Backing up 21st century style
Discussion
Tech help please, I use computers day in day out but I'm what you'd probably describe as a 'user' and tend to avoid computers during my time off.
My personal computer is primarily for managing my devices, photos, videos.
I bought a snazzy new laptop a couple of years ago and stretched the budget to get an SSD and a decent enough processor but regrettably cheaped out on the storage and got only 256gb which I thought would be fine at the time. It was quickly full and now I'm having to move stuff off the laptop and onto external drives.
I have no cloud storage apart from iCloud free which doesn't even offer enough storage to backup my phone. Free services don't offer the space I need.
I have seen remarks on here suggesting that you'd basically have to be an idiot not to be backing up to the cloud these days.
Is paying for cloud storage an inalienable fact of life these days? I have always been wary of allowing my data to float out into the ether and frankly tight enough to want to avoid another parasitic drain on my bank account, however small.
Is there any particular service which can be recommended over the others when it comes to trustworthyness, reliability etc?
My personal computer is primarily for managing my devices, photos, videos.
I bought a snazzy new laptop a couple of years ago and stretched the budget to get an SSD and a decent enough processor but regrettably cheaped out on the storage and got only 256gb which I thought would be fine at the time. It was quickly full and now I'm having to move stuff off the laptop and onto external drives.
I have no cloud storage apart from iCloud free which doesn't even offer enough storage to backup my phone. Free services don't offer the space I need.
I have seen remarks on here suggesting that you'd basically have to be an idiot not to be backing up to the cloud these days.
Is paying for cloud storage an inalienable fact of life these days? I have always been wary of allowing my data to float out into the ether and frankly tight enough to want to avoid another parasitic drain on my bank account, however small.
Is there any particular service which can be recommended over the others when it comes to trustworthyness, reliability etc?
Nearly everything that runs on the internet is moving to a subscription based business model. Netflix, Spotify, O365 etc. The same is true of cloud storage.
If you already use iCloud and are bought into the Apple eco system then there’s nothing wrong with moving to a paid subscription.
If you subscribe to Microsoft Office then you get a fair chunk of storage with OneDirve that would work.
Personally I have unlimited Google drive storage I use but it isn’t the most straightforward to setup initially, effectively needing to buy a domain name and use their business focused service but just for me. Gives me a good email address as an added bonus.
Encryption based backup software can make sure the cloud providers don’t see your data but then you’d probably need to pay a subscription for the software on top unless you’re handy with a computer and can configure something like Veracrypt to work for your use case.
Of course if you’re dead against subscription based cloud services then get 4TB of USB drive for under £100 and pop it somewhere other than your home when not using it.
If you already use iCloud and are bought into the Apple eco system then there’s nothing wrong with moving to a paid subscription.
If you subscribe to Microsoft Office then you get a fair chunk of storage with OneDirve that would work.
Personally I have unlimited Google drive storage I use but it isn’t the most straightforward to setup initially, effectively needing to buy a domain name and use their business focused service but just for me. Gives me a good email address as an added bonus.
Encryption based backup software can make sure the cloud providers don’t see your data but then you’d probably need to pay a subscription for the software on top unless you’re handy with a computer and can configure something like Veracrypt to work for your use case.
Of course if you’re dead against subscription based cloud services then get 4TB of USB drive for under £100 and pop it somewhere other than your home when not using it.
I use Dropbox & find it works very well, although most people would say it isn't a backup. I can access my files on any computer & make changes on any of them which are replicated to the files on the other PCs.
£8 a month for 1TB.
Time for a new SSD as well:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-Solid-State-MZ-76...
£8 a month for 1TB.
Time for a new SSD as well:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-Solid-State-MZ-76...
Edited by Mr Pointy on Saturday 27th April 17:09
Back up to the cloud is all well and good if you backup regularly and have access to it when you need to restore it. The second half of the problem is one people rarely try and get stuck when they need to.
Also what wrong with paying out an approx £50 one-off for a physical backup device. You can always guaranteed to access this
Also what wrong with paying out an approx £50 one-off for a physical backup device. You can always guaranteed to access this
prosimon said:
Back up to the cloud is all well and good if you backup regularly and have access to it when you need to restore it. The second half of the problem is one people rarely try and get stuck when they need to.
Also what wrong with paying out an approx £50 one-off for a physical backup device. You can always guaranteed to access this
A physical backup device can fail. Or be stolen.Also what wrong with paying out an approx £50 one-off for a physical backup device. You can always guaranteed to access this
I well remember Flickr reassuring everyone nothing would change under the new regime. Then it did.
My upload speed still dates from somewhere around the AOL CD era so the cloud has never been a part of my life. Everything I have is local. Have a couple of locals to hand, and another in another location in case yours burns down.
My upload speed still dates from somewhere around the AOL CD era so the cloud has never been a part of my life. Everything I have is local. Have a couple of locals to hand, and another in another location in case yours burns down.
I find one drive works well for me.
I use the office products and treat the one drive as my hard drive, works well with windows.
I auto back up my Samsung s9 photos to one drive too.
I guess issue is I'm stuck into paying Microsoft every month but feel I get a good service for what I pay.
I've got 200mb broadband so dont see much difference to saving to my physical drive and with the app can get all my files on my phone.
I use the office products and treat the one drive as my hard drive, works well with windows.
I auto back up my Samsung s9 photos to one drive too.
I guess issue is I'm stuck into paying Microsoft every month but feel I get a good service for what I pay.
I've got 200mb broadband so dont see much difference to saving to my physical drive and with the app can get all my files on my phone.
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