A while back I wrote about remembering to backup, and since that post I have optimized my daily and weekly backup routines.
When importing my images to Lightroom from my memorycard, I always select to backup to a secondary destination (on my server). And I never postpone the weekly Lightroom backup, even though it might take a few extra minutes to start up. I acknowledge that backing up all the modifications I’ve made are actually a good thing. While writing this, I considered changing to daily backups, but weekly is okay for my work since all my pictures (24000+) are in a single catalog and take about 500MB of space for every backup.
I also have an external harddrive, where I do weekly backups using Microsofts SyncToy, and mails are placed on my server running mirrored disks, obtained by IMAP – So in the event that my workstation crashes, no mails nor documents are lost.
I have also been looking for an online backup solution for some time, but here in Denmark I only found one – KeepIt Unlimited and KeepIt Pro, Unlimited for workstations and Pro for servers. With the pro you have to pay per GB of data being backed up.
KeepIt Unlimited costs 468DKK (90$/63€) and if I wanted KeepIt Pro to backup my 250GB in the basement it would cost 3348DKK (642$/450€), so for the total price of 3816DKK (you do the math for USD/EUR) both my workstation and my server would be secure.
However, while reading LIGHTING ESSENTIALS For Photographers by Don Giannatti I saw he refered a product called Carbonite, and I had to try it out. First on my Workstation – It performed great, I could select the folders or files I wanted to backup directly in the Explorer, and it didn’t hog my bandwidth. Then I installed it on my server, just to see if I would get any limitations. But hey presto – No limits.
And best of all, the price. One year is 54.95$ and two years are 99.95$, thats 287/521DKK or 39/70€. So for my setup, 1042DKK/200$/140€ to backup both my server and my workstation for two years. Had I chosen KeepIt and their Pro product for my server it would’ve cost me 7632DKK/1463$/1025€
Now I had a working online backup solution for my server, something I’ve been looking for for a couple of years. And after testing Carbonite for less than 24 hours on my server, I purchased it.
You can test the software for 15 days for free, you don’t even have to register your credit card. And if you decide to purchase it before the 15 days are over, those days will be appended to your registration period.
As an added bonus, I can actually access my files remotely using the Remote Access menu in my browser. Its not recommended to retrive entire directories. But in a tight spot where you need a specific file, you can access it anywhere in the world.
I rate the Carbonite service 10 out of 10! Apparently it works on Macs as well, don’t think it works on Linux.
In case you actually find this product great, and are signing up – Please let me know (in the comments), and I’ll send you a Refer-A-Friend invitation, giving me 3 free months of Carbonite.