11 Backups and Sharing

Backups are an absolute must for pictures, data, emails, in other words, everything on your computer. It’s not if but when your hard drive crashes and takes all your pictures with it. A good rule of thumb is the 3-2-1 plan: 3 copies, 2 types of media, and one offsite (can be the cloud). Some of the backup functions overlap with the sharing options. Let’s look at a few of the ones I use.

External hard drives that hold one terabyte cost less than $100. I have one that I use on a regular basis, but do not leave it continuously connected because of the potential for ransomware to infect both computer and your backup drive. I use Windows “file history” accessed in the control panel to perform the backups.

Cloud storage is available on many platforms such as Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, Dropbox, and Amazon Photos. Amazon photos is free if you already have a Prime subscription, but you can use it only for photos. Dropbox can be pricy and only gives you 2 Gigabytes of free storage. I do use Google Drive for a redundant cloud backup of my most important folders. Cost is $20/year for 100 Gigabytes. My main backup is Microsoft OneDrive because I get 1 Terabyte free with an Office 365 subscription that costs $70/year. All pictures and documents automatically sync to the cloud. All these cloud services are super easy to use for sharing selected folders with others. You can also use them in a collaborative effort with others.

Flash drives could be considered backups since pictures on them could be dragged back onto the computer. However, their main function for me is as a means of viewing my exported albums on the TV. Just plug a new flash drive into the computer and open to view files which should be empty, then open my pictures, minimize both windows to view on one screen, find your exported album and drag onto the flash drive. They will still remain intact on your computer. Now plug that flash drive into the USB port on your TV, choose the proper input source, and your album comes alive on the big screen. You should also be able to adjust the speed, transition, and order in tools. If there is music loaded on the TV, you can include that with the slideshow.

Google Photos is a new photo service from Google that automatically backs up all photos from all your devices to the cloud. Google uses facial recognition, location, things, and dates to organize your photos and make it searchable. You can edit, crop, and share with others. The cost: it uses your Google Drive storage. A problem with the date and place organization on your scans is they do not carry a geotag or original date, only date scanned. And your edits and albums are on the cloud, not your computer. Right now I do not see this as a viable option for dealing with historical scans with the end result being TV viewing.

Apple Photos Like Google Photos this is a platform ideal for storing and sharing the masses of photos we take today on our phones. Putting all your photos into the icloud photo library will eat into your paid storage. You can edit, crop, share, and download edits back to your computer. Again, organization is based on date and place so not an ideal solution for our historical scans.

Picasa web albums have been discontinued with the advent of Google Photos discussed above.