When thinking about disk space, the old IT insider joke always comes to mind, where a user asks the sysad for more space, and the answer is “Well, why not move to Texas?”.
I still chuckle on this one. It is from the first chapter of the bastard operator from hell series, which we found enormously funny back in University.
Now, I am looking with a frown at my disk space, and have decided to give it a more in-depth look. Having switched from the Nikon D70 with it’s 5 MByte mandatory compressed RAWs to the D300 which happily requires 15 MBytes per RAW, I want to plan ahead:
The chart shows the disk space for each of the four cameras that are or have been in use by me in the last near-five years: The little Canon ixus 40, the workhorse Nikon D70, the backup and lightweight D40, and the new D300. I almost exclusively shoot RAW, and convert JPGs to disk on the computer for my archive managed by Photoshop Elements 5. The RAWs stay on disk as well as the JPGs.
Quick summary: While I added about 36 GBytes in 2005 and 2006, in 2007 and 2008 it was already 60 to 80 GBytes. And it will grow faster with the D300. Free disk space as of today on my main photo drive: 124 GBytes. On the hot mirror drive: 60 GBytes, but only if I remove the backup copy of my MP3s.
Prediction: In 6 months, the hot mirror at the very least will be full and be in need to be replaced by a larger drive (it’s a 400 GB drive now, while the main drive is a 750 GB drive).
The external (shelf-) backup drive is already full, and I have no place to backup the MP3s. I have an unused Hitachi Deskstar 250 GByte SATA drive on my desk, but no external housing for it. That could take the MP3s and other data. Or I’ll just buy a new large external drive, and reuse the existing 250 GBytes external backup for the music files.
Still need a new external backup drive, and some more hard disks in this year. Or maybe finally a NAS?
LikeTags: backups, disk space, Quote
