Amazon Unlimited Storage - is it wise to switch to cloud storage?

mag07 · 03-03-2017, 07:49 AM

Think rule number one is to never rely on one source for backup. No one will guarantee you the safety of your data. In my eyes, it's not an either or, it's both.

awscreo · 03-03-2017, 07:52 AM

Originally posted by mag07

Think rule number one is to never rely on one source for backup. No one will guarantee you the safety of your data. In my eyes, it's not an either or, it's both.

Yup, that's why I'm planning to build NAS eventually (sooner rather than later). But I will back up the most crucial files right now, to avoid hair loss

**UncleVanya** · 03-03-2017, 07:56 AM

Originally posted by awscreo

Thanks for sharing! But, those services are pretty pricey, and as a non-pro photographer I probably can't justify it just yet. The 1 year cost of any of those is basically the price of a NAS storage with few backup drives, which kind of defeats the purpose of the original question)

I'm not sure you saw far enough into that article. Backblaze is $50 a year and Crashplan is $5/month with yearly subscription. Bear in mind the advice in the article - three copies in multiple locations. Many of the services rely on the same underlying storage so having a local nas isn't a bad idea.

awscreo · 03-03-2017, 08:13 AM

Originally posted by UncleVanya

I'm not sure you saw far enough into that article. Backblaze is $50 a year and Crashplan is $5/month with yearly subscription. Bear in mind the advice in the article - three copies in multiple locations. Many of the services rely on the same underlying storage so having a local nas isn't a bad idea.

Yeah, i looked at first three I think, spoke too soon I guess) I'll have a look, thanks!

Fenwoodian · 03-03-2017, 08:16 AM

I recommend using cloud storage that is owned and operated by giant corporations such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and DropBox. Too many of the smaller cloud storage offerings have gone out of business. I doubt that will ever happen with the "bigs" cloud service.

**UncleVanya** · 03-03-2017, 08:22 AM

Originally posted by awscreo

Yeah, i looked at first three I think, spoke too soon I guess) I'll have a look, thanks!

Absolutely - I'm in a similar boat trying to make these evaluations myself.

awscreo · 03-03-2017, 08:29 AM

Originally posted by Fenwoodian

I recommend using cloud storage that is owned and operated by giant corporations such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and DropBox. Too many of the smaller cloud storage offerings have gone out of business. I doubt that will ever happen with the "bigs" cloud service.

Yes that was my concern too. However, seems the Backblaze at least has been around for a long enough time. I wouldn't solely rely on it, but I'm trying both this and Amazon to see what works for me.

One thing - amazon file browsing seems more intuitive (like dropbox), backblaze seems to be a purely backup solution, locating individual files might be an issue if you have a ton of data. At least at first glance.

**monochrome** · 03-03-2017, 08:43 AM

Take on outage of AWS Cloud Services this week, from storage architecture consultants: Use resilient, redundant cloud storage solutions - IOW, use AWS, IBM and Microsoft in redundant, interleaved data streams.

vonBaloney · 03-03-2017, 08:57 AM - **2 Likes**

I had previously backed up all my RAW files to Amazon when they made it free for photos (if you have prime already), but then later on got the $60/yr unlimited deal -- I think they are the only ones offering true unlimited for a reasonable price -- and so then I backed up my system and other files. I don't encrypt the photos (which are just of trees, rocks, buildings, etc, so I'm just not worried too much about a breach), but I encrypt everything else on my end first. As far as the risk of totally losing the data, a cloud solution (from a big company) is certainly less risky than any solution you implement yourself with physical media (because those companies have their own redundancy), although you should do both. And if you are worried about the data getting out into the world (and you should), then you should encrypt anything sensitive and it won't matter if it is leaked.

The problem you want to avoid is not "never having a problem", it is never having a problem you can't recover from. For instance, if Amazon's data is all destroyed today right now, I won't lose anything because I have that data here also. So as long as I hear about that happening, I can take steps to make sure I've got another backup happening. But if instead, my data is all destroyed/stolen here, then I still doesn't lose anything because I've got it backed up on Amazon and maybe other places. So as long as everything doesn't get destroyed everywhere on the same day, all is fine. (And if it is, we're probably in a nuclear war or something and will have bigger fish to fry.) So there is no reason to be inordinately worried about whatever service failing or being hacked (especially if you encrypt everything) unless that is your only copy -- but then it isn't a backup, and so that would be foolish -- it something happens to one copy somewhere, you just make another one. Just make sure the odds are incredibly small that all your copies could be lost at the same time...

**Oakland Rob** · 03-03-2017, 12:41 PM

One thing that would induce me to one of these services more readily is being able to leverage content searching. Right now Google is the best at it by far, but it compresses images. I would dearly love to be able to say search on something and then have a way to sync that search term to keywords I could use in the photos. But in the meantime, it's uncanny. I did a search on "toddler" and it found kids that age. Amazon wasn't nearly as good.

And having a service that would also allow for storage of the same photos you use for say gallery viewing and so on would be nice. Many of these are good at sharing and displaying, but worse at backup, and vice versa. What I'd like is to have one central storage spot, but with two different interfaces depending on what I'm doing, sharing vs pure storage. And Lr integration; the desktop uploaders are just too bare bones.

**UncleVanya** · 03-03-2017, 06:19 PM

Originally posted by Oakland Rob

One thing that would induce me to one of these services more readily is being able to leverage content searching. Right now Google is the best at it by far, but it compresses images. I would dearly love to be able to say search on something and then have a way to sync that search term to keywords I could use in the photos. But in the meantime, it's uncanny. I did a search on "toddler" and it found kids that age. Amazon wasn't nearly as good.

And having a service that would also allow for storage of the same photos you use for say gallery viewing and so on would be nice. Many of these are good at sharing and displaying, but worse at backup, and vice versa. What I'd like is to have one central storage spot, but with two different interfaces depending on what I'm doing, sharing vs pure storage. And Lr integration; the desktop uploaders are just too bare bones.

It is expensive comparatively but Amazon S3 might work if someone writes a Lightroom plug-in.

stevebrot · 03-03-2017, 09:46 PM

Originally posted by awscreo

I wonder if longevity could be a potential issue though? Amazon is amazon, like Google, I don't think they are going away any time soon. Those other ones - not sure. Downloading 4-6tb of data from a server in case they announce shutting down would be a massive pain

As mentioned above, AWS had a massive outage a few days ago due to an error on their end. My main concern with cloud storage has been ready access. Still though, it is tempting to have the option of off-site, high security storage.

One option you might want to consider is an AWS account. At the low end, their offerings are pay-as-you-go for processor time and band-width. Access is essentially SSH with file transfer using scp the same as if you were doing a co-lo somewhere. The AWS business model is a godsend for small businesses who need high availability database, Web, and application servers, but who can't afford traditional solutions. I have a dormant AWS account that has been costing me about $0.85/mo. I really should put it to work one of these days

Steve

**Oakland Rob** · 03-04-2017, 08:44 AM - **1 Like**

Originally posted by stevebrot

As mentioned above, AWS had a massive outage a few days ago due to an error on their end. My main concern with cloud storage has been ready access. Still though, it is tempting to have the option of off-site, high security storage.

One option you might want to consider is an AWS account. At the low end, their offerings are pay-as-you-go for processor time and band-width. Access is essentially SSH with file transfer using scp the same as if you were doing a co-lo somewhere. The AWS business model is a godsend for small businesses who need high availability database, Web, and application servers, but who can't afford traditional solutions. I have a dormant AWS account that has been costing me about $0.85/mo. I really should put it to work one of these days

Yeah, S3 is great although I think I discovered if you have a big bunch of data it might be better to go with Backblaze, Crashplan, etc. And some other online storage sites are actually using S3 (iCloud Photo Library I think, eg). I use Forklift on the Mac to connect via SFTP, but the latest version of Chronosync might be a good choice since I think they've implemented that. It's worth having since it's definitely cheaper for a smaller pile of stuff, and easy to manage.

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03-03-2017, 07:49 AM	#16
mag07 Forum Member Join Date: Jun 2015 Posts: 60	Think rule number one is to never rely on one source for backup. No one will guarantee you the safety of your data. In my eyes, it's not an either or, it's both.

03-03-2017, 07:52 AM	#17
awscreo Veteran Member Join Date: May 2016 Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 2,722 Original Poster	Originally posted by mag07 Think rule number one is to never rely on one source for backup. No one will guarantee you the safety of your data. In my eyes, it's not an either or, it's both. Yup, that's why I'm planning to build NAS eventually (sooner rather than later). But I will back up the most crucial files right now, to avoid hair loss

03-03-2017, 07:56 AM	#18
UncleVanya Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Jul 2014 Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 28,403	Originally posted by awscreo Thanks for sharing! But, those services are pretty pricey, and as a non-pro photographer I probably can't justify it just yet. The 1 year cost of any of those is basically the price of a NAS storage with few backup drives, which kind of defeats the purpose of the original question) I'm not sure you saw far enough into that article. Backblaze is $50 a year and Crashplan is $5/month with yearly subscription. Bear in mind the advice in the article - three copies in multiple locations. Many of the services rely on the same underlying storage so having a local nas isn't a bad idea.

03-03-2017, 08:13 AM	#19
awscreo Veteran Member Join Date: May 2016 Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 2,722 Original Poster	Originally posted by UncleVanya I'm not sure you saw far enough into that article. Backblaze is $50 a year and Crashplan is $5/month with yearly subscription. Bear in mind the advice in the article - three copies in multiple locations. Many of the services rely on the same underlying storage so having a local nas isn't a bad idea. Yeah, i looked at first three I think, spoke too soon I guess) I'll have a look, thanks!

03-03-2017, 08:16 AM	#20
Fenwoodian Pentaxian Join Date: Apr 2015 Location: USA Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 2,874	I recommend using cloud storage that is owned and operated by giant corporations such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and DropBox. Too many of the smaller cloud storage offerings have gone out of business. I doubt that will ever happen with the "bigs" cloud service.

03-03-2017, 08:22 AM	#21
UncleVanya Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Jul 2014 Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 28,403	Originally posted by awscreo Yeah, i looked at first three I think, spoke too soon I guess) I'll have a look, thanks! Absolutely - I'm in a similar boat trying to make these evaluations myself.

03-03-2017, 08:29 AM	#22
awscreo Veteran Member Join Date: May 2016 Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 2,722 Original Poster	Originally posted by Fenwoodian I recommend using cloud storage that is owned and operated by giant corporations such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and DropBox. Too many of the smaller cloud storage offerings have gone out of business. I doubt that will ever happen with the "bigs" cloud service. Yes that was my concern too. However, seems the Backblaze at least has been around for a long enough time. I wouldn't solely rely on it, but I'm trying both this and Amazon to see what works for me. One thing - amazon file browsing seems more intuitive (like dropbox), backblaze seems to be a purely backup solution, locating individual files might be an issue if you have a ton of data. At least at first glance.

03-03-2017, 08:43 AM	#23
monochrome Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Working From Home Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 26,276	Take on outage of AWS Cloud Services this week, from storage architecture consultants: Use resilient, redundant cloud storage solutions - IOW, use AWS, IBM and Microsoft in redundant, interleaved data streams.

03-03-2017, 08:57 AM - 2 Likes	#24
vonBaloney Pentaxian Join Date: Oct 2011 Location: Albuquerque, NM Posts: 6,029	I had previously backed up all my RAW files to Amazon when they made it free for photos (if you have prime already), but then later on got the $60/yr unlimited deal -- I think they are the only ones offering true unlimited for a reasonable price -- and so then I backed up my system and other files. I don't encrypt the photos (which are just of trees, rocks, buildings, etc, so I'm just not worried too much about a breach), but I encrypt everything else on my end first. As far as the risk of totally losing the data, a cloud solution (from a big company) is certainly less risky than any solution you implement yourself with physical media (because those companies have their own redundancy), although you should do both. And if you are worried about the data getting out into the world (and you should), then you should encrypt anything sensitive and it won't matter if it is leaked. The problem you want to avoid is not "never having a problem", it is never having a problem you can't recover from. For instance, if Amazon's data is all destroyed today right now, I won't lose anything because I have that data here also. So as long as I hear about that happening, I can take steps to make sure I've got another backup happening. But if instead, my data is all destroyed/stolen here, then I still doesn't lose anything because I've got it backed up on Amazon and maybe other places. So as long as everything doesn't get destroyed everywhere on the same day, all is fine. (And if it is, we're probably in a nuclear war or something and will have bigger fish to fry.) So there is no reason to be inordinately worried about whatever service failing or being hacked (especially if you encrypt everything) unless that is your only copy -- but then it isn't a backup, and so that would be foolish -- it something happens to one copy somewhere, you just make another one. Just make sure the odds are incredibly small that all your copies could be lost at the same time...

03-03-2017, 12:41 PM	#25
Oakland Rob Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Apr 2015 Location: Bay Area California Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 798	One thing that would induce me to one of these services more readily is being able to leverage content searching. Right now Google is the best at it by far, but it compresses images. I would dearly love to be able to say search on something and then have a way to sync that search term to keywords I could use in the photos. But in the meantime, it's uncanny. I did a search on "toddler" and it found kids that age. Amazon wasn't nearly as good. And having a service that would also allow for storage of the same photos you use for say gallery viewing and so on would be nice. Many of these are good at sharing and displaying, but worse at backup, and vice versa. What I'd like is to have one central storage spot, but with two different interfaces depending on what I'm doing, sharing vs pure storage. And Lr integration; the desktop uploaders are just too bare bones.

03-03-2017, 06:19 PM	#26
UncleVanya Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Jul 2014 Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 28,403	Originally posted by Oakland Rob One thing that would induce me to one of these services more readily is being able to leverage content searching. Right now Google is the best at it by far, but it compresses images. I would dearly love to be able to say search on something and then have a way to sync that search term to keywords I could use in the photos. But in the meantime, it's uncanny. I did a search on "toddler" and it found kids that age. Amazon wasn't nearly as good. And having a service that would also allow for storage of the same photos you use for say gallery viewing and so on would be nice. Many of these are good at sharing and displaying, but worse at backup, and vice versa. What I'd like is to have one central storage spot, but with two different interfaces depending on what I'm doing, sharing vs pure storage. And Lr integration; the desktop uploaders are just too bare bones. It is expensive comparatively but Amazon S3 might work if someone writes a Lightroom plug-in.

03-03-2017, 09:46 PM	#27
stevebrot Otis Memorial Pentaxian Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: Vancouver (USA) Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 42,007	Originally posted by awscreo I wonder if longevity could be a potential issue though? Amazon is amazon, like Google, I don't think they are going away any time soon. Those other ones - not sure. Downloading 4-6tb of data from a server in case they announce shutting down would be a massive pain As mentioned above, AWS had a massive outage a few days ago due to an error on their end. My main concern with cloud storage has been ready access. Still though, it is tempting to have the option of off-site, high security storage. One option you might want to consider is an AWS account. At the low end, their offerings are pay-as-you-go for processor time and band-width. Access is essentially SSH with file transfer using scp the same as if you were doing a co-lo somewhere. The AWS business model is a godsend for small businesses who need high availability database, Web, and application servers, but who can't afford traditional solutions. I have a dormant AWS account that has been costing me about $0.85/mo. I really should put it to work one of these days Steve

03-04-2017, 08:44 AM - 1 Like	#28
Oakland Rob Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Apr 2015 Location: Bay Area California Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 798	Originally posted by stevebrot As mentioned above, AWS had a massive outage a few days ago due to an error on their end. My main concern with cloud storage has been ready access. Still though, it is tempting to have the option of off-site, high security storage. One option you might want to consider is an AWS account. At the low end, their offerings are pay-as-you-go for processor time and band-width. Access is essentially SSH with file transfer using scp the same as if you were doing a co-lo somewhere. The AWS business model is a godsend for small businesses who need high availability database, Web, and application servers, but who can't afford traditional solutions. I have a dormant AWS account that has been costing me about $0.85/mo. I really should put it to work one of these days Yeah, S3 is great although I think I discovered if you have a big bunch of data it might be better to go with Backblaze, Crashplan, etc. And some other online storage sites are actually using S3 (iCloud Photo Library I think, eg). I use Forklift on the Mac to connect via SFTP, but the latest version of Chronosync might be a good choice since I think they've implemented that. It's worth having since it's definitely cheaper for a smaller pile of stuff, and easy to manage.