My Computer Workflow and Backup System

Why I think Backblaze is the best cloud backup solution for digital photography files: Because photographers are often producing hundreds of large image files every week, they need an online backup service that provides them with inexpensive, unlimited backup storage. Most competing cloud services claim they provide “unlimited” backup, but this isn’t always true. Compare Backblaze with the competition.

Boards under the MacBook & display pedestal
are to lift it to the proper viewing height.

My Computer Setup: I'm currently using a 13" Apple MacBook Pro. Instead of a spinning internal hard drive, I've opted for a 500GB flash drive. Since it has no moving parts, it’s extremely fast, but it fills up quickly. I only keep my software applications and my most current image files on this drive. On the road, I connect to the compact 2TB Seagate external USB 3.0 drive you see to the left of the MacBook. This serves as my away-from-the-office backup. In the office, the computer is connected to the 27" Thunderbolt display, a keyboard/mouse, the Drobo to the left of the display, and the ioSafe to the right. Let me explain the purpose of these two backup drives...

Drobo 4-bay array

Your 1st line of protection: In my opinion, it’s a good idea to have your own in house data backup system. All my image files are archived on my external, Drobo 4-bay storage array. The Drobo technology is very reliable. It is my first line of data protection. Although I’ve had many hard drives fail, I’ve never lost any data on the Drobo since I purchased it eight years ago. This is a "self-healing" system that goes beyond the typical RAID array. Drobo has several disc array size solutions, starting at under $300 (hard drives not included).

ioSafe Solo G3
Fire & waterproof

Your 2nd line of protection should be a backup that is off-premise. This is to protect your digital data against physical file damage (such as fire and water) and theft (of your computer or external hard drive). Cloud storage, like the Backblaze Online Backup, is a perfect offline solution. Yes, you can backup to another external hard drive, and rotate these to an offsite location, but it is inconvenient, and not routinely executed by those that try it. Until recently, my only second line of data protection has been my ioSafe Solo G3 (which I still continue to use, even though I also have the Backblaze cloud backup). Using the ioSafe is similar to an offsite solution because it is fireproof and waterproof; and you can anchor (bolt it) to your desk, so it’s less apt to “walk” away. The 2TB ioSafe Solo G3 is under $300, and the 4TB ioSafe Solo G3 is only $100 more.

Inevitable Digital Data Loss: There are really only two kinds of computer users: those that have lost their data, and those that are going to lose their data! It’s amazing that with virtually 100% of the world’s photos and movies now digital, fewer than 10% of people are backing up their computers; and eventually all of these digital items will vaporize. The median hard drive life is about six years (one-half are expected to die during this period). Data can be sometimes be recovered from a failed drive, but recovery can cost as much as $3,000. Systematic backups are a much better solution.

Recovering Cloud Data from many online backup services can be a long process, if you lose a hard drive. Downloading several hundred gigabytes (or several terabytes) of data can take several days or even weeks. Luckily, Backblaze has faster recovery solutions that other services don’t offer:

• Web Browser — For free. You select the files/folders you want to restore using your web browser to download the files. This is good for small amounts of data, typically 1GB or less as the web browser itself is prone to timeouts and errors.
• Backblaze Downloader — For free. You select the files/folders you want to restore using your web browser and then download and use the Backblaze Downloader to stream and checkpoint the data download. This is similar to apps like iTunes and Netflix in how data is downloaded. Be aware that larger amounts of data will consume lots of network bandwidth and will take time.
• USB Flash Drive — For $99, you select up to 110 GB of files/folders you want to restore and get your files on 128 GB USB flash drive. Backblaze will send it to you next day express (within the US) so you get your data fast and you get to keep the drive.
• USB External Hard Drive — For $189, you select up to 3,500,000 MB of files/folders you want to restore and get your files on an external USB hard drive large enough to hold your data, up to a 4 TB drive. Once prepared, Backblaze will send it to you next day express, and you get to keep the drive. There’s no extra charge for the next day shipping and if next day shipping is not available, Backblaze will use the fastest means available to them via FedEx. NOTE: If you have more data than that, you will need to order additional USB Hard Drive restores. Each drive you order is $189. If you have multiple computers that you need to restore from, you will need to order one drive for each separate restore.

How Backblaze works: I’ve used Carbonite for several years, but I find Backblaze to be uniquely better is these ways:

• Truly unlimited cloud backup - unlimited data, unlimited file size, unlimited file types, unlimited number of external drives, and unlimited bandwidth — all for $5 per month.
• Backs up all your data. Unlike other services, there is no need to pick folders and files. Backblaze is the only cloud backup solution that backs up all your photos, movies, music and documents automatically.
• Your Data is Safe. All your files are encrypted before being transmitted. You can use a personal encryption key for additional security.  Backblaze’s native code does not use Java (Java is responsible for 91% of security attacks).
• Fast and seamless backups. Backblaze works in the background, and typically uses less than 1% of your computer’s processing power.
• Inexpensive. Only $5 a month, or $50 a year.
• 15-day free trial - without having to give out your credit card information!

Inside Backblaze's data center and their custom built data storage "pods"

Geeky stuff: If you like understanding how things work, you'll enjoy reading how the employees at Backblaze designed their own data storage ''pods'' — with a complete list of parts, just in case you'd like to build your own 135-TB storage pod for a mere $7,384! That was actually pod version 2.0, and three years ago. They are now putting pod version 4.0 (each holds 180-TB) into their data center which is now storing 100 petabytes of customer data — that's 100,000 terabytes, or 1/4th as much data as Facebook stores today for its 1+ billion users.

This year, Backblaze beat out Facebook as one of the fastest growing technology companies.

Fast Growth. Although it took Backblaze 2.5 years to get from 0 to 10 petabytes, it only took the past 3.5 years to get from 10 petabytes to 100 petabytes. From 2009 through 2013 they've grown revenue 917%. That was good enough for 128th place in the 2014 Deloitte Technology Fast 500™ in the United States — just beating out Facebook in the 129th spot.

Employee Perks. Backblaze is one of a very few companies that offers unlimited vacation time for their employees. At Backblaze, all of their employees know what they need to do. They prioritize their work, keep others informed of what’s going on and get their jobs done. When they need to take a morning off to run an errand or pick up a sick child at school or just to sleep in, they do it. There’s no need to negotiate with a boss as to whether you were on vacation, taking comp time or sick time or whatever.

As an employer, Backblaze does not have to keep track of vacation time or sick time. Their sick policy is simple, if you’re sick, stay home. They do not have to keep track of things such as “Billy taking 2.75 hours of sick time on Thursday.” Nor do they have to worry about how many hours of vacation "Zach" has accrued.

To date, no one has abused Backblaze’s vacation policy or lack of one. If anything, they have had to occasionally remind people to take a few days off. Employees watch out for each other since they are all dependent on each other for Backblaze to succeed. Besides, they all want to work with well-rested, happy people, not grumps who haven’t taken a day off in years.