM - 500GB.
- 2 x 3TB Time Capsules. 6 x 1/2/4TB Thunderbolt Lacie Drives.
- NAS - 60TB in Raid6. NAS - 10TB in Raid5.
- IDrive - 20TB.

 

[chikorita157]

As for my setup, I use external SSD drives to store documents and music and use the interal drive for applications only, which is the setup I have for my 16" M1 Pro MacBook Pro and Mac Studio.

Most of my documents are stored on Office 365. The SSDs get backup to a OWC ThunderBay array, which is repurposed to store backups now since I moved most if not all the other stuff from the array to a bigger RaidZ2 array consisting of 4x 16 TB hard drives via iSCSI. These are accessed by a M1 Mac mini, which acts like a NAS/file server. All the stuff is then backup to Backblaze.

While not quite 3-2-1 as anything on the RaidZ2 array and OWC Thunderbay is only backed up on Backblaze, I kind of want to get a Thunderbolt LTO tape drive to do local backups as I did a restore from Backblaze, which of course took a long time to download with a 1 gigabit internet connection and having to wait for a HD with all the files takes time and costs money. Of course, the LTO Thunderbolt tape drives are expensive, although the tapes are cheap and can hold a lot. In short, that got to wait for a long while.

Also, NAS is not a backup, and you need to back that up too, which can get very expensive since you can't use personal Backblaze on a NAS, thus you need to pay by the storage.

 

[nosnhojm]

Also, NAS is not a backup, and you need to back that up too, which can get very expensive since you can't use personal Backblaze on a NAS, thus you need to pay by the storage.

It depends on how you use it; I use it as a backup destination for files that live elsewhere. RAID is not a backup; it just reduces the chance of data loss for that volume.

 

[Middleman-77]

FYI I've been a long-time user of RAID drives and in particular Drobo and Areca drives. Before that around 20 years ago I dealt with having data on ADTX RAID units with ATTO SCSI cards on PowerMac G4/G5 and Iomega Bernoulli/Jaz drives. And before that, PC-based RAID setups using Adaptec Wide SCSI cards running Windows NT.

For my own documents and most important files/photos, these days I've had those backed up to a 10TB Drobo 5D and have that backed up to a 10TB USB storage drive. I keep a 1TB Sandisk SSD as a regular backup of my working MB Air laptop. For important documents I have those on Dropbox or saved as regular backups on my home/work NAS & USB SSD drives.

At work we use a combination of 40TB Drobo 5D and 8-bay Areca RAID for saving and backing up important images, projects and files as well as a QNAP NAS for office documents and print projects. We have an Areca drive specifically for saving image files and this has been in use for over 10 years, gradually upgraded over the years from 8TB to around 48TB now. Aside from our own image files also include (mostly) clients image files. We have also just got a new Areca 8-bay 8050TB3 for our home setup (for WFH use).

There is a lot of options for fast storage these days with NVMe enclosures and drives like OWC Thunderbay/Express 4M2, but while solid-state is considered relatively 'safe' like any drive there is still a chance for failure, in particular with electronics. So the best bet is to have backups or multiple backups of the work. That can be achieved with using apps like Chronosync or Superduper for example where you can set backups on a set schedule and target destination.

 

[ColdCase]

I like to keep it simple, been doing the following for years, recovering nicely from HD failures along the way.

Your use case may differ but I have photo and video libraries organized annually. They typically grow to 4TB. I use a Thunderbolt JBOD type enclosure to house external drives. I have a 4TB SSD for the current working library, and it is CC backed up to a mirror set of large capacity rotational drives. I clean house and add/replce drives as needed. The so called project backups remain on the internal drive.

For the OS and internal drive, I use TimeMachine to backup to both a local USB drive and to an old networked mini which acts as a server. I use CC to make a bootable clone on a SSD. I backup very important stuff to iCloud.

Archiving critical footage is different than backup. I have a number of hard drive laying around but a copy of the media is stored on archive type media and off site.

Remember that RAID 5, 10, whatever is not a backup, and not cheap. RAID, besides mirror, is old school.. technology and best practices have changed a lot now that storage is cheap. But there are those that hang on because that has worked for them. RAID is certainly a way to provide tons of storage and throughput using inexpensive smaller drives with a reduced possibility of catastrophe ... but not 0. Not the most efficient for low data rate backup unless one's pockets are deep and you have a lot of spare time. Keep in mind that it takes a very long time with significant performance hits for a RAID5 or 10 to recover from a failed drive. If you do insist on using RAID for photo or video media backup, use RAID 10.

Industrial backup is different than 20TB a year.

 

[Middleman-77]

If anyone is looking for cheap storage, Amazon is currently offering a Seagate Exos 14TB HDD for around $235.99

Seagate Exos X16 14TB 7200 RPM SATA 6Gb/s 256MB Cache 3.5-Inch Internal Data Center HDD Enterprise Hard Drive (ST14000NM001G)

14TB 7200Rpm 256MB SATA 3.5 256. Seagate manufactures hard drives that specifically address the needs of the hyper scale storage market. As the flagship of the Seagate X class, the Exos X16 enterprise hard drives are the highest-capacity hard drives in the fleet.

www.amazon.com

which is very cheap and should be more than enough usage for most users. If you put that into a NAS or USB 3.1 dock or enclosure it should last you a long time. For those with big photo libraries, a drive like that (or two as backup) plus a Backblaze account should give you some good coverage and space for the overall cost (which is not costly at all).