anyone else using a private cloud for long term photo storage?

[ampguy]

I've looked at Smugmug Vault, Amazon S3 direct, and other offerings, and with the sizes (and adding in the transfer in/out bw costs, etc.) I need (unlimited, but initially ~1TB), I am calculating that I am better off going with my own private cloud.

My requirements are stringent though, data must be located in multiple sites, preferably different states.

BW options must be multiple, not a single carrier.

What I don't need is rendering, in fact by default, the files will all be private and not indexed by search engines, etc.

Just storage, RAID 5 or 6, high availability server front end or a private volume on a high end NAS.

Curious if anyone else is doing this now and can share best practices for photo archival using a private computing cloud method. (e.g. Service Providers own the hardware and capex, I get a bill monthly).

 

[sevo]

I'd love to, but the low upload speeds on household data lines prevent it - every DSL line I can get here (below dedicated business grade symmetric lines at 600€ a month) is too slow to upload my archive in finite time.

 

[tlitody]

why not just run your own server from home? You get as much space as you want and all you need to do is backup and store data offsite (bank?) from time to time. Providing you are not in a major flood area then everything should be safe.

A home server is a doddle to set up and there s plenty of "image/asset management" software around to manage it all.

 

[eddie1960]

I agree with Tlitody
I have the drives i work from and separate back up drives i run every month or so depending on how busy I've been. large drives cost nothing now I just bough a couple of 2 TB drives for a total of $300 canadian taxes in. about the same price i paid for the older 250gb now relegated to being my work computer music server

 

[scottwallick]

A DIY solution (private indeed)

A DIY solution (private indeed)

I'll share what I have set up for myself.

At home in New York, I have a Synology DS209 running a 2 TB RAID 1. Each of our computers has the Synology Data Replicator software running, so backups are daily and automated. It emails when backups are complete.

At my brother's place in Texas, I have a Synology DS110j running a 2 TB RAID 0 as a remote backup (rsync) server. My DS209 in New York connects to the DS110 in Texas every night and mirrors its contents without deleting files.

So, the DS209 in New York serves as backup to our PCs, and its RAID 1 provides one level of redundancy. The off-site DS110 in Texas is the real backup (since "RAID isn't backup").

Both my Synology NAS devices are accessible over the Web, so my files are always available in one of two places. Both are connected to uninterruptible power supplies. I haven't had more than a few minutes of collective downtime since setting everything up last Christmas. Not bad for a DIY setup, my own personal 'cloud'.

 

[JayGannon]

I've looked at Smugmug Vault, Amazon S3 direct, and other offerings, and with the sizes (and adding in the transfer in/out bw costs, etc.) I need (unlimited, but initially ~1TB), I am calculating that I am better off going with my own private cloud.

My requirements are stringent though, data must be located in multiple sites, preferably different states.

BW options must be multiple, not a single carrier.

What I don't need is rendering, in fact by default, the files will all be private and not indexed by search engines, etc.

Just storage, RAID 5 or 6, high availability server front end or a private volume on a high end NAS.

Curious if anyone else is doing this now and can share best practices for photo archival using a private computing cloud method. (e.g. Service Providers own the hardware and capex, I get a bill monthly).

There are a number of options but there going to be very very expensive due to the mutihomed requirement. Would somewhere with a multihomed backup be suffient or do you need the 100% uptime if a singe DC goes down.

I think the best value for money would be to contact http://www.theplanet.com/
and have them quote you for a custom setup, they amazingly flexible and if they cant help you they will pass you onto someone who can, but I reckon they will have had similar requests before.

 

[sevo]

The advantage of cloud-based storage is that it is out of house, and indeed entirely de-central. The most common types of damage (software problem and hardware failure) can be avoided by careful backups - but fire, thieves and water damage will usually destroy or take the computer as well as the in-house backup server...

 

[ampguy]

yeah

yeah

There's a lot of good info. here, but I'm talking about storage outside of the house, and not in a single physical location or rsync'd over dsl/cable modem to a friend or relatives home-brew NAS.

I love homebrew stuff, and have used Synergy and Qnap NAS stuff (check out reviews and updates at http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/), but for this topic I was wondering what was available storage wise, and bandwidth wise for large archival purposes on a monthly fee based storage that I can assure and give assurance that appropriate compliances are met, if needed.

For example, I have photos of surgery in action, close-ups of patient data. (Call me Dr. Ampguy 😉) that I don't really want on Amazon's S3 service., etc.

The advantage of cloud-based storage is that it is out of house, and indeed entirely de-central. The most common types of damage (software problem and hardware failure) can be avoided by careful backups - but fire, thieves and water damage will usually destroy or take the computer as well as the in-house backup server...