Do you ever use DVDs for backups?

[maureenreynolds]

I was hoping someone else would chime in on this http://www.designerdigitals.com/digi...up-iphoto.html topic but my question is really about the idea of using a dvd in any way for storage, etc.

Dick has been really good about making cds of photos, and a lot of them are of our trips. These of course are his and my unedited pics. I thought I would try burning a dvd this week, as I have had issues in the past both with my burner and lack of know how. As far as I can see photos might be ok, but psds rack up the GB pretty fast. I have a collection of flash drives that I no longer use and the smaller ones seem almost ludicrous now. (I used to have a lot of documents going to and from work but that's history now!)

So does anyone use dvds? and if so, for what? btw, all my dvds are 4gb. Are there larger ones?

[readstoomuch]

I burn to DVD's, Marueen. The only ones that I am aware of are 4.7 GB ... but, I think that you can really only get about 4.3 GB burned to one. I use mine to burn photos too and also for a back up for my DD products.

[deanie]

I use dvd's all the time to back-up both photos and psd. files. It's just as simple as burning a cd and 4 g holds quite a bit. I also use them to back up my materials in zipped form so if my EHD ever fails I will not have lost all my investment!

[Carol Elliott]

I back up to DVDs as well, in addition to EHDs (one here at home and anther at my husbands work).

[Jen D]

I stick to multiple EHD. I had two different CD/DVD go bad on me =( Luckily I had already scrapped the pictures but I lost the back ups... which included my daughters first Christmas =(

[digigrandma]

I regularly back up photos on CDs or DVDs depending on how many photos I have. I've only had 1 CD go bad on me, but, since that is always a possibility I always back up on the EHD and upload all photos to Shutterfly, too.

I once read somewhere that CDs and DVDs might be only good for about 10 years so that is why we need multiple back up plans.

[Gabi]

I back up on DVD's as well and on my EHD, just to be double sure

[THAT-GIRL]

I back up on DVD's ALL MY PURCHASES (scrapbooking stuff)... that's for sure... usually when I buy stuff, I wait till I accumulate somewhere near 4G and then make it all in one new (numbered) folder and burn DVD with it... so I hope never to loose the products that I buy... almost ready to burn the 11-th DVD... and I do back up pictures too, but only raw ones (keepers), otherwise I'll need alot more shelving to build... LOL

[shhbabymine]

I am thinking its time to start reburning some CD's I have and I wanted to put them on DVD's too. I use my EHD but I wish you could back up EHDs to carbonite or somewhere online. I too upload pics to shutterfly. Have started going back month by month with the pics I have stored and picking my favs and putting them in seperate albums at shutterfly, just to be safe in case something happened, to the computers, ehd's and cd's, dvd's......

[Sierra25]

For those of you who use iPhoto how do you backup to DVDs?

[THAT-GIRL]

Sierra25 !
In iPhoto - Go to Share - Burn... of course first select the folder you want to burn... hope that helps...

[Chris]

They do have double sided DVD's that hold 8.75GB but at the time of my iMac purchase, I wasn't interested - Now I wish I had purchased the double sided burner.

I back everything important. I archive them on DVD, then on EHD #1 and again on EHD #2. Probably overkill! All my backed up files have a purple tag, but I need to do some more backing up because I have a lot without the purple!

[Sierra25]

Also do you burn just an iPhoto library or do you burn them as individual jpegs? When you go to share - burn does it save as an iPhoto library or jpegs?

[justmp]

I back up photos and scrapbook LOs to external hard drives and to 2 sets of DVDs...one that I keep at home and one that DH keeps at his office in case there was ever a fire or something.

[THAT-GIRL]

You can burn any format from iPhoto whatever it stores (or you save) and you can burn ether an "Event" or any chosen/made "Album" whatever format you have... when you click "Burn" it asks you to insert CD or DVD and it'll give you circle with green as available space and red if it too much, so you can see if you have enough or too much to put on DVD/CD... just try one you'll get the hang of it... and as for you direct question , I think it burns as individual "jpeg" pictures, other word you are not going to have an iPhoto display when looking from DVD... rather it's going to look like from "Finder" view...
Also you can select all the pictures/images that you want to burn and while they are highlighted press "Ctr-I" and it'll give you information on how many Megs/Gigs of pictures you have... on CD you can put about 700 MB and on DVD's about 4.7 GB ... I am against double sided DVD's 'cause I've read they do go bad faster...

[maureenreynolds]

Sierra, what is the size of your iPhoto library? That will probably preclude any use of "A" dvd to backup. You would have to do it in sections, depending on how many GB you have divided by 4 (the size of a dvd).

The majority of MY photos are not in albums tho I am trying to be sure they are all tagged (keyworded) with dates - 09, 08 etc and some earlier ones are labeled 22. I figure by the year 2022 I will either be looking at this issue from 'beyond' or something totally new will have arrived on the digital scene. Or will we laugh at the idea of digital??

[Mary Rogers]

we are in the process of backing up everything to DVD as well as our multiple EHD....I am so freaked out about losing photos..

I wish you could back up EHDs to carbonite or somewhere

I completely agree.....I think someone should offer that service!! We don't store much on our actual computer HD so the service wouldn't be much help...also, taking photos in RAW uses up so much space. Our 2009 photo folder is over 200 MB

[LauraBean]

I back up my external and internal hard drives to Backblaze in the cloud and have no complaints.

[sarahorton]

I do what Jodi does. I backup everything to external hard drives and then burn DVDs to send to my husband's office. I also upload some photos to Picasa photo albums. I would be devastated if I lost my photos, so I'm a bit overzealous about it. I figure between home, DH's office and Google's servers, I will at least have *some* photos in a worst-case scenerio.

[sweetpeony]

EHD (2) and dvds, which I store in a fireproof safe.

I crop my los before filing them. It reduces the file size a bit. Control-A -->Image--Crop. That crops out all the stuff you can't see in the workspace, like paper and photos which extend beyond the edge of the canvas.

I back up my external and internal hard drives to Backblaze in the cloud and have no complaints.

Laura, what is "Backblaze in the cloud"?

[maureenreynolds]

Mary Ann ...thanks so much for the crop reminder. I remembered there was a process but didn't recall the how. TY!

I just zipped my folder of psds yesterday before another dvd burn, and I'm seeing it as the same size. No, actually the zip is larger. I thought a compressed/zip file was smaller. If not, what's the point in zipping?

I know I'm going back to my original question or concern now. Most of my folders are larger than 4GB - the dvd size. I'm mentally stumped on how to break some of them down, esp with folders of photos. I can see doing for future ones...monthy or by large subject. But even tho Dick says he is a much more ruthless deleter on vacation photos than I am, we usually have 1500+ per 2 wk trip. The ehd I get, but it's the practical use of dvds that mystefies me.

Online Backup from Backblaze has a great commercial. I gasped at the start! Laura, I've considered this concept with our Mobile Me tho I'll have to check with Dick because I believe he uses most of our space.

[LauraBean]

MaryAnn, Maureen has the link to Backblaze in her post. It's online ("cloud," as in out there in cyberspace storage) for a fixed price per year (or per month, but if you buy a year at a time it's a bit cheaper). It took weeks and weeks for the initial backup to be done--it backs up both my internal and my external hard drives--but now that that's done, it just backs up new and changed files. I've not yet needed the service, but I've tested downloading files and it worked fine.

I use DVDs for completed layouts in PSD format as well as for digi purchases but not for most of my photos.