I know many, if not most of you are very good about backing up your digital images. If you are not very diligent about it, I've got a story to tell to change your mind.
I had a backup system set up, but I got behind, distracted by other things. It wasn't set up to automatically backup images to my different drives.
I'm sure you can see where this is going. My primary hard drive failed on December 15th, and I had not performed a full photo backup since August 19th. Not good.
The story doesn't end there (and it gets better/worse). I was missing about 10 GB of photos that had not been backed up (mostly of my daughter). I took the hard drive to Fry's because they did "Seagate Certified" hard drive recovery. I dropped it off on the 16th of December.
On the 19th, they called and said they had recovered 60GB of data from the areas I wanted them to retreive (no applications, just data). So, I'm thinking it sounds like we got most of what I wanted back.
I drop off an external hard drive for them to upload it to, but they don't call me back and say they finished uploading them until the 26th. I go in, pick up the ext hdd and go home to plug it in to my computer which I had bought all new internal hard drives for.
I plugged it is, and what I saw was SOMEBODY ELSE'S DATA! Someone elses wedding, someone elses honeymoon, someone elses porn (not that I have any, but they did). About 60 GB of another couple's life.
I take it back, obviously pissed off. They bumble around telling me they don't know what happened and they'll get right on it. They assure me that my data didn't go anywhere, and that for some reason a full recovery wasn't done on my hdd. What the heck?!
So, they started again. A couple days later they call, my wife answers, and the tech tells her they retreived 1.5 GB and it looks like that's about it! Well, my wife tore him a new *beep*. He said he'd work on it some more.
The next day they had 17.5 GB (keep in mind they were going to quit at 1.5). I tell them, again, which folders to concentrat on and they get 13 more GB the next day for about 30. Not all of what they recovered was photographs. I didn't get all the photographs back, but we were lucky to get most of the photos we wanted of Emmie.
Their supervisor told me they wouldn't give me a refund. It was now my turn to tear him a new *beep*. He told me that he had already talked with management and they said they couldn't do it. The manager was at lunch, I said that I'd wait for his return. If he didn't settle it, I'm sure the corporate office wouldn't like the fact they are sending peoples data to the wrong place to get out (I have lots of contacts in the press).
When I returned to talk with the manager they had my refund ($150.00). I was still ticked off, but at least they did the right thing regarding the refund.
Needless to say, I've spent some addtional money and re-vamped my entire system so this never happens again. Multiple hard drives (1.2 TB), DVD backup off sight. Automatic backups when importing from my camera etc.
Yes, I should have been set up that way from the get go. Shame on me. If you read this story, and you don't have a good backup system in place yet, and you don't get it done, shame on you. It's in your best interest. I learned the hard way.
I also don't recommend Fry's for any data recovery.
Posted by Tom Kloster on January 5, 2008 at 6:55 PM
My sympathies, Ryan - I have been through a similar fiasco, and know the feelings of frustration and remorse..! I permanently lost about 400 images, including some that I can still picture in my mind that were among my favorites.
I thought I'd post my backup methodology, and maybe others will to, since this is what is now known in trendy circles as a "learning moment"..!
I have an elaborate file naming system for images that is organized by geography and year, and that's strictly my own desire to be able to find old images. I have about 30,000 archived at this point. I keep all of my images in a "working" directory on my main computer hard drive, and an external drive that I automatically copy every new addition to the main library to, before erasing the camera version. I then have TWO DVD archives - one that I keep in the house, and one that I keep at work. I used to update these about every three months, but was less diligent this year - I just finished creating the two DVD backups for 2007 last night.
It sounds like a lot of redundancy, but in the end, it's relatively cheap and easy to maintain. I think the most important principles in a backup system are (1) backing up on more than one form of media, in my case magnetic and optical versions, and (2) storing your archival backups in more than one location. I've found a good spot in my office at work for the latter, and simply bought a locking CD case for storing them there. I've also got the case cable-locked to my desk by simply running my laptop security cable through the handle on the CD case. I suppose it is a lot of security, but my main consideration is convenience, since that's really what will determine whether you actually make backups - and so far, I have.
My current system evolved from a computer crash, where I had a single hard drive "working" library and CD libraries as backups. The images I lost were the "limbo" images that I had recently added to my hard drive, with the intention of burning CDs almost immediately - but didn't have blanks. In the couple of days between loading those images onto my hard drive (and erasing them from my camera CF card) and picking up CD blanks, my hard drive started to fail, then crashed. I took the computer to a good recovery outfit, but still lost a lot of images, including the new stuff. So that's when I added the external hard drive as a "second temporary" copy.
Posted by Ned Fenimore on January 5, 2008 at 7:22 PM
I've gotten pretty religious about storing my images across 3 hard drives in backup. two of the drives external. Definitely pays! Before I did I lost several images from a trip to the Tetons.. not a big deal at least, they were all garbage anyway..
Posted by Mark Hudon on January 5, 2008 at 8:20 PM
I had our server crash at the Coffee Co. and lost a whole months worth of data. Now, I double back it up every day and burn a disc on Fridays.
I had one photo hard drive go south the day before I was to get a new computer. I recovered all of the Raw files so it wasn't too bad. Now I have auto back up to one hard drive and one RAID set up. When things start to pile up I burn duplicate DVDs and keep one set at work.
One important thing that I do is to keep a "Top Select Raw" file with all my best photos. If worse comes to worse (and as Raw editors get better and I get better at using them) I can rebuild any photo. Again, that file in on three hard drives and two sets of DVDs.
I recently lost an external Lacie harddrive that completely died after less than 2 years of lite use. Tried a data recovery place and they cannot get anything off it. All photo's so far are lost. Going store in at least two drives now.
Discussion
4 repliesI had a backup system set up, but I got behind, distracted by other things. It wasn't set up to automatically backup images to my different drives.
I'm sure you can see where this is going. My primary hard drive failed on December 15th, and I had not performed a full photo backup since August 19th. Not good.
The story doesn't end there (and it gets better/worse). I was missing about 10 GB of photos that had not been backed up (mostly of my daughter). I took the hard drive to Fry's because they did "Seagate Certified" hard drive recovery. I dropped it off on the 16th of December.
On the 19th, they called and said they had recovered 60GB of data from the areas I wanted them to retreive (no applications, just data). So, I'm thinking it sounds like we got most of what I wanted back.
I drop off an external hard drive for them to upload it to, but they don't call me back and say they finished uploading them until the 26th. I go in, pick up the ext hdd and go home to plug it in to my computer which I had bought all new internal hard drives for.
I plugged it is, and what I saw was SOMEBODY ELSE'S DATA! Someone elses wedding, someone elses honeymoon, someone elses porn (not that I have any, but they did). About 60 GB of another couple's life.
I take it back, obviously pissed off. They bumble around telling me they don't know what happened and they'll get right on it. They assure me that my data didn't go anywhere, and that for some reason a full recovery wasn't done on my hdd. What the heck?!
So, they started again. A couple days later they call, my wife answers, and the tech tells her they retreived 1.5 GB and it looks like that's about it! Well, my wife tore him a new *beep*. He said he'd work on it some more.
The next day they had 17.5 GB (keep in mind they were going to quit at 1.5). I tell them, again, which folders to concentrat on and they get 13 more GB the next day for about 30. Not all of what they recovered was photographs. I didn't get all the photographs back, but we were lucky to get most of the photos we wanted of Emmie.
Their supervisor told me they wouldn't give me a refund. It was now my turn to tear him a new *beep*. He told me that he had already talked with management and they said they couldn't do it. The manager was at lunch, I said that I'd wait for his return. If he didn't settle it, I'm sure the corporate office wouldn't like the fact they are sending peoples data to the wrong place to get out (I have lots of contacts in the press).
When I returned to talk with the manager they had my refund ($150.00). I was still ticked off, but at least they did the right thing regarding the refund.
Needless to say, I've spent some addtional money and re-vamped my entire system so this never happens again. Multiple hard drives (1.2 TB), DVD backup off sight. Automatic backups when importing from my camera etc.
Yes, I should have been set up that way from the get go. Shame on me. If you read this story, and you don't have a good backup system in place yet, and you don't get it done, shame on you. It's in your best interest. I learned the hard way.
I also don't recommend Fry's for any data recovery.
I thought I'd post my backup methodology, and maybe others will to, since this is what is now known in trendy circles as a "learning moment"..!
I have an elaborate file naming system for images that is organized by geography and year, and that's strictly my own desire to be able to find old images. I have about 30,000 archived at this point. I keep all of my images in a "working" directory on my main computer hard drive, and an external drive that I automatically copy every new addition to the main library to, before erasing the camera version. I then have TWO DVD archives - one that I keep in the house, and one that I keep at work. I used to update these about every three months, but was less diligent this year - I just finished creating the two DVD backups for 2007 last night.
It sounds like a lot of redundancy, but in the end, it's relatively cheap and easy to maintain. I think the most important principles in a backup system are (1) backing up on more than one form of media, in my case magnetic and optical versions, and (2) storing your archival backups in more than one location. I've found a good spot in my office at work for the latter, and simply bought a locking CD case for storing them there. I've also got the case cable-locked to my desk by simply running my laptop security cable through the handle on the CD case. I suppose it is a lot of security, but my main consideration is convenience, since that's really what will determine whether you actually make backups - and so far, I have.
My current system evolved from a computer crash, where I had a single hard drive "working" library and CD libraries as backups. The images I lost were the "limbo" images that I had recently added to my hard drive, with the intention of burning CDs almost immediately - but didn't have blanks. In the couple of days between loading those images onto my hard drive (and erasing them from my camera CF card) and picking up CD blanks, my hard drive started to fail, then crashed. I took the computer to a good recovery outfit, but still lost a lot of images, including the new stuff. So that's when I added the external hard drive as a "second temporary" copy.
I had one photo hard drive go south the day before I was to get a new computer. I recovered all of the Raw files so it wasn't too bad. Now I have auto back up to one hard drive and one RAID set up. When things start to pile up I burn duplicate DVDs and keep one set at work.
One important thing that I do is to keep a "Top Select Raw" file with all my best photos. If worse comes to worse (and as Raw editors get better and I get better at using them) I can rebuild any photo. Again, that file in on three hard drives and two sets of DVDs.