Great! Weve compiled a list of the questions we get asked most frequently along with answers and links to columns: read our super FAQ to see if your question is covered. There are lots of cloud services you might choose to solve this problem, though I lean toward the paid version to gain a little bit of leverage around getting the data out should one of the services go away in the future. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question. Both iCloud Drive and Dropbox are the most notable and affordable in this category, and both offer great integration into macOS. only. Email yours to mac911@macworld.com including screen captures as appropriate, and whether you want your full name used. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts. Perhaps you like to solve your own problems and would like to buy raw storage using AWS. Back up an external hard drive to iCloud (photos stored on external drive not on Mac) Apple disclaims any and all liability for the acts, 1-800-MY-APPLE, or. What you can do however, if you want a local backup on your hdd is to use your Mac and make a backup through finder (or iTunes on older MacOS versions. So weve got a solution for local backup, and havent yet landed on the right solution for cloud backup. Smart Sync lets you select manually whether files and enclosing folders are stored locally or just in the cloud. The goal here was not to optimize for local storage but to find a place to upload about 175GB of photos and videos that have accumulated over a decade. Refunds. Whats it like to work at a Standing Desk? zinacef, Jan 24, 2018 12:21 PM in response to jonesria, Jan 24, 2018 12:36 PM in response to jonesria, call You are using an out of date browser. Heres the Job To Be Done: determine how to synchronize 10+ years of photos made pre-cloud services so that they update with all of the handy-dandy cloud services without breaking the bank and while maintaining the discoverability we like from cloud services. Jan 24, 2018 12:21 PM in response to jonesria If youre a laptop user, external storage is often a hassle. omissions and conduct of any third parties in connection with or related to your use of the site. Photos used to be easy to manage in the pre-digital era.
If you have a lot of photos (lets call this 10,000+) that you want to load and maintain accessibility using a cloud service of your choice, managing these photos can be challenging.
B2 charges are based on the size of your stored data and downloads: $0.005 (half a cent) per GB per month for storage and $.01 (one cent) per GB downloaded. How to migrate a dead Mac to a new one without erasing the new Mac, How to check your Macs internal temperature and keep it cool, How to switch to single-page view in Microsoft Word and the Preview app. https://support.apple.com/guide/iphone/back-up-iphone-iph3ecf67d29/ios.
Tell me youre a baseball data nerd without telling me youre a baseball data nerd.
An external hard drive is the best and easiest strategy. Apple may provide or recommend responses as a possible solution based on the information Change). More Theres one final thing to consider, which is that iCloud imposes a daily, weekly, and monthly limit on uploading. My photos are taking up too much room on my Mac. Press J to jump to the feed. You could try using Bailiff. Subscribe to the Macworld Digital Magazine. I would now like to use iCloud to back up the external hard drive just in case anything goes wrong with the drive. Now, use the File > Consolidateoption to add the photos to iCloud. Virtualize your storage by seeing all your files and folder in the Finder, but letting them stay entirely offline and in the cloud except as you need them. There's an old backup I'd like to transfer over, the only problem being that it is stored in my iCloud backups and I seemingly can't move it over. You can force Monterey to download all of the files by disabling optimise Mac storage, but they can only be stored on the main Macintosh HD. (With a Family Plan, you can choose to share 200GB and 2TB storage plans among all family members.). These options lack Finder integration: you have to use third-party software to upload and download files as you need them. If you havent thought about it, heres a handy table from that article: Most of us are looking at the 10Mbps link speed and somewhere between 100GB and 1000GB to upload. Looks like no ones replied in a while. Next, select photo > settings > iCloud > optimize mac storage or set to download originals if youd like to make a backup at the same time. Local back up also doesnt protect against loss from theft or fire and fails to solve the basic problem of how can I use these images more effectively instead of looking at them in a file tree once every 6 months?. Any clue if there's a way to make it not overwrite the old backup? Storage is almost free, its trivial to store tens of thousands of photos so that you can print them on demand, and relatively easy to store if you have an access device like a phone or a computer. r/iCloud is a 100% community-driven subreddit. I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Q: Sales and I've accessed it through System PreferencesApple IDiCloudManage, but from there the only thing that I can do with the backups is delete them. The best combination for this is Panic Transmit ($45) and Backblaze B2.
I don;t even know if all the files on my iCloud Drive would even fit on my iMacs SSD drive. iCloud storage in the U.S. costs $2.99 a month for 200GB of storage and $9.99 a month for 2TB of storage. This Mac 911 article is in response to a question submitted by Macworld reader Doug. This approach does require a healthy broadband connection. Neither iCloud nor Dropbox lets you add storage above their maximums for individual plans, and you cant install two separate user accounts on a single macOS account. If you pick iCloud like I did there is some work you need to do first to ensure that you dont fill up your hard drive. You are on your way to seeing all of your photos and videos more often. (Though this is a perfectly fine answer). Can you trust what you read on the Internet? provided; every potential issue may involve several factors not detailed in the conversations Storing 2TB costs $10 a month, for instance. Dropbox charges $11.99 a month or $119.88 a year for 2TB of storage and $19.99 a month or $198.96 a year for 3TB. It's just that it's an old backup that I don't want to overwrite, but I need to turn iCloud Backups back on on the phone I'm using. For iCloud, in the iCloud preference pane (Mojave and earlier) or the Apple ID preference panes iCloud section (Catalina or later), enable iCloud Drive if it isnt already and click Options. However, non-B2 options require more study and management to pick a storage flavor and manage costs. It is extremely handy for sharing large files and less easy to find that photo you were looking for (the Carousel photo app notwithstanding). Change), You are commenting using your Facebook account. Here they are, in order of solves everything to solves a point solution like photos: Backing up the whole computer to a shared location in some cloud somewhere seems like a great option if you have an unlimited symmetrical internet connection. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question. Does anyone know of any way to move them over to an external hard drive? Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in: You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Thank you for posting on r/iCloud. In response to jonesria. As a backup (not the only backup), I think this solution actually works quite well. Dropbox offers two distinct options for managing local file storage. There are other storage options supported by Transmit and other file-transfer software like Cyberduck, including Amazon S3 and Google Cloud, which have deep storage options that are much cheaper for long-term storage but charge higher prices for retrieval and may have a delay between requesting a retrieval and files downloading. any proposed solutions on the community forums. Copyright 2022 IDG Communications, Inc. A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. In response to jonesria, Question: So, Apple has trapped me again into making a choice based on the discoverability of files and lock-in to the ecosystem I use most. (LogOut/ Scrolling through a photo album looks much different than it used to, but also opens up many more opportunities for creativity and organization than ever. Hes a senior contributor to Macworld, where he writes Mac 911. Change), You are commenting using your Twitter account. So which one should you choose? This is a fun idea, but its not cheap either. It is also optimized for the Android ecosystem it works for iOS, but doesnt show up natively within Apple Products unless you are super clever about how you set things up. This doesn't affect our editorial independence. jonesria, Back up an external hard drive to iCloud (photos stored on external drive not on Mac), User profile for user: If iCloud and Dropbox combined arent enough (say, you need 4TB), you could use both together.
No way, sorry. If you are asking a question, please remember to change your post flair to Answered once your question has been answered.
When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. It was expensive to print, time-consuming, and difficult to store. Then go to System Preferences/iCloud, sign in, and check Photos syncing. Backblaze is known as a secure internet-hosted backup service, but it also offers the easiest-to-configure on-demand cloud storage, too. The free one (Google Photos), the paid one (Dropbox), or the more expensive and integrated one (Apple iCloud)? You can load material into iCloud Drive from other Macs, from iOS and iPadOS, and icloud.com. For people with a fiber connection, this one would work great. Youre not quite done. Eric Root, User profile for user: You must log in or register to reply here. Thank you for the info! It may not display this or other websites correctly. Or if you were more picky you decided to print only the good ones. Check the Optimize Mac Storage box, and macOS automatically manages when files are offloaded. Optimizing storage in iCloud Drive lets macOS put in placeholders for items when storage grows tight. Whats a Community Managers Secret Weapon?
Dropbox offers plenty of storage (1TB for $99/year) but is more of a file synching service than a photo synching service. Customer Experience is Not Rocket Surgery. Youll need to have enough iCloud storage to store your originals (but you knew that anyway). A number of pure cloud storage systems let you upload megabytes to terabytes and retain them there for less-interactive access at relatively low cost. We give you the scoop on what's new, what's best and how to make the most out of the products you love. But I realized the OSX is optimizing space and many files on my iCloud Drive are not getting backed up. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. If the photos are in the Photos application and you moved the Library to the external drive, open Photos with the option/alt key held down and select the Library on the external as the system Library. There are other, cheaper solutions available from Western Digital but frankly Id be worried about uploading to someone elses cloud not named Apple, Amazon, or Google. Macworld is your best source for all things Apple. You might have to turn off optimized storage for it to work properly though. #9 Its Your Job To Make Yourself Better. We are not officially endorsed by nor affiliated with Apple. You bought some film, took some shots that you hoped would turn out well, and then printed all of the pictures. Im also viewing this from an Apple-biased point of view, so a spoiler here is that the recommendation will not end with the option to use Google Photos and Just Forget About it. I have therefore bought an external hard drive and moved the photos from the Mac to the external hard drive. The primary benefit of being able to put a 2TB drive in your pocket is that you can easily move a large number of files between computers even when you have a relatively fast wireless internet. All postings and use of the content on this site are subject to the. Then go to Photos/Preferences/iCloud and set up syncing. Theres one more thing youll need to do create a smart folder of referenced photos before you can add these external photos to iCloud. Not every question will be answered, we dont reply to email, and we cannot provide direct troubleshooting advice. Jan 24, 2018 12:36 PM in response to jonesria It's amazing to see proof that even if sci-fi creators had a grand vision, they were only looking at a small portion of the known universe. You can post any questions you have, tips, or general discussions about the iCloud service. You cannot move that particular backup anywhere. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding. I have a 1TB Fusion Drive on my iMac and both 4TB and 8TB external drives for cloning the startup volume and for holding media and archives. More practical services like Carbonite or Crashplan will still take days to run a full backup. Next, enable this new Photo Library to use iCloud. So whats a way that you could back up everything yet still keep a copy locally? Once you start talking about hundreds of gigabytes or more of data this might take days (or almost a week) to complete unless you want to take the radical step of using an Amazon Snowballand putting your data in deep storage. If not, were always looking for new problems to solve! 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OS X Yosemite (10.10.5). Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns. This is the least bad option (given that Im using it today) but it doesnt protect against the inevitable hard drive failure that will happen at some point. Currently I have a bunch of files on my iCloud Drive; I have a time machine copy of my iMac on a time capsule and HD attached to the computer. Maybe there is a simple, practical solution a local USB drive is fast, easy, and cheap (I have a 2TB Western Digital Passport, and thats good for the Sneakernet at my place). Its on iCloud. That can lead you to opt for relatively little SSD storage when upgrading to a new Mac, especially compared to hard disk drives you might have installed or accessible with your previous Mac. The easiest and most affordable cloud storage methods follow. If you were going to set up a home NAS you might investigate a Synology NAS (2 or 4 or 8 bay) which will set you back a minimum of $600-800 including the right number of hard drives for the storage you need. Can you please tell me how I should go about doing this? captured in an electronic forum and Apple can therefore provide no guarantee as to the efficacy of In his spare time, he writes about printing and type history. JavaScript is disabled.
Glenn Fleishmans most recent books include Take Control of Untangling Connections, Take Control of Your M-Series Mac, and Take Control of Securing Your Mac. For those of us with a typical cable modem connection for internet, have you thought about how long it takes to upload data? Being geeky as I am, I love the idea of purchasing new hardware to back up files on the computer seamlessly to a local storage server on the network and then seamlessly upload the files as needed to a cloud service that maximized the savings. This site contains user submitted content, comments and opinions and is for informational purposes Less, User profile for user: MacBook Air (11-inch Mid 2013), For this solution Im optimizing for ease of use and a turnkey system. If you dont want to create an ever-growing photo library. Im choosing to optimize in this example for a consumer or pro-sumer set up where the main goal is viewing the image or movie on lots of different devices. EDIT: actually, if you want that particular iCloud backup on an external drive you could restore the backup to an iPhone and then create a backup through your Mac on the external drive. There are a few obvious options when considering a backup procedure for your photos (or for your whole computer). But for large-scale storage of not-very-frequently accessed data you want to have online and backed up automatically by the storage hosts, its a great option. When this is done select the Import New Items option to add these to your Photos Library. It allows you to chose which files from iCloud get stored locally and which stay in the cloud. (LogOut/ have you thought about how long it takes to upload data, Make a new System Photo Library on an External Hard Drive, create a smart folder of referenced photos, iCloud imposes a daily, weekly, and monthly limit on uploading, Look up a list of items and return matches in Google Sheets, A Practical Guide to Uploading An External Hard Drive of Photos to iCloud, Make a Boolean Expression From A List of Rows in Google Sheets, back up the whole computer to a shared location (Carbonite, Crashplan, or similar), create a local backup NAS using RAID and AWS, continue with lame local back up to a single hard drive, upload photos to a cloud service like Google Photos or iCloud. Instead, you might want to lean on the cloud. If you migrate to a small drive, you may need to combine cloud methods to make it all work. Use the Import option in Photos (file > import) to import the photos youd like to add to your iCloud library. Smart Sync Auto-Evict, when enabled, deletes files from your Mac as necessary to preserve free storage space, while keeping the representation of the file in the Finder and storing the data at Dropboxs servers. However, you might prefer to not have to maintain external storage and deal with maintaining local or internet-hosted backups. Open Photos while holding down the option key this will give you the option to create a new System Photo Library in the place of your choosing. If a file isnt stored on your Mac, you can simply double-click or otherwise try to access its representation in your filesystem, and its downloaded from the cloud. (LogOut/ Google Photos gives you instant upload and permanent storage, and a decent photo editing and management service. When you get a chance to go back to a great team, jump at the opportunity! iCloud wouldn't work as an external backup as it's a synchronization system.