archiving photo files

[Scott Kathe]

My iMac is slowing down so I'd like to free up space on the hard drive by backing up my image files to two separate external hard drives. Can I use Super Duper to carry out this task? or is there something in OSX Disk Utility that I can use? Currently I have a 250 GB hard drive in my iMac, I have a 500 GB external that I have partitioned into two drives, one has the Super Duper backup and the other has the Time Machine archive. So, in addition to the present 500 GB external I will end up with two more external hard drives but I'd like an easy way to back up my images files so I can get the ones I'm done with off the hard drive so my applications will run faster. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Scott

[dnanian]

The problem is that iPhoto, at least, uses an opaque "bundle" that's hard to manage this way. But what you might want to do is use iPhoto's "Export" option to export the photos you want to archive to their own "archive" volume, then delete them from iPhoto.

Make sure to keep your "archive" separate from your backup—and don't forget to back it up, too!

[Scott Kathe]

Originally Posted by dnanian

The problem is that iPhoto, at least, uses an opaque "bundle" that's hard to manage this way. But what you might want to do is use iPhoto's "Export" option to export the photos you want to archive to their own "archive" volume, then delete them from iPhoto.

Make sure to keep your "archive" separate from your backup—and don't forget to back it up, too!

I have my images stored in a Pictures folder not an iPhoto Library-I'm not a fan of iPhoto.

Scott

[dnanian]

OK, but since you have to select what you want to archive, you'd likely do that with Finder, copy them to the 'archive' volume, etc.

[Scott Kathe]

Dave,

That wouldn't be too difficult to do if I keep up with the backup every time I make a change. I was just wondering if Super Duper could do the initial Picture file backup and then after I have worked on a bunch of files only backup the changes that had been made to the images in the file since the previous backup. If I didn't back up the images after I worked on them and forgot which images I worked on I'd have to backup the entire folder again.

Scott

[dnanian]

We do that, Scott: a Smart Update only backs up the changes. It's the "archive" -- moving things to a location and then deleting the originals -- I'm referring to.