I have a question about data storage. I use a significant amount of space for images on my desktop. and coming from an IT background, I have a server in my office with 11TB of space, however, each inspection is generating close to 8Gb of images. I get I could dial back the resolutions some. That isn’t the point of this post.
The point is, How long do you hold onto electronic data and where do you store it?
I keep everything on my server, and use Dropbox to transport between phone, tablet and PC.
Does anyone have any insight to which service is best for holding onto data without the need for a massive External drive device?
Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive, Amazon S3 or some other service I unaware of…
that is alot of memory for photos!! I just backed up about 800 inspections that were on my desktop, I average about 200-300 photos per inspection. and it was only180 GB. You would have been at 6400 GB for that many inspections?? That is crazy.
So I just backed it all onto a 256 GB flash drive. I am amazed how much memory can go into such a little device!
It is crazy… When I got into IT, a 2Gb Flash drive was an amazing amount of space…
Each photo my S21Ultra grabs is about 17Mb, 200 images comes out to 3,416Mb (or 3.3Gb) and my dropbox can fit 8Gb… making backing it up and cleaning it a daily chore…
wow. I dont know what your resolution is set at, but my pictures come out plenty clear on my reports. (I use spectora, and I think it automatically adjusts the resolution when I take photos through the app), but I am not sure what that resolution is set at.
When I get home, I just use Samsung Dex, to copy the file from my phone to my desktop. Takes about 30 seconds. Then I can drag photos from the file if I need to for the report.
When my inspection folder starts getting big, I just transfer to my flash drive.
Storage: Cloud. 1 terabit. Transfer important information to cloud.
8 terabits in SSD’s and HHD’s. Transfer important information to cloud.
Not very good at filing storage.
Carson Dunlop keep my reports for 7 years.
My HHD’s in my PC’s are only for image backup. Disconnect a hard drive and add another one once full. Keep HHD’s dated in a drawer. Typically 2 to 4 terabits. Damn I remember when 500 gigs was a large storage drive. Lol.
Last inspection - folder, inspection pictures in raw and compressed (reduced resolution) form, report and all correspondence - 108mb.
Maryland law requires keeping the report and all notes for 5 years.
Your pictures are probably takin up all the space. I use a free bulk photo tool (Faststone photo resizer). Camera resolution is 6 MP. Get an older camera with low resolution or change it in settings. You don’t need print quality pictures for a report that will be seen on a computer,
agreed, But 8Gb free dropbox is just to small, and running my server is about $40/month in power… Figure I could run a cloud service subscription for cheaper overall…
Forget the cloud nonsense. As you well know it’s just a server in somebody’s basement (Hillary). You can buy hard drives or SSHD and store locally it’s much safer (even Google loses data). You must get your picture size down though, it’s eating up your storage!
Change your phone camera settings, you really don’t need images that big for the report. One of the guys I work with has an S20 Ultra and the images actually look better after dropping the max resolution from 64 (pretty sure that was the default) to 12. Then let it compress the jpegs from there.
Just to add a bit of suspense to this thread, my local jurisdiction (the province of Québec in the Great White North, Canada) has legislated residential home inspection and is now considering keeping ANY AND ALL data - including photos FOREVER (i.e. NO statute or limitations), AS WELL as holding the inspector FOREVER LIABLE (NO LIMITS) for an inspection!
This is, of course, totally ridiculous, abusive and downright unacceptable!
We have made our position very clear to the Government and will see if they accept it!
Totally concur. Totally ridiculous.
Depends on what government is in power. Liberals would be better positioned. get in front of some older QLP ministers.
Look at bill 141.
WHY are you guys NOT resizing your photos after you create your reports? There is ZERO reason to save all your photos in full HiRes for an eternity. It is likely you will never look at them again.
I take on average 250-450 pics in HiRes for about 10Gb total. The photos get downsized when batching to the report, about 50-100 pics, with the entire Report w/pics ending up at about 2.5Mb.
After the report is completed, I resize the raw original Photo File down to about 500Mb. (Still large if needed for review down the road without being outrageous). The raw Video File stays about 400Mb (no attempt at downsizing), making my entire inspection folder with all documents, report copy, photos, videos, etc… for archiving at just under 1.0Gb average.
I use 1TB about every two years with resized photos. That is all I want to spend. Also, I send my reports .pdf vs html and this keeps the file size low for my clients and under my email client max of 25MB.