We’re photographers, with great creativity and great gear. Feeling invincible in what we do. Having everything under control. We think. Until it happens. Yesterday evening it happened to me. My 2011 Macbook Pro quit on me. Starts to boot, shows funny graphics on the screen, goes black, starts to boot again…and again…and again.
Panic starts to come up. What happens if I don’t get it back up running? Do I have proper backups? Sure I do backups. I always back up my raws to an external hard drive. Only occasionally, when I download my camera and I don’t have my external drive at hand I copy my raw backups to a folder called “Raws” on my Macbook HD. To transfer them later to the external drive. I know I have taken the shortcut on a few occasions lately. Darn….
Sure I use Time Machine to backup my Macbook to an Apple Airport Time Capsule. Only it gave me error messages the last couple of weeks that it is full. I had already made a mental note to check the Time Capsule and get the backup done, only didn’t get to do it yet. Darn…
I keep all my past images on an external double raid disk, perfectly safe. I have a copy on another drive that I keep in my office desk. In case the house burns down. Only the current years images I always keep on my MacBooks Hard Drive, because I work on them. Besides the Time Machine backups (that should work in theory unless it gives error messages) I do copy my images and my Lightroom catalogue occasionally to yet another external flash drive. Only we talk of about 200 GB of data, that takes a while so I don’t do it too often. I know I have done it prior to our summer vacation, which means I potentially miss 2 months images including our summer vacation (at least I have those raws on the external drive) if I don’t get my MacBook back on line and the Time Machine backup is incomplete. Darn….
What the true loss of data is I can only check once I get my either the MacBook repaired or a replacement machine. Until then I will sleep bad. In theory I have a great foolproof multiple backup strategy. In reality it might have failed me. Because machines will fail you once in a while. It is not the question if…but only when. So I give you a good advice!
BACKUP!!! YOUR!!! DATA!!!!
===========Update=================
Seems I’ve got really lucky ! It turned out the Graphic Chip on my MacBook died. As it doesn’t make sense to change the motherboard on a 5 1/2 year old machine I bit the bullet and picked up a new MacBook Pro (its a beauty with the Retina Display and a SSD). I started the old Macbook in Harddisk-Mode (one of the Apple technicians gave me this tip, simply press “t” while turning it on), connected the two Macbooks with a Thunderbolt cable and the old MacBook showed up as external Harddisk on my new MacBook. Then it was a matter of minutes to copy the files from the old to the new machine. Voilà, problem solved (minus the cash out for the new MacBook). But I really got lucky this time. From now on I make sure I have constant backups. One scare is enough!
I don’t take a lot of photos but I do back all of my photos on Amazon’s unlimited photo service which comes free with their prime thing. The rest I just cram into Dropbox. I don’t trust doing offline backups for some reason. I always lose my thumb drives.
You did get lucky and I’m glad you did. I’m guilty myself of not backing up often enough and at times we take our gadgets for granted without having thinking that something could go wrong. Thank you for the reminder and enjoy the rest of your Sunday. It s off to work for me.
Thanks! Escaped the Frankonian rain and drove down to Piemont in Northwestern Italy. The nature here in Autumn is spectacular as is the food. And best, there is sunshine 😎. Will do a post with some photos next week. Have a great Sunday noneless!
Awe, I have a soft spot for Italy and can’t wait to see your post and pictures. Waiting patiently. Enjoy your time there ❤️😉
Thank you so much for the reminder 🙂 🙂
Another Tip: Shoot analogue 😉
🙂 That’s a good one! I just need to make sure not to open the camera before I’ve fully retracted the film….
Did it. Still do backup on DVD. Just because its the safest way. I don’t trust hard drives anymore.
Good luck!
Good! But just be aware DVD’s are also not forever….
Nothin is forever 😉
Yikes! Hope you get the problem fixed and your photos are safe. My 2010 MacBook just went funny yesterday, too (is this an epidemic??) and when I rebooted it and it worked, I quickly did that backup I’d been putting off for way too long…
Good you had a chance to do a backup. But I got lucky too. Turned out the Graphic Chip on my MacBook died. As it doesn’t make sense to change the motherboard on a 5 1/2 year old machine I bit the bullet and picked up a new MacBook Pro (its a beauty with the Retina Dispaly and a SSD). I started the old Macbook in Harddisk-Mode (one of the Apple technicians gave me this tip, simply press “t” while turning it on), connected the two Macbooks with a Thunderbolt cable and the old MacBook showed up as external Harddisk on my new MacBook. Then it was a matter of minutes to copy the files from the old to the new machine. Voilà, problem solved (minus the cash out for the new MacBook). But I really got lucky this time. From now on I make sure I have constant backups. One scare is enough!
I’m thinking of buying a new one, too. SSD, obviously, since I like to move my laptop around. But someone said the ones they sell in Finland don’t have the latest Intel processor… Do you happen to know anything about it (you’re not in Finland, I know, but in general…) ? Anyway, I’ll keep in mind that tip! Have a fun Saturday with your new computer!!! I can imagine it must be a beauty!!!! 🙂
Its true, the current generation of MacBook Pro’s (Mid 2015) don’t have the latest processor generation, but generally so, I don’t think this is a country-issue. The latest regular MacBooks have a new processor (plus new keyboard…), but what I don’t like they have only one single connecting port (USB-C) and you have to have adapters for everything else. The new MacBook Pro hasn’t been announced. I went for the current version MacBook Pro because I like its Power (it is significantly faster than the regular MacBook), I like the 15” size and all the connectors (2 Thunderbolt, 2 USB 3.0, HDMI, Headphone jack and very important and SD-Card reader). And it is supposed to have 9h battery life as well (my old one had 2 hours). I’m setting it up right now and love it! You have a great weekend as well!
Sorry this happened to you despite all your backup procedures. Accordingly I have not ‘liked’ this post. Good luck with the recovery.
Thanks😉
The same problem for me yesterday. Totally frustrating.
Good luck with your recovery! I guess we’re Partners in pain 😟
danke für die erinnerung… gleich mal wieder machen. und viel glück!
Danke 🙂
Gerne, man kann immer noch als schlechtes Beispiel dienen…..