Craft Edge

I need some advise. I have taken 60,000 pictures in the last 4 years and I need to know a good way to store them. My computer is down to it's last tidbit of memory. I have put lots of them on dvd disks but I don't know how long those will be good and I don't want to loose any of these precious memories.
Any help would be greatly appreciated as I don't see myself slowing down with the camera anytime soon.
Thanks!

I would highly suggest purchasing an external hard drive. I received one for Christmas, and I can't believe I waited so long! Now I have all of my pictures, TTF's, cut files and all of those other important documents stored safely as back-up. I usually back everything up once a week or so. This way, if my computer crashes again as it did a few months ago, (but luckily I was able to salvage all my pics!) everything will be SAFE!

A lot of the online photo places will also store the digital photos, but you usually have to print from them once a year. I find the quality of the prints varies from place to place. If you have a Costco membership, they are good (and reasonably priced). Also, don't write directly on your cd's with a marker as it can break down the stuff in the cd and ruin it (we learned this from experience).

I second the motion for an external hard drive. They are in many cases cheaper than an internal drive. Best thing about it is when a hurricane or other disaster comes, you can snatch your external drive and run for your life. It would be a bummer to loose that many images.

An external hard drive is an awesome idea, BUT you still need to back up to something ELSE as well.

Trust me. I learned the hard way.

I had all of my pictures on my EHD. And then it died. Just one day it was dead. My computer would no longer recognize it. I've tried everything to get it to work again, but it's dead.

Thankfully I also had all my pictures on cd so I was able to REupload them to my NEW external hard drive. PLUS I have them all stored at Snapfish. But if I didn't have at least one of those options, I would have lost 5 years worth of pictures and I would have been completely devastated.

One thing I learnt when I was doing my family history was to print (before we had a computer ot put it all on) a second copy of everything and give it to family to store away somewhere.
That way if anything happens to your house someone else has a copy - or even store it in your desk at work if you have one.
So do a second copy on a disc or memory stick and give it to someone to put in a drawer or cupboard if they are really valuable to you.
Raewyn

I am a firm believer of not leaving things to technology. If you store them on your comp and it crashes, they're gone. If your EHD crashes, they're gone. If for some reason you rely on an internet company to store them and something happens to THEIR storage, they're gone. I have had a TON of people tell me that they wish they had not left such and such picture on their desktop because they're using a laptop...well, I don't trust my laptops that are running windows.

But I also rely heavily on CD's. I put all of my pictures on the comp, fix them up, burn them to discs, and we have a fireproof, waterproof safe that I keep all my discs in. If you don't want to do all that work, just take your memory card up to walmart and have them put it on a disc--but BE CAREFUL!!

I NEVER wipe my memory card unless I know for sure the files are on the disc. My grandpa takes my grandma's SD memory card up to walmart, prints out hard copies and has a disc made at the same time then just wipes it. I was visiting a couple of months ago looking for something and the disc was blank. Walmart only keeps the pics for 24 hours, IF THAT. There was nothing they could do and I would then have to sit and scan up EVERY picture (and there was like 100) then save them.

I do however keep my fonts, SVG/.Scut files, and documents on an EHD--I know it's probably not the best, but it works for the tiny space I have